Development of Immersive Cognitive Tasks for Use in Human Memory Research Restricted; Files Only

Abstract

Virtual Reality (VR) has been identified as a promising tool for improving cognitive assessments due to its ability to increase ecological validity while maintaining high experimental control. Previous studies have demonstrated that immersive environments may lead to increased cognitive performance and the measurement of cognitive phenomena. However, it remains unclear how virtual reality compares to standard two-dimensional displays.

To address this gap, this study aimed to investigate the effect of immersion on familiarity memory processes and develop a framework for creating immersive cognitive assessments. The study utilized a series of three experiments to examine the impact of immersive reality on various cognitive processes, including scene recall, scene familiarity-detection during recall failure, the subjective experience of déjà vu, memory for a spatial trajectory, and subjective feelings of prediction.

The experiments successfully reproduced effects from a previous two-dimensional non-immersive task and showed larger effect sizes in a more immersive virtual reality version of the task. These findings provide support for the idea that virtual reality-based cognitive assessments can elicit stronger effects in cognitive phenomena. Additionally, the framework developed in these experiments could facilitate the development of new tools and assessments that could improve the detection of memory deficits in clinical populations.

Overall, this study contributes to the growing body of literature supporting the use of VR technology for cognitive neuroscience research and demonstrates its potential for developing new tools to study cognitive processes in more naturalistic settings while maintaining experimental rigor.

Table of Contents

Abstract ii

Acknowledgements iii

List of Tables v

List of Figures v

1 Introduction 1

1.1 ImmersiveCognitiveAssessments.................................. 1

2 Validating Immersive Assessments Via the Study of Deja vu 3 2.1 Background.............................................. 3 2.2 Methods................................................ 5 2.2.1 Participants.......................................... 5 2.2.2 Stimuli ............................................ 5 2.2.3 Materials ........................................... 6 2.2.4 Procedure........................................... 7 2.3 Results................................................. 10 2.3.1 ImmersiveVRisAssociatedwithBetterRecall...................... 10 2.3.2 Spatially Similar Scenes Elicit Greater Familiarity when displayed in VR . . . . . . . 11 2.3.3 Identification Failure in Spatially Similar Scenes Was Associated with Deja Vu and is enhanced inVR ....................................... 11 2.3.4 Deja Vu Was Associated with Intense Familiarity Across all Presentation Modalities . 12 2.3.5 Deja vu was Associated with Feelings-of-Prediction. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 2.3.6 TurnPredictionAccuracyAccompaniedRecallSuccess . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13 2.3.7 When stimuli were displayed in VR Deja vu States were Associated with Increased CorrectTurnJudgments................................... 14 2.4 Discussion............................................... 16 3 Limitations and Future Directions 19 3.1 LimitationsandFutureDirections ................................. 19 3.1.1 LimitationsinParticipantSample ............................. 19 3.1.2 LackofDirectPhysiologicalData.............................. 19 3.1.3 IncreasedNoisefromVR .................................. 20 3.1.4 AreastoTargetasweIncreaseEcologicalValidity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20 3.2 Conclusion .............................................. 21

References

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About this Honors Thesis

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School	Emory College
Department	Neuroscience and Behavioral Biology
Degree	B.S.
Submission	Honors Thesis
Language	English
Research Field	Computer Science Psychology, Cognitive Biology, Neuroscience
Keyword	Virtual Reality Neuropsychology Deja Vu
Committee Chair / Thesis Advisor	Daniel Drane, Emory University
Committee Members	Stephan Hamman, Emory University Emily Wall, Emory University

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