A hybrid control strategy for capturing cognitive processes in virtual reality (VR) in a natural and efficient way

When using virtual reality (VR) to study cognitive processes, the user’s sensory input and motor output in the virtual setting should closely resemble the actual physical signals. For extended VR settings, in which users can freely navigate substantial distances, this becomes challenging, as the virtual movement cannot be matched in the real world for space constraints. It has been suggested that performing rotations in the physical world, while keeping translational movements purely virtual, may present a good compromise. However, most such control strategies use head orientation as input to determine the virtual movement direction and/or require additional tracking hardware. Using the head to control the virtual locomotion is problematic when the objective of the VR investigation relates to attention or gaze. For such research topics, it is critical to avoid confounding gaze and head orientation with commands for moving in the VR. Here, we propose a control strategy that combines virtual translation with physical body rotation to control VR locomotion. This leaves the head free from navigational control and allows studying attention, gaze and other cognitive processes in naturalistic settings and large, complex virtual environments. Importantly, we achieve this by standard software and hardware, which is part of typical consumer-grade VR bundles.