Thesis (Ph. D.)--Miami University, Dept. of Psychology, 2006. / Title from second page of PDF document. Includes bibliographical references (p. 64-72).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Washington State University, May 2007. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 106-109).

This study sought to determine if an online course designed and delivered in Second Life can meet the needs of higher education students with dyslexia. the course design incorporated strategies from Gagne’ and Briggs’ principles of instruction, Gagnon and Collay’s constructivist learning design, Powell’s key learning needs of dyslexics, and elements of universal design. Specific design elements are discussed including screen captures from the design. the study employed a mixed methods approach incorporating an online survey, recorded observation session, and two follow up interviews. the observation session and interviews were only completed by the sample population of eight participants, which included three participants with dyslexia and five participants without dyslexia. the sample population was selected using purposeful sampling techniques to ensure the widest representation of the population with a small sample. Extensive excerpts of the sample participants’ interview responses are presented and discussed, including participants’ suggestions for improving the course design. Key findings from all three data sources are discussed. Finally, implications for instructional design and special education and suggestions for further research are presented.

Massively multiplayer online environments continue to grow in popularity, with cur- rent technical designs based upon a well-proven client-server model. This approach has some inherent limitations, high costs to provision server resources for peak demands and restriction of the maximum number of concurrent participants within a virtual environ- ment. Incorporating peer-to-peer (P2P) techniques provides developers the opportunity to significantly reduce costs, while also breaking through the barrier of the number of concur- rent participants within a single virtual environment. This dissertation presents a hybrid P2P design incorporating a managed server along with a Voronoi-based P2P overlay for the development of massive virtual environments. In this design, the managed server en- sures a secure computing environment and long-term persistent storage, with the virtual environment simulation distributed among the peers, ensuring computational scalability.

The growth of the World Wide Web has prompted many businesses to develop electronic commerce (e-commerce) as a domain where consumers can conveniently purchase their products (Chittaro& Ranon, 2002). Marketing and Human - Computer Interaction (HCI) research has focused on the ways interactivity can improve purchasing experience. One particular technique is through the use of computer models of products known as visual object representations (Ozok& Komlodi, 2009). Research on visual product representations is focused on models of objects typically purchased in a store, such as clothing and electronics, which can usually be manipulated and rotated as desired (Ozok& Komlodi, 2009). There seems to be a gap in the literature regarding computer models for which consumers actually do not have an established mental models. Computerized walk-through models allow users to virtually navigate a space as well as to view a model of a living space from different orientations. An experiment was conducted on 100 participants to investigate computerized walk-through models and the role the type of model and workload plays in the amount of knowledge gained about the layout and consumer preference. Participants navigated a computerized walk-through model or a two dimensional picture set of a hotel room (low complexity) or apartment (high complexity) .Then they completed a series of surveys. Results indicate that two-dimensional models were best for learning the layout of a high complexity model and that three-dimensional models were better for learning the layout of a low complexity model. Results have implications for virtual model use in education and the military.

One of the oft cited reasons for virtual environments is that they provide experiences with places one would never be able to visit and to perform tasks that would otherwise be dangerous, or inaccessible. The ability to become transported to another environment, such that you think you are "there," is known as presence. Existing presence literature focuses largely on the sensory aspects of virtual environment experiences. However, there is more to experience than what is sensed. This dissertation investigates the theoretical components of holistic experiences in virtual environments. In order to explore the relationship between experiential design and presence, a new evaluation tool was needed. This ultimately led to the development of the Virtual Experience Test. To validate the Virtual Experience Test, an experiment was designed that utilized subjective evaluations regarding game-play in the commercial game Mirror's Edge. Measures of experiential design, flow, and presence were taken and the relationships between the measures analyzed. The results of this research showed that environments utilizing holistic designs result in significantly higher presence. Furthermore, this study produced a validated measure of holistic experience that designers could use to evaluate their virtual environments.

Conventional analysis of atmospheric data includes three-dimensional desktop-computer displays. One disadvantage is that it can reduce the ability to zoom in and see small-scale features while concurrently viewing other faraway features. This research intends to determine if using virtual environments to examine atmospheric data can improve a meteorologist's ability to analyze the given information. In addition to possibly enhancing small-scale analysis, virtual environments technology offers an array of possible improvements. Presented is the theory on developing an experiment to establish the extent to which virtual environments assist meteorologists in analysis. Following is the details of an implementation of such an experiment. Based on the quantitative results obtained, the conclusion is that immersion can significantly increase the accuracy of a meteorologist's analysis of an atmospheric data set.

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Across domains, researchers, engineers, and designers are faced with large volumes of data that are heterogeneous in nature - including spatial, abstract, and temporal information. There are numerous design and technical challenges when considering the unification, management, and presentation of these information types. Most research and applications have focused on display techniques for each of the information types individually, but much less in known about how to represent the relationships between information types. This research explores the perceptual and usability impacts of data representations and layout algorithms for the next-generation of integrated information spaces. We propose Information-Rich Virtual Environments (IRVEs) as a solution to challenges of integrated information spaces. In this presentation, we will demonstrate the application requirements and foundational technology of IRVEs and articulate crucial tradeoffs in IRVE information design. We will present a design space and evaluation methodology to explore the usability effects of these tradeoffs. Experimental results will be presented for a series of empirical usability evaluations that increase our understanding of how these tradeoffs can be resolved to improve user performance. Finally, we interpret the results though the models of Information Theory and Human Information Processing to derive new conclusions regarding the role of perceptual cues in determining user performance in IRVEs. These lessons are posed as a set of design guidelines to aid developers of new IRVE interfaces and specifications. / Ph. D.