Dextrous and shared interaction with medical data: stereoscopic vision is more important than hand-image collocation.

The current experiment was carried out to extend our knowledge about the relative importance of stereoscopic display and hand-image collocation for dextrous interaction. We devised a new task, the Volumetric Dexterity Test (VDT), which quite accurately duplicates the way professional personnel such as surgeons and radiologists interact with detailed medical data in a VR environment. Our results were surprising. Stereo vision was very important to both accuracy and speed of task completion, as we found previously. But the presence of hand-image collocation did not improve accuracy, despite the fact that this was a truly three-dimensional task. If this finding is borne out it has important implications for the volumetric presentation of medical data to individual practitioners and in group settings.