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Getting Your Game On: Using Virtual Reality to Improve Real Table Tennis Skills
Abstract
Objective: The present study investigates skill transfer from Virtual Reality (VR) sports training to the real world, using the fast-paced sport of table tennis.Background: A key assumption of VR training is that the learned skills and experiences transfer to the real world. Yet, in certain application areas, such as VR sports training, the research testing this assumption is sparse.Design: Real-world table tennis performance was assessed using a mixed-model analysis of variance. The analysis comprised a between-subjects (VR training group vs control group) and a within-subjects (pre- and post-training) factor. Method: Fifty-seven participants (23 females) were either assigned to a VR training group (n = 29) or no-training control group (n = 28). During VR training, participants were immersed in competitive table tennis matches against an artificial intelligence opponent. An expert table tennis coach evaluated participants on real-world table tennis playing before and after the training phase. Blinded regarding participant's group assignment, the expert assessed participants’ backhand, forehand and serving on quantitative aspects (e.g. count of rallies without errors) and quality of skill aspects (e.g. technique and consistency).Results: VR training significantly improved participants’ real-world table tennis performance compared to a no-training control group in both quantitative (p<.001, Cohen’s d = 1.08) and quality of skill assessments (p<.001, Cohen’s d = 1.10).Conclusions: This study adds to a sparse yet expanding literature, demonstrating real-world skill transfer from Virtual Reality in an athletic task.
... Аналіз літературних джерел. Багаточисленні дослідження [2,4,[7][8][9] та практичний досвід свідчить про зниження результативності у спортсменів в процесі їх діяльності. Авторами визначено серед низки чинників, що впливають на зниження результативності спортсменів, зниження інтересу до занять спортом, що пов'язане з використанням монотонних навантажень та застарілих технологій у практиці спортивної підготовки [5,6,9,10]. ...
... Наукові дослідження, проведені авторами [2,4,5,8] вказують на те, що однією з технологій, яка здатна значно покращити фізичну та розумову підготовку спортсменів, є віртуальна реальність, яка досягла значних успіхів за останнє десятиліття. Швидкий прогрес, зокрема в розробці тривимірної графіки у 360-градусному віртуальному середовищі надає спортсменам можливість тренуватися «по-новому» на додачу до традиційної системи спортивного тренування. ...
The article considers the possibility of developing innovative approaches to managing the training of athletes on the basis of virtual reality technology. The achievements and shortcomings of virtual reality in sports are analyzed. It is believed that winning in sports technology is gaining more and more significance these days and can achieve a wide range of advantages. It was found peculiarity of the choice of advanced technologies and computer graphics for the creation of a realistic virtual world with the method of eliminating the movement of the mind, which will be based on the sensors of the movement of people through the creation of singing algorithms in computer programs. It has been established that the systems of "virtual reality", creating the "presence effect", directed at the promotion of congestion, regularly engage in various types of physical activity and sports, and can also accurately determine the aspects of the athlete's performance. Through the exchange of the current day, caused by a pandemic, technology is in great demand in economically and technologically developed countries. Using of new forms, tools and approaches in the training process of athletes provides a number of advantages over conventional classes in the sports industry. The introduction of virtual reality in the sports training of athletes allows: to optimize the training process and make it more effective; increase the motivation and interest of athletes in sports; create safe conditions for the improvement of certain technical and tactical elements in the sport; help to predict the results.
... The most immersive VR systems are the CAVE, a large cube with screens which the user physically enters, and the VR head-mounted display (VR-HMD, e.g., HTC Vive, Oculus Rift), a wearable device with a screen that covers the eyes to view the virtual world in stereovision. Even though the CAVE and the VR-HMD are two immersive systems that share the same key features (Slater, 2009), the present study focused on the VR-HMD because (a) it is becoming increasingly accessible to the public (Cherni, Nicolas, & Métayer, 2021), (b) its cost is much lower than the CAVE, (c) the VR-HMD is also smaller and very much easier to transport than the CAVE, and (d) its positive influence on motor and sport performance has been validated (Bideau, Kulpa, Vignais, Brault, Multon, & Craig, 2009;Michalski, Szpak, Saredakis, Ross, Billinghurst, & Loetscher, 2019b;Rolin, Fooken, Spering, & Pai, 2018). Despite all the previous promising advantages, using VR and especially VR-HMD to enhance sport performance can also have several limitations, such as limited field of view, no direct perception of the user's own body, limited haptic feedback, and limited interaction with physical objects (Stone et al., 2018), costs, unsuitability for training some specific sport skills, potential development of unnatural patterns of motion, and even social isolation (Düking et al., 2018). ...
While a growing number of studies have highlighted the potential of virtual reality (VR) to improve athletes’ skills, no research has yet focused on acceptance of a VR head- mounted display (VR-HMD) designed to increase sport performance. However, even if technological devices could potentially lead to performance improvement, athletes may not always accept them. To investigate this issue, the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) examines if perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use, perceived enjoyment, and subjective norms (i.e., social influence) are positive predictors of intention to use a specific technology. The aims of the present study were to test with competitive athletes the validity of the TAM before a first use of a VR-HMD intended to enhance sport performance and to examine to what extent the level of practice and the type of sport practiced have an influence on the previous variables of the TAM. The study sample comprised 1162 French athletes (472 women, 690 men, M age = 24.50 ± 8.51 years) who usually practiced a sport in competition (from recreational to international level). After reading a short text presenting the VR-HMD and its interests for sport performance, the participants filled out an online questionnaire assessing their acceptance of this technological device before a first use. The results of the structural equation modeling analysis revealed that perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use, perceived enjoyment, and subjective norms were positive predictors of intention to use this VR-HMD, validating the suitability of the TAM for investigating the acceptance by athletes of a VR-HMD designed to increase their sport performance. The results also showed that athletes of all sport levels (a) had a significant intention to use VR, (b) found it quite useful (except for recreational athletes), quite easy to use, and quite pleasant to use, even if their entourage would not encourage them to use it (except for international athletes), and (c) found the VR-HMD easy and pleasant to use whatever the sport practiced. Notably some athletes (e.g., triathletes, swimmers, cyclists) did not find the VR-HMD significantly useful and did not have significant intention to use it to increase their performance. Identifying acceptance by athletes of such a device may increase the likelihood that it will be used by athletes of different levels and from different sports, so that they can benefit from all its advantages related to the improvement of their sport performance. Needs-based targeted interventions may also be conducted toward athletes who might be reluctant to integrate this type of device into their training.
The use of virtual environments (VE) for training perceptual-motors skills in sports continues to be a rapidly growing area. However, there is a dearth of research that has examined whether training in sports simulation transfers to the real task. In this study, the transfer of perceptual-motor skills trained in an adaptive baseball batting VE to real baseball performance was investigated. Eighty participants were assigned equally to groups undertaking adaptive hitting training in the VE, extra sessions of batting practice in the VE, extra sessions of real batting practice, and a control condition involving no additional training to the players’ regular practice. Training involved two 45 min sessions per week for 6 weeks. Performance on a batting test in the VE, in an on-field test of batting, and on a pitch recognition test was measured pre- and post-training. League batting statistics in the season following training and the highest level of competition reached in the following 5 years were also analyzed. For the majority of performance measures, the adaptive VE training group showed a significantly greater improvement from pre-post training as compared to the other groups. In addition, players in this group had superior batting statistics in league play and reached higher levels of competition. Training in a VE can be used to improve real, on-field performance especially when designers take advantage of simulation to provide training methods (e.g., adaptive training) that do not simply recreate the real training situation.
In training assembly workers in a factory, there are often barriers such as cost and lost productivity due to shutdown. The use of virtual reality (VR) training has the potential to reduce these costs. This research compares virtual bimanual haptic training versus traditional physical training and the effectiveness for learning transfer. In a mixed experimental design, participants were assigned to either virtual or physical training and trained by assembling a wooden burr puzzle as many times as possible during a twenty minute time period. After training, participants were tested using the physical puzzle and were retested again after two weeks. All participants were trained using brightly colored puzzle pieces. To examine the effect of color, testing involved the assembly of colored physical parts and natural wood colored physical pieces. Spatial ability as measured using a mental rotation test, was shown to correlate with the number of assemblies they were able to complete in the training. While physical training outperformed virtual training, after two weeks the virtually trained participants actually improved their test assembly times. The results suggest that the color of the puzzle pieces helped the virtually trained participants in remembering the assembly process.
In this article, we provide the nontechnical reader with a fundamental understanding of the components of virtual reality (VR) and a thorough discussion of the role VR has played in social science. First, we provide a brief overview of the hardware and equipment used to create VR and review common elements found within the virtual environment that may be of interest to social scientists, such as virtual humans and interactive, multisensory feedback. Then, we discuss the role of VR in existing social scientific research. Specifically, we review the literature on the study of VR as an object, wherein we discuss the effects of the technology on human users; VR as an application, wherein we consider real-world applications in areas such as medicine and education; and VR as a method, wherein we provide a comprehensive outline of studies in which VR technologies are used to study phenomena that have traditionally been studied in physical settings, such as nonverbal behavior and social interaction. We then present a content analysis of the literature, tracking the trends for this research over the last two decades. Finally, we present some possibilities for future research for interested social scientists.
Inhibitory control, or the ability to suppress planned but inappropriate prepotent actions in the current environment, plays an important role in the control of human performance. Evidence from empirical studies utilizing a sport-specific design has shown that athletes have superior inhibitory control. However, less is known about whether this superiority might (1) still be seen in a general cognitive task without a sport-related context; (2) be modulated differentially by different sporting expertise (e.g., tennis versus swimming).
Here we compared inhibitory control across tennis players, swimmers and sedentary non-athletic controls using a stop-signal task without a sport-specific design. Our primary finding showed that tennis players had shorter stop-signal reaction times (SSRTs) when compared to swimmers and sedentary controls, whereas no difference was found between swimmers and sedentary controls. Importantly, this effect was further confirmed after considering potential confounding factors (e.g., BMI, training experience, estimated levels of physical activity and VO2max), indicative of better ability to inhibit unrequired responses in tennis players.
This suggests that fundamental inhibitory control in athletes can benefit from open skill training. Sport with both physical and cognitive demands may provide a potential clinical intervention for those who have difficulties in inhibitory control.
This paper presents the design and implementation of a distributed virtual reality (VR) platform that was developed to support the training of multiple users who must perform complex tasks in which situation assessment and critical thinking are the primary components of success. The system is fully immersive and multimodal, and users are represented as tracked, full-body figures. The system supports the manipulation of virtual objects, allowing users to act upon the environment in a natural manner. The underlying intelligent simulation component creates an interac- tive, responsive world in which the consequences of such actions are presented within a realistic, time-critical scenario. The focus of this work has been on the training of medical emergency-response personnel. BioSimMER, an application of the system to training first responders to an act of bio-terrorism, has been imple- mented and is presented throughout the paper as a concrete example of how the underlying platform architecture supports complex training tasks. Finally, a prelimi- nary field study was performed at the Texas Engineering Extension Service Fire Protection Training Division. The study focused on individual, rather than team, in- teraction with the system and was designed to gauge user acceptance of VR as a training tool. The results of this study are presented.
Because fire rescue personnel often enter unfamiliar buildings to perform critical tasks like rescues, the importance of finding new and improved ways to train route navigation is becoming paramount. This research was designed to compare three methods for training firefighters to navigate a rescue route in an unfamiliar building. Thirty firefighters from the Madison County, Alabama, area were trained to navigate through the Administrative Science Building at The University of Alabama in Huntsville. The firefighters, who had not had any experience with the Administrative Science Building prior to the experiment, were randomly assigned to one of three experimental training groups: Blueprint, Virtual Reality, or No Training (Control). After training, we measured the total navigation time and number of wrong turns exhibited by firefighters in the actual building. Participants were required to rescue a mock baby (a life-sized doll) following the specific trained route. Measures of test performance were compared among groups by using analyses of variance (ANOVAs). The results indicated that firefighters trained with virtual reality or blueprints performed a quicker and more accurate rescue than those without training. Furthermore, the speed and accuracy of rescue performance did not differ significantly between virtual reality and blueprint training groups. These results indicate that virtual reality training, if constructed and implemented properly, may provide an effective alternative to current navigation training methods. The results are discussed with regard to theories of transfer of training and human performance in virtual environments.
Transfer of training is of paramount concern for training researchers and practitioners. Despite research efforts, there is a growing concern over the "transfer problem." The purpose of this paper is to provide a critique of the existing transfer research and to suggest directions for future research investigations. The conditions of transfer include both the generalization of learned material to the job and the maintenance of trained skills over a period of time on the job. The existing research examining the effects of training design, trainee, and work-environment factors on conditions of transfer is reviewed and critiqued. Research gaps identified from the review include the need to (1) test various operationalizations of training design and work-environment factors that have been posited as having an impact on transfer and (2) develop a framework for conducting research on the effects of trainee characteristics on transfer. Needed advancements in the conceptualization and operationalization of the criterion of transfer are also discussed. ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR Copyright of Personnel Psychology is the property of Blackwell Publishing Limited and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts)
Virtual environments (VEs) are extensively used in training but there have been few rigorous scientific investigations of whether and how skills learned in a VE are transferred to the real world. This research aimed to measure and evaluate what is transferring from training a simple sensorimotor task in a VE to real world performance. In experiment 1, real world performances after virtual training, real training and no training were compared. Virtual and real training resulted in equivalent levels of post-training performance, both of which significantly exceeded task performance without training. Experiments 2 and 3 investigated whether virtual and real trained real world performances differed in their susceptibility to cognitive and motor interfering tasks (experiment 2) and in terms of spare attentional capacity to respond to stimuli and instructions which were not directly related to the task (experiment 3). The only significant difference found was that real task performance after training in a VE was less affected by concurrently performed interference tasks than was real task performance after training on the real task. This finding is discussed in terms of the cognitive load characteristics of virtual training. Virtual training therefore resulted in equivalent or even better real world performance than real training in this simple sensorimotor task, but this finding may not apply to other training tasks. Future research should be directed towards establishing a comprehensive knowledge of what is being transferred to real world performance in other tasks currently being trained in VEs and investigating the equivalence of virtual and real trained performances in these situations.
The aim of this study was to determine the role of head, eye and arm movements during the execution of a table tennis forehand stroke. Three-dimensional kinematic analysis of line-of-gaze, arm and ball was used to describe visual and motor behaviour. Skilled and less skilled participants returned the ball to cued right or left target areas under three levels of temporal constraint: pre-, early- and late-cue conditions. In the pre- and early-cue conditions, both high and low skill participants tracked the ball early in flight and kept gaze stable on a location in advance of the ball before ball-bat contact. Skilled participants demonstrated an earlier onset of ball tracking and recorded higher performance accuracy than less skilled counterparts. The manipulation of cue condition showed the limits of adaptation to maintain accuracy on the target. Participants were able to accommodate the constraints imposed by the early-cue condition by using a shorter quiet eye duration, earlier quiet eye offset and reduced arm velocity at contact. In the late-cue condition, modifications to gaze, head and arm movements were not sufficient to preserve accuracy. The findings highlight the functional coupling between perception and action during time-constrained, goal-directed actions.
To demonstrate that virtual reality (VR) training transfers technical skills to the operating room (OR) environment.
The use of VR surgical simulation to train skills and reduce error risk in the OR has never been demonstrated in a prospective, randomized, blinded study.
Sixteen surgical residents (PGY 1-4) had baseline psychomotor abilities assessed, then were randomized to either VR training (MIST VR simulator diathermy task) until expert criterion levels established by experienced laparoscopists were achieved (n = 8), or control non-VR-trained (n = 8). All subjects performed laparoscopic cholecystectomy with an attending surgeon blinded to training status. Videotapes of gallbladder dissection were reviewed independently by two investigators blinded to subject identity and training, and scored for eight predefined errors for each procedure minute (interrater reliability of error assessment r > 0.80).
No differences in baseline assessments were found between groups. Gallbladder dissection was 29% faster for VR-trained residents. Non-VR-trained residents were nine times more likely to transiently fail to make progress (P <.007, Mann-Whitney test) and five times more likely to injure the gallbladder or burn nontarget tissue (chi-square = 4.27, P <.04). Mean errors were six times less likely to occur in the VR-trained group (1.19 vs. 7.38 errors per case; P <.008, Mann-Whitney test).
The use of VR surgical simulation to reach specific target criteria significantly improved the OR performance of residents during laparoscopic cholecystectomy. This validation of transfer of training skills from VR to OR sets the stage for more sophisticated uses of VR in assessment, training, error reduction, and certification of surgeons.
One can use a number of techniques (e.g., from videotaping to computer enhancement of the environment) to augment the feedback that a subject usually receives during training on a motor task. Although some forms of augmented feedback have been shown to enhance performance on isolated isometric tasks during training, when the feedback has been removed subjects have sometimes not been able to perform as well in the "real-world" task as controls. Indeed, for realistic, nonisometric motor tasks, improved skill acquisition because of augmented feedback has not been demonstrated. In the present experiments, subjects (Experiment 1, N = 42; Experiment 2, N = 21) performed with a system that was designed for teaching a difficult multijoint movement in a table tennis environment. The system was a fairly realistic computer animation of the environment and included paddles for the teacher and subject, as well as a virtual ball. Each subject attempted to learn a difficult shot by matching the pattern of movements of the expert teacher. Augmented feedback focused the attention of the subject on a minimum set of movement details that were most relevant to the task; feedback was presented in a form that required the least perceptual processing. Effectiveness of training was determined by measuring their performance in the real task. Subjects who received the virtual environment training performed significantly better than subjects who received a comparable amount of real-task practice or coaching. Kinematic analysis indicated that practice with the expert's trajectory served as a basis for performance on the real-world task and that the movements executed after training were subject-specific modifications of the expert's trajectory. Practice with this trajectory alone was not sufficient for transfer to the real task, however: When a critical component of the virtual environment was removed, subjects showed no transfer to the real task.
The authors describe the effects of practice conditions in motor learning (e.g., contextual interference, knowledge of results) within the constraints of 2 experimental variables: skill level and task difficulty. They use a research framework to conceptualize the interaction of those variables on the basis of concepts from information theory and information processing. The fundamental idea is that motor tasks represent different challenges for performers of different abilities. The authors propose that learning is related to the information arising from performance, which should be optimized along functions relating the difficulty of the task to the skill level of the performer. Specific testable hypotheses arising from the framework are also described.
Purpose
To investigate the effect of virtual reality proficiency-based training on actual cataract surgery performance. The secondary purpose of the study was to define which surgeons benefit from virtual reality training.
Design
Multicenter masked clinical trial.
Participants
Eighteen cataract surgeons with different levels of experience.
Methods
Cataract surgical training on a virtual reality simulator (EyeSi) until a proficiency-based test was passed.
Main Outcome Measures
Technical performance in the operating room (OR) assessed by 3 independent, masked raters using a previously validated task-specific assessment tool for cataract surgery (Objective Structured Assessment of Cataract Surgical Skill). Three surgeries before and 3 surgeries after the virtual reality training were video-recorded, anonymized, and presented to the raters in random order.
Results
Novices (non–independently operating surgeons) and surgeons having performed fewer than 75 independent cataract surgeries showed significant improvements in the OR—32% and 38%, respectively—after virtual reality training (P = 0.008 and P = 0.018). More experienced cataract surgeons did not benefit from simulator training. The reliability of the assessments was high with a generalizability coefficient of 0.92 and 0.86 before and after the virtual reality training, respectively.
Conclusions
Clinically relevant cataract surgical skills can be improved by proficiency-based training on a virtual reality simulator. Novices as well as surgeons with an intermediate level of experience showed improvement in OR performance score.
The general proposition that performance is a multiplicative function of ability and motivation has a long-standing history. Three recent studies have reported results that suggest that shifting from an additive model to a multiplicative model may improve efforts to predict performance. This article represents an extensive examination of this multiplicative proposition when motivation is conceptualized in terms of personality characteristics. The Project A database, the Management Continuity Study database, and 2 additional data sets were brought together to facilitate a systematic investigation concerning whether ability and personality interact when predicting performance. Contrary to expectations, the results indicate that ability-personality interactions are not detected at above chance levels.
This experiment compared the value of real-world training, virtual reality training, and no training in the transfer of learning to the same task performed in real-world conditions. Results provide no evidence of transfer from a virtual reality training environment to a real-world task. There was no significant difference between the virtual reality training group and the group that received no training on the task. The group that received real-world training performed significantly better than both of the other two groups. The results question the utility of virtual training and suggest that in the present configuration, individuals learn performance characteristics specific only to the virtual reality context. Needed improvements to virtual reality for the purpose of enabling the transfer of training are indicated.
G*Power (Erdfelder, Faul, & Buchner, 1996) was designed as a general stand-alone power analysis program for statistical tests commonly used in social and behavioral research. G*Power 3 is a major extension of, and improvement over, the previous versions. It runs on widely used computer platforms (i.e., Windows XP, Windows Vista, and Mac OS X 10.4) and covers many different statistical tests of the t, F, and chi2 test families. In addition, it includes power analyses for z tests and some exact tests. G*Power 3 provides improved effect size calculators and graphic options, supports both distribution-based and design-based input modes, and offers all types of power analyses in which users might be interested. Like its predecessors, G*Power 3 is free.
Conducted a meta-analysis of flight simulation research to identify important characteristics associated with the effectiveness of simulator training. Some 247 articles, research reports, and technical reports were located, from which 26 experiments were identified as having sufficient information for statistical meta-analysis. The major finding was that the use of simulators combined with aircraft training consistently produced improvements in training for jets compared to aircraft training only. Use of motion cuing added little to the training environments for jets. The average effectiveness of performance-paced training was greater than that for lock-step training. In general, training outcomes appear to be influenced considerably by the type of task and the amount and type of training given. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2014 APA, all rights reserved)
Knowing whether an individual prefers the left or right hand for skilled activities is important to researchers in experimental psychology and neuroscience. The current study reports on a new measure of skilled hand preference derived from the Provins and Cunliffe (1972) handedness inventory. Undergraduates (n = 3324) indicated their lateral preference for their hands, feet, eyes and ears. A measure of hand performance and familial handedness was also obtained. Factor analysis identified ten items that loaded on skilled hand preference and these were included in the new FLANDERS questionnaire. Cluster analysis of the new questionnaire revealed three distinct groups (left-, mixed- & right-handed). The new test showed a strong association with other measures of lateral preference and hand performance. Scores on the test were also related to the sex of the respondent and the hand preference of their parents. The FLANDERS provides a measure of skilled hand preference that is easy to administer and understand and should be useful for experimenters wanting to screen for hand preference.
An experiment assessed whether novice table-tennis players' ball-balancing and bouncing skills could predict their performances after a semester of being coached. A pretest-posttest design was used to test this hypothesis with 82 male and 77 female physical education students who initially performed the skills and subsequently participated in a round-robin tournament. Moderate negative but significant (p<.01) Spearman rank-order correlation coefficients were obtained between some of the ball control skills scores and overall ranking in the table-tennis tournament.
Virtual reality (VR) is typically defined in terms of technological hardware. This paper attempts to cast a new, variable-based definition of virtual reality that can be used to classify virtual reality in relation to other media. The defintion of virtual reality is based on concepts of "presence" and "telepresence," which refer to the sense of being in an environment, generated by natural or mediated means, respectively. Two technological dimensions that contribute to telepresence, vividness and interactivity, are discussed. A variety of media are classified according to these dimensions. Suggestions are made for the application of the new definition of virtual reality within the field of communication research. s t ) - r technologies social responses to communication c SRCT Paper #104 Page 3 Jonathan Steuer Defining VR: Dimensions Determining Telepresence Defining Virtual Reality: Dimensions Determining Telepresence Virtual reality (VR) has typically been portrayed as a medium, l...