Supporting Playful Rehabilitation in the Home using Virtual Reality Headsets and Force Feedback Gloves

Virtual Reality (VR) is a promising platform for home rehabilitation with the potential to completely immerse users within a playful experience. To explore this area we design, implement, and evaluate a system that uses a VR headset in conjunction with force feed-back gloves to present users with a playful experience for home rehabilitation. The system immerses the user within a virtual cat bathing simulation that allows users to practice fine motor skills by progressively completing three cat-care tasks. The study results demonstrate the positive role that playfulness may play in the user experience of VR rehabilitation.