Immersive Field Research Articles

Navigating the digital revolution and crisis times: humanitarian and innovation-inspired leadership through the pandemic

PurposeThis article examines the leadership vision, values and vigilance of an emerging markets logistics firm in managing customer and humanitarian concerns and critical supply chains during the COVID-19 pandemic. The study explores how an emerging markets firm has contributed to global supply chain mobility and vaccine distribution in the pandemic – keeping cargo moving – drawing on vision, values and vigilance, including attention to the innovation momentum of the firm.Design/methodology/approachThe article concentrates on an exemplar firm, leader and management team to illustrate challenges of helmsmanship during the pandemic for an emerging markets firm, Agility, that operates worldwide in numerous developed and developing economy markets. The article develops a case study analyzing how Agility has met the simultaneous challenges for innovation and transformation in the digital revolution and navigation through the crisis times of the global pandemic. The analysis derives from direct management communications, corporate documents and media sources.FindingsThe vision, values and vigilance of the leadership, with emphasis on digital innovations and disruptions, digital supply chains, humanitarian partnerships, focusing both globally and on emerging markets, and nurturing smaller as well as larger businesses, have enabled the firm to thrive. Given the importance of global supply chains during COVID-19, Agility is a pivotal example of partnering with governments and pharmaceutical companies worldwide in delivering the new array of vaccines, as well as personal protective equipment and other medical supplies, in the battle against the pandemic. Agility in addition illustrates the strategic value of partnering with other logistics firms in humanitarian collaborations as well as in business strategy transactions.Research limitations/implicationsThe article contributes to the emergent research stream on leadership, innovation and internationalization in the Arabian Gulf Cooperation Council and Middle East North Africa (GCC/MENA) region and more generally on the strengths and proficiencies of emerging market firms and leaders. Future research could examine additional firms, industries or regions of the world during the pandemic or other crisis contexts. Further data sources and analyses can be used in validating and extending the findings.Practical implicationsDigital supply chains, humanitarian partnerships and an emphasis on digital communications, storage and transportation innovations can benefit firms from all regions of the world during the global pandemic and other crises, as well as in normal operations.Social implicationsEmerging markets represent the majority of global population and economic growth, as well as of pandemic cases and mortality risk, signifying the importance of leadership, collaboration and innovation around issues such as vaccine delivery into emerging markets regions of the world.Originality/valueThe article takes a revelatory case perspective in the pandemic crisis context from a unique foundation of immersive field research and data access in the GCC/MENA) region.

Teachers’ perceptions of exploiting immersive virtual field trips for learning in primary education

This study aimed to understand what role teachers consider the immersive virtual field trip (VFT) system to play in primary school classrooms. There were 19 teachers' perceptions of immersive VFTs for educational purposes explored. The interview transcripts were analyzed using the phenomenographic method. The results showed that, for usability issues, three categories: lack of interaction, language affordance, and hardware and network problems, were generated from the teachers' concerns. The teachers proposed three ideas: instructional scaffolding, microscopic scale, and localized content, for immersive VFT systems and content design. Regarding learning influences, the teachers considered that the learning by immersive VFTs may provide the benefits of: enriching experiences, increasing motivation, understanding abstract concepts, and fostering inquiry learning. The teachers suggested five instructional approaches: advance organizer, learning extension, learning evaluation, collaboration, and role playing for the implementation of immersive VFTs in classrooms. These findings could benefit future development of immersive VFT learning systems.

Examination of changes in output diameter to improve producing Immersive Sound Field by air jet

Examination of changes in output diameter to improve producing Immersive Sound Field by air jet

Has robotic prostatectomy determined the fall of the laparoscopic approach?

Robotic-assisted laparoscopic prostatectomy (RALP) has revolutionised the surgical management of localised prostate cancer in the modern era. The surgeon is provided with greater precision, more versatile dexterity and an immersive three-dimensional visual field. The impressive hardware facilitates, for example, the dissection of the peri-prostatic fascia, whilst preserving the neurovascular bundle, or the suturing of the vesico-urethral anastomosis. Prior to RALP, laparoscopic radical prostatectomy (LRP) represented the first venture into the minimally invasive world. Associated with more cumbersome ergonomics, LRP has a significant learning curve compared with the robotic approach. There has been a paucity, until recently, of high-quality literature comparing outcomes between the two operations, including the attainment of the Pentafecta of survivorship: biochemical recurrence-free, continence, potency, no postoperative complications and negative surgical margins.

Intuiting a Monsoonal Ethnography in Three Bay of Bengal Cities

This visual essay offers an exploration of monsoonal materiality and agency in the urban environments of three cities situated around the Bay of Bengal: Chennai, Dhaka and Yangon. The text and images emerge from Monsoon Assemblages, a research project exploring intersections between changing monsoon climates and rapid urbanization in South Asia. Multi-modal, more-than-human ethnography has been employed during the course of research to explore how the lively materiality of the monsoon is entangled within urban lived environments. The essay outlines the process of intuiting a monsoonal ethnography and conveys the power of immersive field experience. By collecting and curating an assemblage of visual material and fieldnotes, this piece seeks to evoke the materiality and agency of the monsoon, itself a complex assemblage that manifests in different ways in different places. The juxtaposition of image and text conveys the generative and multifaceted agency of the monsoon and the urban environments it becomes enmeshed within.

“Just one person in the middle”: Ethics and political social work practice

Political social workers and other policy practitioners frequently lack explicit guidance from the NASW Code of Ethics as to how to navigate difficult ethical choices. This secondary analysis of qualitative data explores ways in which social work students encounter ethical challenges when practicing in a political setting. Secondary analysis was conducted with data from interviews with social work students. Interviews took place after students concluded an immersive field placement in a Southern part-time state legislature. Transcripts were coded deductively, with the NASW (2017) Code of Ethics’ six core values as an agreed-upon coding schema, using latent thematic analysis. Data also were examined to identify teleological or deontological approaches to ethical decision-making. Themes emerged relating to each of the profession’s core values. These include four themes related to social justice and to competence, three themes related to the importance of human relationships and to integrity, and one theme each related to service and to dignity and worth of the person. Both the absolutist deontological and the morally relativistic teleological approaches were evident in transcripts, with students tending to prefer one. Social work education must better prepare students and practitioners for the ethical challenges of practice in political and policy-making spaces. Challenges that emerge in practice of a political nature should be considered during the next Code of Ethics revisions.

Immersive light field video with a layered mesh representation

We present a system for capturing, reconstructing, compressing, and rendering high quality immersive light field video. We accomplish this by leveraging the recently introduced DeepView view interpolation algorithm, replacing its underlying multi-plane image (MPI) scene representation with a collection of spherical shells that are better suited for representing panoramic light field content. We further process this data to reduce the large number of shell layers to a small, fixed number of RGBA+depth layers without significant loss in visual quality. The resulting RGB, alpha, and depth channels in these layers are then compressed using conventional texture atlasing and video compression techniques. The final compressed representation is lightweight and can be rendered on mobile VR/AR platforms or in a web browser. We demonstrate light field video results using data from the 16-camera rig of [Pozo et al. 2019] as well as a new low-cost hemispherical array made from 46 synchronized action sports cameras. From this data we produce 6 degree of freedom volumetric videos with a wide 70 cm viewing baseline, 10 pixels per degree angular resolution, and a wide field of view, at 30 frames per second video frame rates. Advancing over previous work, we show that our system is able to reproduce challenging content such as view-dependent reflections, semi-transparent surfaces, and near-field objects as close as 34 cm to the surface of the camera rig.

How self-limiting mobilization works in Morocco

ABSTRACT This article draws on three years of immersive field experience to analyse the long-term effects of repression on contentious practices in Morocco. Informed by Charles Tilly’s insights about contentious practices, I show how activists from various organizations – the Moroccan Truth and Justice Forum; Islamists from Justice and Beneficence; and the February 20 Movement (the Moroccan manifestation of the Arab popular uprisings) – carefully chose the type of action they took, the number of people they mobilized, and the precise time and location of their actions. This self-limitation was based on their assessments of what authorities would tolerate. It allowed activists to continue their work without the dire consequences that occur during times of harsh repression.

The virtual field trip: Investigating how to optimize immersive virtual learning in climate change education

AbstractImmersive Virtual Reality (IVR) is being used for educational virtual field trips (VFTs) involving scenarios that may be too difficult, dangerous or expensive to experience in real life. We implemented an immersive VFT within the investigation phase of an inquiry‐based learning (IBL) climate change intervention. Students investigated the consequences of climate change by virtually traveling to Greenland and exploring albedo and greenhouse effects first hand. A total of 102 seventh and eighth grade students were randomly assigned to one of two instructional conditions: (1) narrated pretraining followed by IVR exploration or (2) the same narrated training material integrated within the IVR exploration. Students in both conditions showed significant increases in declarative knowledge, self‐efficacy, interest, STEM intentions, outcome expectations and intentions to change behavior from the pre‐ to post‐assessment. However, there was a significant difference between conditions favoring the pretraining group on a transfer test consisting of an oral presentation to a fictitious UN panel. The findings suggest that educators can choose to present important prerequisite learning content before or during a VFT. However, adding pretraining may lead to better transfer test performance, presumably because it helps reduce cognitive load while learning in IVR. Practitioner NotesWhat is already known about this topic? Immersive virtual reality (IVR) simulations lead to higher presence but may lead to less learning when the content is not designed based on the affordances of the technology. One explanation for this finding is that cognitive load may be higher in IVR. The pretraining principle (ie, individuals learn more deeply from interactive multimodal learning environments when they receive pretraining on relevant prior knowledge) can be particularly effective in IVR‐based learning compared to learning through a video. Evidence shows that instructional design principles such as segmentation and generative learning strategies such as summarization can improve learning in IVR simulations. What this paper adds An investigation of the value of two different approaches to designing immersive virtual field trips (VFTs) within a real educational middle school context. Evidence that VFTs featuring IVR climate change simulations, in the context of inquiry‐based learning (IBL), can increase important variables such as declarative knowledge, interest in science and intentions to take climate action in seventh and eighth grade students. Evidence that presenting important learning content before a VFT leads to higher transfer scores. Implications for practice and/or policy Implementing an immersive VFT within the context of an IBL intervention provides students with relevant and engaging learning experiences and results in increased knowledge and interest in science. In the design of instruction using VFTs, educators can choose to either present prerequisite learning content prior to a VFT or during a VFT. However, adding pretraining has an advantage in terms of higher transfer scores.

Examining Influences of an Early Whole-School Immersive Field Experience on Preservice Teachers

ABSTRACT Although much is known about the benefits of student teaching in developing preservice teachers, less is known about preservice teachers’ earlier field experiences at the freshman and sophomore academic levels. This study examined a student-led educational organization that provided an early, whole-school immersive field experience through the creation of the third space. The Whole-School Immersive Program (WISP) that created this third space brought together university faculty, preservice teachers, P-12 educators, and their administrators. Through a qualitative case study approach that utilized semi-structured focus group and individual interviews, alumni surveys, and participants’ applications, this study examined the program’s influences on preservice teachers. The findings indicated that these preservice teachers gained a deeper understanding of the school context, (dis)confirmed their desire to become educators, and gained knowledge of personal inquiry from participating in this student-led educational organization.

Students’ motivational beliefs and strategies, perceived immersion and attitudes towards science learning with immersive virtual reality: A partial least squares analysis

AbstractResearchers have been devoted to exploring the impacts of immersive virtual reality (IVR) on education in recent years. However, efforts to probe the role of students’ learning traits such as motivated strategies for learning in their IVR learning have been limited. Most studies commonly analyzed learners’ perceptions of immersion with a single construct rather than with multiple constructs. Therefore, this study implemented immersive virtual field trips for science learning in three elementary classes (a total of 76 students) for understanding how students’ inherent self‐efficacy, intrinsic value and self‐regulation for science learning related to their perceived immersion (ie, basic attention, temporal dissociation, transportation, emotional involvement, enjoyment) and attitudes (ie, perceived usefulness and behaviors of IVR learning) when engaging in IVR learning environments. The reliability and validity of the constructs in the PLS‐SEM path modeling were first confirmed. This study further identified that motivation of intrinsic value and self‐regulation may play a dominant role in the students’ learning attitudes in IVR environments for science education. It was also verified that the students’ immersive experiences of attention and enjoyment significantly mediated their IVR learning. Notably, the students with lower levels of self‐efficacy may have been more immersed in IVR environments and further held positive learning attitudes. The findings of this study have implications for practicing IVR‐related learning activities in elementary classrooms with considerations of learners’ psychological characteristics and perceived immersion when confronting IVR technology. Practitioner NotesWhat is already known about this topic Students’ motivational characteristics influences their learning in online environments. Students’ perceived immersion in VR learning context is related to their learning perceptions and predict positive affection. What this paper adds Understanding the structural relationships among young students’ motivational characteristics, perceived immersion, and learning attitudes towards their IVR learning. Identifying a dominant role of motivation of intrinsic value and self‐regulation in students’ learning attitudes in IVR environments for science education. Verifying the mediating effects of immersion on the relationships between motivational characteristics for science learning and learning attitudes. Implications for practice and/or policy IVR‐related learning activities in classrooms may benefit the students with low level of self‐efficacy for science learning. Scaffolding approaches (e.g., prompts for observing virtual elements) might be considered to support those students with limited self‐regulatory skills to learn science in the context of IVR. The immersion factors of basic attention and enjoyment were highlighted when designing or implementing IVR learning activities in classrooms.

Immersive virtual field trips and elementary students’ perceptions

AbstractIn response to the increased attention and interest related to the application of virtual reality with head‐mounted displays in education, this study examined the elementary students’ perceptions of using immersive virtual field trips (VFTs) in the classroom. Reflection papers from 25 students were analyzed and triangulated with field notes from class observations and teacher interviews. The content analysis revealed that VFTs were perceived to be efficient with regard to time and cost, to expand learning opportunities, but lacked physical interaction. Elementary students also suggested immersive VFTs are engaging, real, and provide an increased perception of virtual presence. However, they also expressed concerns about health and safety, psychological side effects, technical malfunctions, and low social interaction.

Twenty‐First‐Century Climate Education: Developing Diverse, Confident, and Competent Leaders in Environmental Sustainability

AbstractWith climate change impacting systems globally at alarming rates, the need for educating the next generation of environmental stewards is necessary. The Rocky Mountain Sustainability and Science Network (RMSSN) is an immersive field experience for undergraduate and graduate students interested in climate change and sustainability within National Parks. The program was established to educate and cultivate a diverse audience of future leaders, environmental guardians, and sustainability advocates with a focus on engaging underrepresented minorities (URM) in science. Participants were evaluated through efficacy instruments and focus groups to determine how a short‐term research experience could impact a student's future outlook and perceived ability to impact science and sustainability. Findings indicate URM, and majority students were more confident in their abilities, and more motivated to continue within their studies. RMSSN provides a framework that is translatable to other field‐based curriculums. This paper addresses specific engagement mechanisms for educating future science leaders.

Evaluation of the Presented Method Producing Immersive Sound Field by Oscillating Air-jet

Many systems employ a combination of vibrotactile information from transducers with acoustic information to produce immersive virtual sound field such as air vibration in a concert hall. Here, we propose a method to reproduce an immersive sound field on a user’s body by employing oscillating air-jet. In this paper, we report on and evaluate the reproducibility of the virtual sound field by the proposed method.

探究沉浸式电影与观者、场域融合的边界

探究沉浸式电影与观者、场域融合的边界

The value of being there: toward a science of immersive virtual field trips

With immersive experiences becoming a medium for mass communication, we need pedagogies as well as scientific, evidence-based design principles for immersive learning. To foster evidence-based designs of immersive learning, we detail an empirical evaluation of a geosciences field trip, common in undergraduate education across numerous disciplines. The study builds on a previously proposed research framework in which we detailed a basic taxonomy of virtual field trips distinguishing between basic, plus, and advanced immersive virtual field trip experiences. The experiment reported here expands the original evaluation of basic field trips into the realm of plus versions using pseudo-aerial $$360^{\circ }$$ imagery to provide embodied experiences that are not possible during the actual field trip. We also refined our original experimental design placing a stronger focus on the qualitative feedback elicited from the students. Results show an overwhelmingly positive response of students to virtual field trips with significantly higher-valued learning experience and enjoyment. Furthermore, the introduction of pseudo-aerial imagery (together with higher image resolution) shows a significant improvement in the participants spatial situation model. As contextualizing and spatially grounding is essential for place-based learning experiences, plus versions of virtual field trips have the potential to add value to the learning outcome and immersive virtual field trip experience. We discuss these encouraging results as well as critical feedback from the participants, such as the absence of touch in virtual experiences, and lay out our vision for the future of immersive learning experiences across environmental sciences.

Power practices around infrastructures in Glòries, Barcelona

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to investigate ways of practicing political power in public space in the interaction between central and marginal users in Glòries, an area under transformation in Barcelona. Originally conceived as the core of its extension, Glòries is now a battle field where conflictive spatial-social manifestations are strongly linked to pending conditions and partially implemented infrastructural projects. The key actors are in large majority illegal migrants, which activities and spatial strategies are particularly uncomfortable for city administrators; challenging the traditional focus on actors that are stable and institutionalized, included and previewed by the tools for urban projects implementation.Design/methodology/approachTo achieve insights on urban spatial articulations of appropriations by marginal actors around infrastructures, the method deployed is to look closely at the interplays between persecuted and persecutors and their ways of practicing power in space in the frame of the illegal street markets in Glòries. This is part of an ongoing PhD research on the complexity of involved processes. The research is executed in diverse work packages: mapping of material transformations (morphology, domain, accessibility and permeability), in diverse timeframes; surrounding functions and temporal fixities, appropriations catalysts; media presences and discussions; crossed references with immersive field work and exchange with locals.FindingsA broad variety of illegal street markets have been monitored in Glòries, revealing an increase in scale, frequency and levels of tension. Around them, their dynamic properties can be extracted and measured: spatial configurations, sizes, timeframes, number of traders/visitors, the relation to other elements, the strategies of displaying, displacing and dispersing used by the police. In all, the relationship with the infrastructural elements shows crucial and a better understanding of their relations constitutes a path to understand how both infrastructures and collective behavior contribute to dynamic productive and power logics in space.Originality/valueThis research and case study are an outstanding framework to explore the concrete spatial interactions and interplays of different power or territorialization processes, i.e. the strategies to denote presence and agency – in novel ways. Focusing on their spatial outcomes in contemporary transformation processes where infrastructures are dominant components is a way to inform the design, practice and implementation of city project and management.

Immersive virtual field trips in education: A mixed‐methods study on elementary students' presence and perceived learning

AbstractThe purpose of this study was to investigate the influence of immersive virtual field trips (VFTs) with head‐mounted displays (HMDs) on the presence and perceived learning. A mixed‐method approach was used to obtain an overall understanding of students' experiences with this immersive technology in an elementary classroom. Both quantitative and qualitative data were collected from 27 elementary‐school students through presence surveys and reflection papers. Statistical analyses were performed to compare immersive VFTs with traditional VFTs regarding students' virtual presence. Further, an inductive content analysis was performed to analyze reflection papers. The results showed an overall enhancement in virtual presence with the use of immersive VFTs. However, students felt that learning was not favorable with HMDs. The result of this study provides practical implications for the use of immersive VFTs in classroom settings.

Immersive field experiences lead to higher-level learning and translational impacts on students

Internships in STEM disciplines, especially in fields related to conservation and sustainability, have become more widespread in recent years. Such experiences are thought to go beyond traditional classroom learning and are now required as part of the curriculum in many programs. However, benefits of such internships have largely been presumed up to this point. In this work, we developed and tested a research question asking if there is a gradient of learning that occurs across immersive educational experiences. These range from low-level immersion classroom learning to highly immersive field internships. We found that student learning increases as the level of immersion increases. Furthermore, our findings suggest that highly immersive internships lead to more translational outcomes. This is based on values and dispositional changes relevant to research that are absent in lower-level immersive experiences. These findings suggest that highly immersive internships are likely to be key foundational experiences that help undergraduate student stakeholders develop a set of knowledge, skills, and abilities that are critical to a translational workforce in conservation and sustainability.

A case study of immersive virtual field trips in an elementary classroom: Students’ learning experience and teacher-student interaction behaviors

The academic evidence for examining the educational influences of immersive virtual reality (VR) with head-mounted displays (HMD) has been relatively limited until now, in particular for virtual field trips which allow teachers to guide students to explore learning elements in virtual environments. This study therefore invited 24 elementary school students to engage in an immersive virtual field trip which was part of a 2-week summer camp on the learning subject of social studies. The students' learning experiences (i.e., perceived presence, motivational beliefs change, and attitudes) were investigated and the teacher-student interaction behaviors in the learning activity were explored. The results showed that the students' motivation was generally enhanced, particularly for the diminishment of test anxiety. The important role of the perceptions of spatial presence and experienced realism in the students’ motivational beliefs was also addressed. Moreover, different behavioral patterns of teacher-student interactions during the process of the virtual field trips were identified by lag sequential analysis. This work started a pedagogical research to probe how HMD-based VR technology was applied in classrooms for teachers to lead their students on virtual field trips. The proposed instructional strategies for appropriately guiding students to learn during the process of immersive virtual field trips were also the contribution of this study.