A Study on Virtual Reality Workspace to Improve Work Efficiency

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In order to create a present lighting environment, in the initial design stage of the virtual model, we increased the brightness of the model and used natural light sources instead of ordinary light sources to make the light fill the entire virtual space.

For the requirement of enough natural light, we designed some large floor-to-ceiling windows to replace the walls on either side of the VRWS. Moved the virtual worker’s desk beside the floor-to-ceiling window to allow the users to enjoy the beautiful natural scenery outside the floor-to-ceiling window.

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For privacy protection, we designed VRWS that could not share their workspace but use it one by one. In the VRWS experiment, an HMD with a computer and mouse was provided to the participants to complete the experiment. The HMD used in this experiment is Acer Windows Mixed Reality headset AH101. Each participant experimented alone in this setting. Through the above steps, we developed the VRWS.

Comparative Experiments

In total, 20 people participated in the experiment, including 9 females and 11 males, who were between the ages of 24 and 30.

All the participants were fluent in English. Before the start of the experiment, we assigned all participants randomly to groups A, B, C, and D. Each group consists of five participants. Among them, group A and C performed OPWS experiments before VRWS experiments. Group B and D performed the experiments in the reverse order. Each experiment should be controlled within 25 minutes, and after the experiment, a questionnaire was issued. After the experiments, all the data and questionnaires were collected to compare OPWS and VRWS.

Cognitive Assessment Battery Test

In this experiment, each participant was required to complete his/her 'work' in OPWS and VRWS. Therefore, we adopted the CAB (Cognitive Assessment Battery) test consisted of no language-based questions with only numbers and pictures. This test would avoid deviation, such as different understanding speeds and understanding difficulty caused by different languages.

The purpose of the CAB test is to measure people's logical thinking ability. Thus, in this 'work' process, the participants were expected to concentrate on solving the test as an essential requirement. We assumed that there was a relationship between the CAB test results and work efficiency.

Every participant received an electronic test containing 45 questions. Each test question had four options. In order to rule out errors due to condition differences, the participants were requested to not use all tools except a mouse during the answering process in both settings. Some examples of the CAB test are shown in Fig. 5.

At the same time, these three kinds of test questions would appear in the same proportion in each set of test papers for each participant.

Questionnaire

In order to use the SD method for evaluation, the expression phrases in the questionnaire were designed with reference to Research on Emotional Engineering [12] and Versatility of Building Language Description [13]. The set adjective pairs are shown in Table I. The reason for choosing these phrases is because they can express people’s feelings where they are at the workspace.

The evaluation scale in this experiment was divided into seven levels. A small value is for a negative evaluation, and a large value is for a positive evaluation.

Results

The more correct answers and the less time it took means, the more efficient the subjects worked. Similarly, the more correct answers per unit time one got, the more efficient one worked. Thus, we calculate the difference between the number of correct results of the CAB test in each subject's OPWS and VRWS and the difference between the times taken in the two experiments.

For the questionnaire, the adjective pairs are compared with the average of the two groups’ results. As shown in Fig. 7, lower points are negative evaluations, and higher points are positive evaluations.

In order to ensure the validity of this study, a t-test (student's t-test) was used to analyze the data further. In this study, SPSSAU was used for data analysis.

Before performing the t-test, we should confirm the normality of the sample. Because the number of sample data from the CAB test and questionnaire were all less than 50, so the Shapiro-Wilk test was chosen.

Through the Shapiro-Wilk test, although some sample data were considered to have no normality traits because their P-values were under 0.05. However, their absolute value of Kurtosis were all less than 10, and the absolute value of Skewness were all less than 3. So even some sample data were not the standard normal distribution but basically can accept as a normal distribution. Therefore, all the sample data can be considered to follow the normal distribution. So, we adopt the t-test to analyze the sample data.

T-test results on the CAB test are shown in Table II, and t-test results on the questionnaire are shown in Table III.

TABLE III. T-TEST RESULTS ON QUESTIONNAIRE

t-test

Question Number Environment(average ± SD) t p

OPWS(N=20) VRWS(N=20)

Q1 5.30 ± 0.98 2.90 ± 1.25 6.753 0.000

Q2 5.10 ± 1.21 2.95 ± 1.00 6.13 0.000

Q3 5.05 ± 1.39 2.80 ± 1.20 5.476 0.00

Q4 4.65 ± 1.39 3.95 ± 0.89 1.901 0.066

Q5 3.00 ± 1.08 2.40 ± 0.94 1.878 0.068

Q6 4.10 ± 1.17 3.95 ± 1.10 0.419 0.678

Q7 5.70 ± 0.86 2.95 ± 1.15 8.568 0.000

Q8 4.70 ± 1.22 4.15 ± 1.14 1.476 0.148

Q9 5.20 ± 0.89 2.50 ± 1.15 8.301 0.000

Q10 4.30 ± 0.86 3.65 ± 1.23 1.938 0.06

Q11 4.00 ± 1.12 4.15 ± 1.35 -0.382 0.704

Q12 3.60 ± 1.64 3.60 ± 1.10 0 1

Q13 5.50 ± 1.10 2.35 ± 1.09 9.098 0.000

Q14 5.40 ± 1.39 2.10 ± 0.72 9.424 0.000

Q15 4.55 ± 1.43 3.85 ± 0.81 1.901 0.067

Q16 4.70 ± 1.42 4.00 ± 1.03 1.789 0.082

From Table II, we can know that the Correct Answer is non-significant different (0.1 < p), and Time Difference is marginally significant different (0.05 < p < 0.1).

From Table III, Q1, Q2, Q3, Q7, Q9, Q13, and Q14 are significantly different (p < 0.01). Q4, Q5, Q10, Q15, and Q16 are marginally significant different (0.05 < p < 0.1). Also, Q6, Q8, Q11, and Q12 are non-significant different (0.1 < p).

Discussion

In this research, each experiment was only conducted for about 25 minutes, so we guessed that the time was not long enough to make a significant differences in the number of Correct Answer and Difference in Time between the two experiments.

A small number of participants could not bear the noisy environment in OPWS. In order to leave as soon as possible, they completed the CAB test at the fastest speed possible while giving the correct answer as much as possible. Therefore, these participants believed that although they could not bear the unbearable interference in OPWS, from the perspective of the results, the work efficiency has improved.

From OPWS to VRWS, although it was more beneficial for participants to answer CAB tests, it was impossible to make difficult questions easier just because the environment changed better, so the Correct Answer was no significant difference.

The results of Q14 shows an effect of sufficient separation of auditory interference by noise-canceling earphones. At the same time, we believe that the no auditory interference environment also has positive effect on the results of many significant and marginally significant items.

The results of Q1, Q7, Q9, and Q13 indicates the floor-to-ceiling windows greatly improves the subject's vision. The virtual nature environment surrounding the VRWS gave the subjects more natural feeling. Because of the floor-to-ceiling windows, it was easier for natural light through the windows to enter the room.

As shown in the results of Q2, Q3, and Q9, compared with the noisy environment of OPWS, the elegant and comfortable virtual environment design and private use features could play a role in preventing psychological pressure.

HMD must be worn when using VRWS. There might be a negative effect on the physical sense, but the impact was not significant from the results of Q4, Q10, Q15, and Q16.

The CAVE system used in this experiment has good lighting effects, so the participants did not strongly feel the difference in lighting effects between the two experiments from the result of Q5.

There is no difference between Q15 and Q16 because wearing HMD could be an obstacle to face-to-face communication. As considered other network communication methods such as e-mail, HMD only caused communication failure in certain situations.

Most of the participants rejected the use of HMD for a long time. The main reasons were: the weight and volume of HMD put an extra burden on long-term work, virtual reality might cause vertigo. VRWS did not have sufficient input support and HMD cooling problems. These reasons have led to the results of Q6, Q8, and Q11.

The participants did not notice the visual interference problem in OPWS from the result of Q12. HMD was a display device wrapped around the eyes of the user, and the user could no longer feel the external visual interference theoretically. Considering that the CAVE system was used to simulate OPWS in the comparative experiment, the busy scene in the noisy OPWS was displayed in 2D by several projection surfaces around the participants in the CAVE system, which might affect the psychological reality of visual interference. Thereby, they reduced the intensity of interference. Furthermore, the contrast effect between OPWS and VRWS in Q12 in movement was not significant.

Conclusion and Future Work

Throughout the experiments, it was hard to confirm that VRWS could maintain or improve work efficiency. Aiming at work efficiency, the conclusions of OPWS related research maybe can use as a design standard for VRWS. Through this research, we can know VRWS has generally received higher evaluations and has more significant positive evaluations on Relaxing, Enjoyable, and Not noisy in sound. Using VRWS based on OPWS related research conclusions as to the design standard, compared to OPWS, people can get a wider virtual vision environment, can reduce the psychological pressure, feel a freer atmosphere, enjoy the office process more, and have a quieter office. Also, VRWS may be more comfortable, may have better lighting effects, help generate positive emotions, increase work enthusiasm, and increase work efficiency.

For future work, firstly is to improve the defects of the VRWS input. Because wearing the HMD cannot see the surrounding environment, using the keyboard, paper, pen, and other tasks will become difficult. Through the camera connected to the HMD, the keyboard, paper, and pen can be recognized and displayed in VRWS, which is convenient for users. This also means turning VRWS into ARWS (Augmented Reality Workspace). In addition, for the virtual environment part of VRWS, consider the ability to implement customize-ability for it, which will further improve the practicality of VRWS and improve work efficiency.