About this Research Topic
Extended Reality (XR) combines elements of the real world with digital information and therefore provides great opportunities for training due to the possibility of providing an immersive, realistic yet safe, reproducible, and controllable training environments. Training is an inherently collaborative effort, with trainees and trainers working together to achieve specific goals. Recently, we have seen considerable effort to use virtual training environments (VTEs) in demanding training contexts, e.g. first responder training, assembly training, etc. For such contexts, trainers and trainees must undertake various roles as supervisors, adaptors, role players, and observers in training, making collaboration complex, but essential for training success. These multi-user aspects for collaborative VTEs have received little investigation so far. In this Research Topic we emphasize contributions that address potential and perspectives of VTEs.
Collaboration between trainers, trainers and trainee(s), and trainees in VTEs
The interplay between the trainer, who sets and controls the training, and the trainees, who participate in the training, is a promising field for research. XR training builds competencies for instructors as well as trainees. Sharing a virtual environment fosters empathy, allowing the trainer to walk around and truly observe students as they experience the training scenarios. An instructor can annotate mistakes and provide constructive feedback in real-time. The student can correct themselves while the instruction is still fresh in their minds. Additionally, the training session can also be recorded and replayed later in 3D to evaluate and review trainees and/or trainers in order to further improve the trained skills.
Novel collaborative interfaces for VTEs
Multi-user aspects for truly collaborative VTEs have received far less investigation so far, as many systems are designed for single-person use only. Therefore, this a fruitful topic to explore which interaction approaches and interfaces are needed to provide meaningful cooperation and support the work of multiple persons with different roles and abilities (e.g. trainer and trainees). The user experience and quality of the experience are also important aspects that need to be investigated when designing and developing VTEs.
Ethics and Accessibility
XR training - especially when used in professional and / or mandatory training - might have a strong effect on trainees’ careers and lives. Therefore, ethical and societal implications need to be researched and discussed. Similar, accessibility of the training needs to be ensured to not exclude persons with disabilities and/or others that are less technology-literate.
Collaboration between trainers, trainers and trainee(s), and trainees in VTEs
- Innovative interaction concepts between trainer and trainee in XR (role plays, how to create a social bond/connection between trainer and trainee, collaboration between different trainer functions, etc.)
- Live manipulation of the virtual environment by the trainer in XR allowing the trainer to change context and situation
- Real-time performance measurements in XR and use of dashboards to visualize those measurements
- Use of bio-signal measurements (heart rate, heart rate variability, eye tracking, etc.) for adaptive, individualized training, including automatized context-changes depending on the measurements.
- Didactic concepts for training in XR (e.g. familiarization, strategies to foster transfer and retention etc.)
- How to best integrate and combine traditional and virtual training
- Methods for evaluating learning and quality of collaboration in VTEs
Collaboration between trainers, trainers and trainee(s), and trainees in VTEs
The interplay between the trainer, who sets and controls the training, and the trainees, who participate in the training, is a promising field for research. XR training builds competencies for instructors as well as trainees. Sharing a virtual environment fosters empathy, allowing the trainer to walk around and truly observe students as they experience the training scenarios. An instructor can annotate mistakes and provide constructive feedback in real-time. The student can correct themselves while the instruction is still fresh in their minds. Additionally, the training session can also be recorded and replayed later in 3D to evaluate and review trainees and/or trainers in order to further improve the trained skills.
Novel collaborative interfaces for VTEs
Multi-user aspects for truly collaborative VTEs have received far less investigation so far, as many systems are designed for single-person use only. Therefore, this a fruitful topic to explore which interaction approaches and interfaces are needed to provide meaningful cooperation and support the work of multiple persons with different roles and abilities (e.g. trainer and trainees). The user experience and quality of the experience are also important aspects that need to be investigated when designing and developing VTEs.
Ethics and Accessibility
XR training - especially when used in professional and / or mandatory training - might have a strong effect on trainees’ careers and lives. Therefore, ethical and societal implications need to be researched and discussed. Similar, accessibility of the training needs to be ensured to not exclude persons with disabilities and/or others that are less technology-literate.
Collaboration between trainers, trainers and trainee(s), and trainees in VTEs
- Innovative interaction concepts between trainer and trainee in XR (role plays, how to create a social bond/connection between trainer and trainee, collaboration between different trainer functions, etc.)
- Live manipulation of the virtual environment by the trainer in XR allowing the trainer to change context and situation
- Real-time performance measurements in XR and use of dashboards to visualize those measurements
- Use of bio-signal measurements (heart rate, heart rate variability, eye tracking, etc.) for adaptive, individualized training, including automatized context-changes depending on the measurements.
- Didactic concepts for training in XR (e.g. familiarization, strategies to foster transfer and retention etc.)
- How to best integrate and combine traditional and virtual training
- Methods for evaluating learning and quality of collaboration in VTEs
Keywords: Extended Reality XR), Virtual Reality (VR), Augmented Reality (AR), Virtual Training Environments (VTE), User Experience (UX), Interaction Design, Computer Supported Cooperative Work (CSCW)
Important Note: All contributions to this Research Topic must be within the scope of the section and journal to which they are submitted, as defined in their mission statements. Frontiers reserves the right to guide an out-of-scope manuscript to a more suitable section or journal at any stage of peer review.
