Unconscious Elapsed Time Perception Controller Considering Unintentional Change of Illusion: Designing Visual Stimuli Presentation Method to Control Filled-Duration Illusion on Visual Interface and Exploring Unintentional Factors That Reverse Trend of Illusion

Delays (wait times) often occur in computer use, and an illusion changing the subjective elapsed time can occur unintentionally due to perceptual stimuli from computer interfaces. Since this can adversely affect users’ experience and state of mind, investigating and manipulating such an illusion with computer interfaces has been an important topic for many years. While many studies have focused on visual interfaces, few studies examine these two research directions: 1) the possibility that illusion-manipulation methods verified under specific conditions may cause illusions to have completely different trends due to certain factors and 2) the feasibility of illusion-manipulation methods for changing the subjective elapsed time by using only visual stimuli in a small space at the edge of the field of view/screen. Therefore, this study verified these two directions. We designed two methods for changing the frequency and duration of visual stimuli. We also designed two visualization styles: the blinking visualization style and vibration visualization style. Three evaluations were conducted. First, the results showed the feasibility of illusion-manipulation methods using visual stimuli in a small space at the edge of the field of view/screen. The subjective elapsed time changed with a constant trend from −8.9 to 0.6% in 10 seconds. Second, the results showed that the trend in elapsed time of illusions caused by the same visual stimulus pattern could change when different visualization styles were used. Specifically, when using the method of changing the duration of visual stimuli, the increase or decrease in the subjective elapsed time was reversed depending on whether the blinking or visualization style was used. Third, the results showed that the trend in elapsed time of illusions caused by visual stimuli could change when there is visual information other than illusion-inducing visual stimuli (i.e., when some of the user’s attention is diverted to something other than illusion-inducing visual stimuli). Specifically, when using the method of changing the frequency of visual stimuli, the increase or decrease in subjective elapsed time was reversed depending on whether there was visual information other than illusion-inducing visual stimuli (e.g., an advertisement video, a first-person perspective movie of walking outdoors). These results could provide new insights for designers, researchers, and users to explore and consider the illusion of changing the subjective elapsed time with visual interfaces.