ABSTRACT
A virtual reality application may target any of a variety of domains, from architectural walkthroughs to psychological therapy. Regardless of the specific application domain, however, there may be a need to evaluate the effectiveness of the virtual experience. Presence is most commonly defined as the sense of “being there” in a virtual space. The literature on virtual environments reports many methods for evaluating the quality of the user’s experiences—that is, the level of presence the user experiences. Some measures are subjective responses from the users, some are objective readings from sensors, and some are based on experimenters’ observations. Post-experiment questionnaires, for example, can be administered after any virtual experience without changing the experience. Sensors, e.g., head and eye trackers, can capture data for coding and analysis of behaviors such as eye contact between real and virtual humans.
