Exploring Effective Real-Time Ergonomic Guidance Methods for Immersive Virtual Reality Workspace
Ruihua Ji, Zhuang Chang, S. Wang, Mark Billinghurst · 2024
Studying and working in Virtual Reality (VR) provides an immersive experience and enables free body movement for input. However, poor working posture in VR can result in discomfort and even lead to musculoskeletal problems over time. In this work, we explore how to use Mediapipe Blazepose to provide effective real-time ergonomic posture guidance methods in a virtual office environment using (1) auditory, (2) visual, and (3) combined auditory-visual cues. We do this in a within-subject design user study comparing these three conditions and a baseline condition where no guidance is provided. Our results indicate that all three guidance conditions significantly improved users’ ergonomic posture maintenance compared with the baseline condition. However, we found that the combined auditory-visual guidance is the most effective and preferred method. We also discuss multi-modal interaction methods, privacy concerns, and directions for future research.