Perception of Multimodal Feedback Inconsistency in an Interactive Tracking Task

The presented study estimates the impact of inconsistency in proprioceptive and visual feedback which can be a side effect of interaction in shared virtual environment. An important factor for interaction in virtual reality is the perception of a partner’s input as communication, not as disturbance. Therefore, the effects of disturbances correlated with a partner’s pre-recorded input are contrasted to several conditions of more or less predictable perturbations. As generalizable scenario a tracking task is used. The root mean square error and the percentage of correct performance in time are analyzed in a multivariate analysis of variance. Results indicate that people adapt to a partner’s input in timing patterns even though they ignore the magnitude of the disturbance. This indicates that the perception of Co-Presence is more depending on time factors as well.