Dissertation (PRID301)

29th September, 2009

Abstract

Social interaction within virtual environments is on the increase, in accordance with both the rising prevalence of personal computer technology and the numerous forms of traditional communication being converted to formats suitable for the digital era. This is evidenced firstly by the growing popularity of various virtual social communication activities such as online social networking, and secondly the increasing sophistication and depth of interaction these services provide.

Consequently, there is a continual demand for the improvement of the interface through which these interactions can take place. Current interfaces are highly limited as to the depth and type of information they can respond to from their user. The field of biofeedback contributes aspects that could be crucial to the development of improved interfaces. Although its original purpose was to be a form of medical treatment, the field readily overlaps with the fields in human-computer interface design. The acquisition of physiological data that was originally only intended for use as a feedback loop for patients can actually be used for a much wider variety of purposes as an interface to virtual reality.

With the introduction of biofeedback technology as an interface, there will be a profound change in the means and methodology with which humans can interact with their virtual environments, and subsequently socially within them. Its gradual adoption is enabling the production of interfaces that are both more intuitive to their users and capable of garnering a wider variety of input relevant to particular activities, for instance prospective virtual social environments of the future.

This dissertation examines how the adoption of biofeedback technology into the interfaces for virtual environments will affect social interaction within them by exploring the way that the technology can be adapted to meet the already recognisable requirements for this interaction.

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The Development of Biofeedback Interfaces and their Effect on Social Interaction in Virtual Environments

Dissertation Hand-in

30th March, 2009

The dissertation hand-in marks that there is only the DirectX coursework and final year project left to complete. Here’s a picture of my two printed documents yesterday ready for binding and handin:

The actual document is available here: Dissertation.pdf

Writing

8th March, 2009

Something about the sunlight makes me want to take closeup studies of random stuff, even if it’s my pen and dissertation writing:

Looking into Second Life

24th January, 2009

It seems a rather long time ago now, but before starting the final year I decided to look into the world of Second Life because I knew vaguely that I would be including it in my dissertation study and knew that I couldn’t possibly write about it without trying it first.

But as I say, that really does seem a long time ago so I had a small go again to familiarise myself with how it worked and how stupid my online avatar looked :)

Here I am exploring Lilly’s Irish Pub, one of the more refined and complete areas I discovered in my original visit.

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Non-verbal Social Communication in Virtual Reality

9th January, 2009

While searching for writing on forms of communication and a perception of social liberation in virtual worlds, I came across the journals of Nick Yee, exactly the sort of stuff I’m looking for for my dissertation. Here are the relevant links:

http://www.bioedonline.org/news/news.cfm?art=2789

Nick Yee’s homepage

Dissertation and Project Proposals

10th October, 2008

I have spent today trying to formulate a more cohesive proposal from Biro spider diagrams, mainly for the dissertation at this stage. However the Dissertation and Final Year Project are going to be closely related so the thoughts at this state apply to both.

Therefore, the general question I have proposed is “How have the perceived boundaries between virtual worlds and reality become increasingly blurred?”