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Wearing a VR helmet seems to cause motion sickness in a majority of people and it affects women more frequently than men.
In a test of people playing one virtual reality game using an Oculus Rift headset, more than half felt sick within 15 minutes, a team of scientists at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis reports online December 3 in Experimental Brain Research. Among women, nearly four out of five felt sick.
So-called VR sickness, also known as simulator sickness or cybersickness, has been recognized since the 1980s, when the U.S. military noticed that flight simulators were nauseating its pilots. In recent years, anecdotal reports began trickling in about the new generation of head-mounted virtual reality displays making people sick. Now, with VR making its way into people's homes, there's a steady stream of claims of VR sickness.
"It's a high rate of people that you put in [VR headsets] that are going to experience some level of symptoms," says Eric Muth, an experimental psychologist at Clemson University in South Carolina with expertise in motion sickness. "It's going to mute the 'Wheee!' factor."
Abstract: The virtual reality head-mounted display Oculus Rift induces motion sickness and is sexist in its effects. (DOI: 10.1007/s00221-016-4846-7)
(Score: 2) by VanderDecken on Friday December 09 2016, @03:38PM
Nausea due to VR is nothing new. When I was in university in the early 90's and taking my computer graphics courses, we were just then at the transition point where computers were getting fast enough that you could have VR without motion sickness. Prior to that, nausea was a given. And keep in mind, to avoid it the graphics were limited to coarse wireframe. Even so, it was a mind-blowing experience despite the heavy goggles, gloves, and bundle of cables.
Ever since then, it's just been a balancing act between resolution, amount of motion, and avoiding nausea in most people. I guess these guys pushed it a bit too far this time.
The two most common elements in the universe are hydrogen and stupidity.
(Score: 2, Funny) by WillR on Friday December 09 2016, @04:11PM
There was an arcade I used to go to (kids: ask your parents what an "arcade" was) that had a 4-player Quake machine where each player had a chair with a trackball for looking around on one arm and move/shoot buttons on the other, and a huge curved projection screen right in front of them where it took up almost their whole field of view. It was immersive as hell for the 1990s, but I could only play 1 or 2 rounds before the feeling that was about to hurl set in. Spending hours playing the same game on a crappy 13" CRT was somehow never a problem...