Search Results (6)

Dyslexia is a highly prevalent learning disability characterized by deficits in specific cognitive and linguistic skills which impair accurate and fluent reading of written words. Intensive, comprehensive, multicomponent interventions are effective in improving outcomes for students with dyslexia, but effective curriculum delivery has traditionally required an educator with substantial training. Many school systems lack sufficient staff with this level of expertise to successfully meet the needs of all their struggling readers. Towards this end, a technology-assisted dyslexia intervention was developed to provide teacher support through a virtual human avatar, resulting in significantly reduced training time while maintaining the comprehensive scope and structure of a traditional intervention model. This paper evaluates the comparative efficacy of the tech-assisted delivery model and the traditional model across two independent substudies. Results from quasi-experimental observational substudies in both laboratory school (n = 82) and public-school (n = 157) samples demonstrate non-inferiority, i.e., comparable student progress in reading and spelling, of the tech-assisted instruction compared to the traditional delivery model. Furthermore, despite differences in the educator training model, implementation fidelity was equivalently strong (>90%) in both groups. Findings provide encouraging evidence towards the scalability of effective dyslexia intervention by providing technology-based support at the level of the teacher. Implications for practice and questions for future research are discussed. Full article

The three-dimensional (3D) body scanning technology has impacted various fields, from digital anthropometry to healthcare. This paper provides an exhaustive review of the existing literature on applications of 3D body scanning technology in human-centered work. Our systematic analysis of Web of Science and Scopus journal articles revealed six critical themes: product development, healthcare, body shape, anthropometric measurement, avatar creation, and body image. Three-dimensional body scanning technology is used to design and develop ergonomically coherent and fit products. In addition to its application in clothing, footwear, and furniture, its non-invasive and rapid image-capturing capabilities make it an attractive tool for clinical diagnostics and evaluations in healthcare. Given the exponential growth of digital interfaces, 3D avatars and body forms have gained popularity, and scanners facilitate their growth and adoption. The creation of anthropometric databases for various populations, from children to boomers and from adolescents to pregnant women, has been made possible with body scanning technology and has been helpful in several applications. This review highlights the growing importance of 3D body scanning technology in various contexts and provides a foundation for researchers and practitioners seeking to understand its utility and implications. Full article

With the rise of head-mounted displays (HMDs), immersive virtual reality (IVR) for second-language learning is gaining attention. However, current methods fail to fully exploit IVR’s potential owing to the use of abstract avatars and limited human perspectives in learning experiences. This study investigated IVR’s novel potential by using non-human avatars to understand complex concepts. We developed a system for learning English vocabulary through the actions of non-human avatars, offering a unique learning perspective. This paper presents an IVR vocabulary learning environment with a dragon avatar and compares word retention rates (immediate and one-week memory tests), subjective workload, and emotional changes with traditional methods. We also examined the vocabulary ranges that are teachable using this system by varying the number of avatars. The results showed that the proposed method significantly reduced forgotten English words after one week compared to traditional methods, indicating its effectiveness in the long term. Full article

As an artificial space extended from the physical environment, the virtual environment (VE) provides more possibilities for humans to work and be entertained with less physical restrictions. Benefiting from anonymity, one of the important features of VEs, users are able to receive visual stimuli that might differ from the physical environment through digital representations presented in VEs. Avatars and contextual cues in VEs can be considered as digital representations of users and contexts. In this article, we analyzed 21 articles that examined the creativity-boosting effects of different digital user and contextual representations. We summarized the main effects induced by these two digital representations, notably the effect induced by the self-similar avatar, Proteus effect, avatar with Social Identity Cues, priming effect induced by contextual representation, and embodied metaphorical effect. In addition, we examined the influence of immersion on creativity by comparing non-immersive and immersive VEs (i.e., desktop VE and headset VE, respectively). Last, we discussed the roles of embodiment and presence in the creativity in VEs, which were overlooked in the past research. Full article

Artificial Intelligence (AI) changed our world in various ways. People start to interact with a variety of intelligent systems frequently. As the interaction between human and AI systems increases day by day, the factors influencing their communication have become more and more important, especially in the field of human-agent negotiation. In this study, our aim is to investigate the effect of knowing your negotiation partner (i.e., opponent) with limited knowledge, particularly the effect of familiarity with the opponent during human-agent negotiation so that we can design more effective negotiation systems. As far as we are aware, this is the first study investigating this research question in human-agent negotiation settings. Accordingly, we present a human-agent negotiation framework and conduct a user experiment in which participants negotiate with an avatar whose appearance and voice are a replica of a celebrity of their choice and with an avatar whose appearance and voice are not familiar. The results of the within-subject design experiment show that human participants tend to be more collaborative when their opponent is a celebrity avatar towards whom they have a positive feeling rather than a non-celebrity avatar. Full article

Halitosis is a highly distressing, socially unaesthetic condition, with a very high incidence amongst the adult population. It predominantly arises from excessive oral cavity volatile sulphur compound (VSC) concentrations, which have either oral or extra-oral etiologies (90–95% and 5–10% of cases, respectively). However, reports concerning age- and gender-related influences on the patterns and concentrations of these malodorous agents remain sparse; therefore, this study’s first objective was to explore the significance and impact of these potential predictor variables on the oral cavity levels of these malodorants. Moreover, because non-oral etiologies for halitosis may represent avatars of serious extra-oral diseases, the second objective was to distinguish between etiology- (source-) dependent patterns of oral cavity VSCs. Oral cavity VSC determinations were performed on 116 healthy human participants using a non-stationary gas chromatographic facility, and following a 4 h period of abstention from all non-respiratory oral activities. Participants were grouped according to ages or age bands, and gender. Statistical analyses of VSC level data acquired featured both univariate/correlation and multivariate (MV) approaches. Factorial analysis-of-variance and MV analyses revealed that the levels of all VSCs monitored were independent of both age and gender. Principal component analysis (PCA) and a range of further MV analysis techniques, together with an agglomerative hierarchal clustering strategy, demonstrated that VSC predictor variables were partitioned into two components, the first arising from orally-sourced H₂S and CH₃SH, the second from extra-orally-sourced (CH₃)₂S alone (about 55% and 30% of total variance respectively). In conclusion, oral cavity VSC concentrations appear not to be significantly influenced by age and gender. Furthermore, (CH₃)₂S may serve as a valuable biomarker for selected extra-oral conditions. Full article