How do Virtual Reality Experiences compare to those IRL?

Jin and teammates report that they “investigated how participant perceptions of a single interior environment varied among a real-world space (R) and two surrogate VR spaces (one made with 360° spherical photography and one made with 360° spherical digital rendering).

A total of 42 undergraduate, interior design students were randomly assigned to one of two experiments, resulting in two groups of 21 students. Each participant completed a visual acuity task and evaluated perceived brightness, glare, and spaciousness within the real-world space and one of the two surrogate VR environments. Participants reported acceptable baseline levels of perceived realism in both VR environments. There was no significant difference between the rendered-VR simulation and real-world space for brightness, glare, and spaciousness, while the photographed-VR simulation was seen as significantly brighter and glaring. Performance on the visual acuity task was significantly lower in both VR simulations than in the real-world-approximating the difference between 20/20 and 20/60 vision.”

Xu Jin, Jason Meneely, and Nam-Kyu Park.  “Virtual Reality Versus Real-World Space:  Comparing Perceptions of Brightness, Glare, Spaciousness, and Visual Acuity.”  Journal of Interior Design, in press, https://doi.org/10.1111/joid.12209