A Tree’s Perspective: Enhancing Nature Connectedness Through Transitional and Multisensory Virtual Reality ExperiencesEmbodying natural entities in Virtual Reality (VR) shows potential to enhance nature connectedness, but design factors that support such embodiment remain underexplored. This study examined whether transitional elements in the physical setting before and after VR and multisensory stimuli during VR can strengthen nature connectedness in a transformative tree-embodiment experience. Through a mixed-methods approach (N=20), where we varied the pre- and post-VR experience (Neutral vs. Transitional) and sensory modalities (Audiovisual vs. Multisensory), we found that both transitional and multisensory experiences significantly enhanced presence, embodiment, and nature connectedness, with increases in emotional connectedness sustained one week later. Drawing on interview insights and impact ratings of specific design features, we derive design recommendations for integrating transitional and multisensory elements. Our findings demonstrate the value of holistic design for enhancing the emotional and transformative potential of VR nature embodiment for fostering environmental awareness.2026LTJulian Rasch et al.TU Dortmund UniversityImmersion & Presence ResearchMultisensory Fusion ExperienceHuman-Nature Relationships (More-than-Human Design)CHI
Diffusing Social Boundaries through Virtual Bodies: How Mixed Reality Embodied Experiences Can Foster Social Connection.Virtual and Mixed Reality (XR) offer new opportunities for supporting social connection by reshaping embodied interaction and transforming social norms. We present Body RemiXer, an asymmetric XR installation designed to foster connection by inviting interpersonal touch, abstracting identity through ethereal avatars, encouraging synchronized interaction, and enabling impossible forms of shared embodiment. Through phenomenological interviews, we investigated how these design tactics mediated participants’ sense of connection. Our analysis reveals both potentials and tensions: abstraction lowered inhibitions and highlighted shared humanness but risked depersonalization; body mixing fostered unity but challenged virtual body ownership; mediated touch evoked closeness, but reminded of physical reality; and participants navigated bifurcated social norms across physical and virtual spaces. We contribute a nuanced account of these design trade-offs, advancing understanding of how abstraction, embodiment, touch, and social norm negotiation shape connection in XR, and outlining design considerations for crafting social XR experiences.2026ESEkaterina R. Stepanova et al.KTH Royal Institute of TechnologySocial & Collaborative VRImmersion & Presence ResearchIdentity & Avatars in XRCHI
Being in Virtual Worlds: How Interaction, Environment, and Touch Shape Embodiment in Immersive ExperiencesEmbodiment is an everyday experience that typically goes unnoticed. While we often take it for granted, with the adoption of virtual reality (VR) technology, embodiment in virtual bodies and worlds has become an important consideration for designers of immersive experiences. To date, the VR design community has primarily considered embodiment in terms of body ownership over a synchronized visual representation. In this paper, we construct an interactional framework of virtual embodiment, beginning by revisiting what it really means to be “embodied.” Our framework reconnects embodiment and presence in virtual environments founded in Dourish's concept of embodied interaction and Heidegger's Dasein or “being-in-the-world.” We discuss how embodiment, fundamentally rooted in past and present interactions, changes our understanding of body ownership and its extension into VR. Integrating theories from VR research, philosophy, HCI, and psychology we uncover the complex interplay of interaction, environment, and touch in shaping embodied experiences. We present a novel framework for understanding embodiment in VR rooted in interaction, enabling designers to create more immersive and meaningful virtual worlds.2025JDJohn Desnoyers-Stewart et al.Simon Fraser University, School of Interactive Arts and TechnologyMid-Air Haptics (Ultrasonic)Full-Body Interaction & Embodied InputImmersion & Presence ResearchCHI
Awedyssey: Design Tensions in Eliciting Self-transcendent Emotions in Virtual Reality to Support Mental Well-being and ConnectionAccess to nature and feeling connection is critical for mental health and well-being. These benefits may be mediated by self-transcendent emotions evoked by nature. We need to explore the capacity of technology to offer such experiences when we lack access to the restorative power of nature. Despite growing research validating this capacity, there is a lack of articulated design knowledge of how such experiences can be created. Here, we explore a technologically-mediated support for mental well-being through an agile design approach informed by self-transcendent emotion theory and transformative experience design. We developed Awedyssey as a sensory deprivation countermeasure experience in virtual reality (VR) and as a part of a public exhibition. We gathered qualitative feedback through interviews, diaries, and surveys. From this data we identified design tensions for designing complex emotional experiences when considering the diversity of individuals and dual effects of designing for realism, autonomy, vastness, and comfort.2023NMNoah Miller et al.Immersion & Presence ResearchMental Health Apps & Online Support CommunitiesInteractive Narrative & Immersive StorytellingDIS
Strategies for Fostering a Genuine Feeling of Connection in Technologically Mediated SystemsHuman connection is essential for our personal well-being and a building block for a well-functioning society. There is a prominent interest in the potential of technology for mediating social connection, with a wealth of systems designed to foster the feeling of connection between strangers, friends, and family. By surveying this design landscape we present a transitional definition of mediated genuine connection and nine design strategies embodied within 50 design artifacts: affective self-disclosure, reflection on unity, shared embodied experience, transcendent emotions, embodied metaphors, interpersonal distance, touch, provocations, and play. In addition to drawing on design practice-based knowledge we also identify underlying psychological theories that can inform these strategies. We discuss design considerations pertaining to sensory modalities, vulnerability–comfort trade-offs, consent, situatedness in context, supporting diverse relationships, reciprocity, attention directedness, pursuing generalized knowledge, and questions of ethics. We hope to inspire and enrich designers’ understanding of the possibilities of technology to better support a mediated genuine feeling of connection.2022ESEkaterina R. Stepanova et al.Simon Fraser UniversityAgent Personality & AnthropomorphismSocial & Collaborative VRCHI
Virtual Transcendent Dream: Empowering People through Embodied Flying in VRFlying dreams have the potential to evoke a feeling of empowerment (or self-efficacy, confidence in our ability to succeed) and self-transcendent experience (STE), which have been shown to contribute to an individual’s overall well-being. However, these exceptional dreaming experiences remain difficult to induce at will. Inspired by the potential of Virtual Reality (VR) to support profound emotional experiences, we explored if a VR flying interface with more embodied self-motion cues could contribute to the benefits associated with flying dreams (i.e., STE and empowerment). Our results indicated that a flying interface with more self-motion cues indeed better supported STE and empowerment. We derived several design considerations: obscurity, extraordinary light and supportive setting. Our results contribute to the discourse around design guidelines for self-transcendence and empowerment in VR, which may further be applied to the improvement of mental well-being.2022PLPinyao Liu et al.Simon Fraser UniversityFull-Body Interaction & Embodied InputImmersion & Presence ResearchCHI
JeL: Breathing Together to Connect with Others and NatureBio-responsive immersive Virtual Reality can transform our interactions to bring awareness to our physiological rhythms fostering connection with our bodies, each other and nature. JeL is an immersive installation that aims to foster a feeling of connection through the process of breathing synchronization. Two immersants synchronize their breathing to fuel the growth of a coral-like structure that, together with the interactions of others, populates an initially empty coral reef. JeL is designed to support an intimate connection between users and with nature, sending a message about our collective capacity to care for the environment. JeL is an installation and research platform for exploring breathing synchronization and its effect on the feeling of connection. It was well received at a digital art festival where participants were able to relax and synchronize using the installation. Reflection on our design process and observations provides insights for the development of systems that promote connection.2020ESEkaterina R. Stepanova et al.Immersion & Presence ResearchHuman-Nature Relationships (More-than-Human Design)Digital Art Installations & Interactive PerformanceDIS
Designing Mind(set) and Setting for Profound Emotional Experiences in Virtual RealityVirtual reality (VR) has the potential to support profound emotional experiences, such as experiencing awe when virtually viewing the Earth from space. In doing so, VR can potentially both give people positive emotional experiences contributing to their overall well-being and give researchers a way to study these profound emotional experiences in a more controlled environment. Through a design refinement process, we explored the potential influence of the ``set and setting''--one's mindset and the physical and social environment--when transitioning people into and out of VR designed to support profound emotional experiences. We present our findings from a design refinement session and a case study exploring how set and setting may support the profound emotional experience of awe. We discuss common themes in user experience and trends of awe-related behavioural and introspective measures. Our results contribute to the discourse around the role of the design of set and setting in overall user experience.2020AKAlexandra J Kitson et al.Immersion & Presence ResearchInteractive Narrative & Immersive StorytellingDIS
FaceHaptics: Robot Arm based Versatile Facial Haptics for Immersive EnvironmentsThis paper introduces FaceHaptics, a novel haptic display based on a robot arm attached to a head-mounted virtual reality display. It provides localized, multi-directional and movable haptic cues in the form of wind, warmth, moving and single-point touch events and water spray to dedicated parts of the face not covered by the head-mounted display.The easily extensible system, however, can principally mount any type of compact haptic actuator or object. User study 1 showed that users appreciate the directional resolution of cues, and can judge wind direction well, especially when they move their head and wind direction is adjusted dynamically to compensate for head rotations. Study 2 showed that adding FaceHaptics cues to a VR walkthrough can significantly improve user experience, presence, and emotional responses.2020AWAlexander Wilberz et al.Hochschule Bonn-Rhein-SiegMid-Air Haptics (Ultrasonic)Immersion & Presence ResearchCHI
Inhaling and Exhaling: How Technologies Can Perceptually Extend our Breath AwarenessAttending to breath is a self-awareness practice that exists within many contemplative and reflective traditions and is recognized for its benefits to well-being. Our current technological landscape embraces a large body of systems that utilize breath data in order to foster self-awareness. This paper seeks to deepen our understanding of the design space of systems that perceptually extend breath awareness. Our contribution is twofold: (1) our analysis reveals how the underlying theoretical frameworks shape the system design and its evaluation, and (2) how system design features support perceptual extension of breath awareness. We review and critically analyze 31 breath-based interactive systems. We identify 4 theoretical frameworks and 3 design strategies for interactive systems that perceptually extend breath awareness. We reflect upon this design space from both a theoretical and system design perspective, and propose future design directions for developing systems that "listen to" breath and perceptually extend it.2020MPMirjana Prpa et al.Simon Fraser UniversityMental Health Apps & Online Support CommunitiesSleep & Stress MonitoringBiosensors & Physiological MonitoringCHI
Geocaching with a Beam: Shared Outdoor Activities through a Telepresence Robot with 360 Degree ViewingPeople often enjoy sharing outdoor activities together such as walking and hiking. However, when family and friends are separated by distance it can be difficult if not impossible to share such activities. We explore this design space by investigating the benefits and challenges of using a telepresence robot to support outdoor leisure activities. In our study, participants participated in the outdoor activity of geocaching where one person geocached with the help of a remote partner via a telepresence robot. We compared a wide field of view (WFOV) camera to a 360° camera. Results show the benefits of having a physical embodiment and a sense of immersion with the 360° view. Yet challenges related to a lack of environmental awareness, safety issues, and privacy concerns resulting from bystander interactions. These findings illustrate the need to design telepresence robots with the environment and public in mind to provide an enhanced sensory experience while balancing safety and privacy issues resulting from being amongst the general public.2018YHYasamin Heshmat et al.Simon Fraser University360° Video & Panoramic ContentTeleoperation & TelepresenceCHI
Navigation Interfaces for Virtual Reality and Gaming: Theory and PracticeIn this course, we will take a detailed look at various breeds of spatial navigation interfaces that allow for locomotion in digital 3D environments such as games, virtual environments or even the exploration of abstract data sets. We will closely look into the basics of navigation, unravelling the psychophysics (including wayfinding) and actual locomotion (travel) aspects. The theoretical foundations form the basis for the practical skillset we will develop, by providing an in-depth discussion of navigation devices and techniques, and a step-by-step discussion of multiple real-world case studies. Doing so, we will cover the full range of navigation techniques from handheld to full-body, highly engaging and partly unconventional methods and tackle spatial navigation with hands-on-experience and tips for design and validation of novel interfaces. In particular, we will be looking at affordable setups and ways to “trick” out users to enable a realistic feeling of self-motion in the explored environments. As such, the course unites the theory and practice of spatial navigation, serving as entry point to understand and improve upon currently existing methods for the application domain at hand.2018EKErnst Kruijff et al.Bonn-Rhein-Sieg University of Applied SciencesFull-Body Interaction & Embodied InputImmersion & Presence ResearchCHI
Are You Dreaming? A Phenomenological Study on Understanding Lucid Dreams as a Tool for Introspection in Virtual RealityVirtual reality (VR) is resurging in popularity with the advancement of low-cost hardware and more realistic graphics. How might this technology help others? That is, to increase mental well-being? The ultimate VR might look like lucid dreaming, the phenomenon of knowing one is dreaming while in the dream. Lucid dreaming can be used as an introspective tool and, ultimately, increase mental well-being. What these introspective experiences are like for lucid dreamers might be key in determining specific design guidelines for future creation of a technological tool used for helping people examine their own thoughts and emotions. This study describes nine active and proficient lucid dreamers’ representations of their introspective experiences gained through phenomenological interviews. Four major themes emerged: sensations and feelings, actions and practices, influences on experience, and meaning making. This knowledge can help design a VR system that is grounded in genuine experience and preserving the human condition.2018AKAlexandra Kitson et al.Simon Fraser UniversityImmersion & Presence ResearchMental Health Apps & Online Support CommunitiesCHI
Navigation Interfaces for Virtual Reality and Gaming: Theory and PracticeIn this course, we will take a detailed look at various breeds of spatial navigation interfaces that allow for locomotion in digital 3D environments such as games, virtual environments or even the exploration of abstract data sets. We will closely look into the basics of navigation, unravelling the psychophysics (including wayfinding) and actual locomotion (travel) aspects. The theoretical foundations form the basis for the practical skillset we will develop, by providing an in-depth discussion of navigation devices and techniques, and a step-by-step discussion of multiple real-world case studies. Doing so, we will cover the full range of navigation techniques from handheld to full-body, highly engaging and partly unconventional methods and tackle spatial navigation with hands-on-experience and tips for design and validation of novel interfaces. In particular, we will be looking at affordable setups and ways to “trick” out users to enable a realistic feeling of self-motion in the explored environments. As such, the course unites the theory and practice of spatial navigation, serving as entry point to understand and improve upon currently existing methods for the application domain at hand.2018EKErnst Kruijff et al.Bonn-Rhein-Sieg University of Applied SciencesFull-Body Interaction & Embodied InputAR Navigation & Context AwarenessImmersion & Presence ResearchCHI