The Human Muscular Arm Avatar as an Interactive Visualization Tool in Learning Anatomy: Medical Students’ Perspectives

The perception of body ownership creates a sense of embodiment, which can be a powerful learning tool. Embodied learning can occur by watching an individual's body movement and also via human–computer interactions, such as virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR). In this article, we designed and implemented a novel virtual body-ownership AR/VR tool for human anatomy—the human muscular arm avatar (HMAA). HMAA utilizes embodiment-based body ownership to explore the human hand/forearm musculature. The HMAA was trialed with medical students to explore the extent to which it could be used to aid student learning. The key findings of the usability study suggest that 98% (
N
= 100) of students found the tool extremely useful; 83% reported that the tool allowed them to engage with the learning materials, peers, and content effectively. Also, 10% of students mentioned that the HMAA fostered an embodied learning experience. This triggered an intentional exploration of instances suggesting embodiment in the data. HMAA is believed to have allowed individuals to visualize and conceptualize abstract ideas that would have been otherwise challenging using static models. The outcomes of this article indicate the significant potential of body-ownership-based self-learning tools for anatomy. However, further studies using learning outcomes are needed to investigate the potential advantages of body-ownership-based tools compared to current learning techniques.