ISL, Researchers Create Unique Experiment for Innovative Pedestrian Distraction Study

Kramer


Kaczmarski


Neider

After successfully navigating his way across the busy street, psychology researcher Art Kramer decides to attempt the crossing again and ends up taking one for science. "You've been hit. Better luck next time," booms a mellifluous, paternalistic voice from above.

Kramer is walking on a treadmill situated in the center of the CAVE™, a 3-D virtual reality immersive environment operated by the Beckman Institute's Integrated Systems Laboratory (ISL) that features three wall-sized display screens in front and on both sides, and another on the floor. Kramer recovers from his encounter with the simulated automobile and lets collaborator and Beckman Fellow Mark Neider take his turn in this newest addition to the world of virtual reality psychology experiments. Neider also successfully crosses the street but he, too, wants to experience the sensation of standing in the path of oncoming traffic.

"You've been hit. Better luck next time." The voice, like the cars, street, and building on the screens is artificial – an AT&T software version of human sound. The images of moving cars were downloaded from the Internet and the street and building images are from pictures of University campus locales taken by Jim Crowell, ISL's triple threat experiment designer/psychologist/ computer programmer.

Crowell, Kramer, and Neider are in the CAVE this mid-August afternoon fleshing out the final form of an experiment that is groundbreaking in its design and in its research focus. It also marks the first time the CAVE has ever been used for an experimental study, said ISL Director Hank Kaczmarski.

The meeting in the Beckman basement home of the CAVE is the culmination of a seven- to eight-month long collaborative process between Crowell and Kaczmarski from ISL and Kramer and Neider, with input from Beckman faculty member Jason McCarley. The study being done by Neider and Kramer involves the topic of pedestrian distraction during traffic situations.

Kaczmarski said designing for experiments almost always includes incorporating something novel, so installing a modified treadmill into the CAVE for the pedestrian study "was a pretty typical process."