Profile analysis of after-effects experienced during exposure to several virtual reality environments

Motion sickness symptoms are an unwanted by-product of exposure to virtual environments. This problem is not new and was reported in the early flight simulators and experiments on ego motions and vection. The cardinal symptom of motion sickness is, of course, vomiting, but this symptom is ordinarily preceded by a variety of other symptoms. In his classic studies of motion sickness conducted before and during World War II, G. R. Wendt introduced a three point scale to score motion sickness beyond a vomit/no vomit dichotomy. Later, Navy scientists developed a Motion Sickness Questionnaire (MSQ), originally for use in a slowly rotating room. In the last 20 years the MSQ has been used in a series of studies of air, sea, and space sickness. Only recently, however, has it been appreciated that symptom patterns in the MSQ are not uniform but vary with the way sickness is induced. In seasickness, for example, nausea is the most prominent symptom. In Navy simulators, however, the most common symptom is eye strain, especially when cathode ray tubes are employed in the simulation. The latter result was obtained in a survey of over 1,500 pilot exposures. Using this database, Essex scientists conducted a factor analysis of the MSQ. We found that signs and symptoms of motion sickness fell mainly into three clusters: 1) oculomotor disturbance, 2) nausea and related neurovegetative problems, and 3) disorientation, ataxia, and vertigo. We have since rescored the MSQ results obtained in Navy simulators in terms of these three components. We have also compared these and other profiles obtained from three different vitual reality systems to profiles obtained in sea sickness, space sickness, and alcohol intoxication. We will show examples of these various profiles and point out simularities and differences among them which indicate aspects of what might be called 'virtual-reality sickness'.