In the current VR literature, postural sway analysis and survey methodologies are useful ways that researchers look to measure participant behavior and experience, but as they are typically performed separately, insights into participant experiences may be limited. The current project sought to employ both methods at the same time to gather new insights from participants as they go through radical changes in their avatar (virtual self) while performing two tasks in a virtual environment. This work sought to demonstrate the effectiveness of different surveys in capturing participant experience; demonstrate how postural sway analysis can provide insight into participants' experience; and illustrate how combining both datasets allow for a more complete representation of participants' phenomenological and behavioral experience in VR. We discovered that while the two types of data were not directly tied together, experience from participants could be partially explained from the behavioral measures collected.

The focus of this study was to look at how quickly rulesets learned in VR would decay after doing a similar task in reality. Alongside this study is the impact that gender has when tools designed for one gender in mind are used by another gender. Miami students (N = 12) were asked to do both a virtual and real maze inside of the SPoCC lab. They were then compared to themselves on how many mistakes they made from the beginning of the real maze trial versus the end of it. It was found that males made fewer mistakes at the end of the real maze trial than at the beginning. Females did not seem to adjust to the experimental setup at all, which was reflected in them never making any mistakes in the real maze trial. Given these findings, more participants are needed, as well as better tools in the setup, in order to conclusively find the rate of decay for learned rulesets.

Individuals who are skilled in a given motor task possess the ability to reliably achieve a desirable level of performance under variations in contextual conditions, even those not previously experienced. This ability is restricted in individuals with motor control impairments (MCI), whose functional performance in a variety of tasks is disturbed by contextual change. Previous research suggests that skilled individuals are resilient to contextual change not because they have discovered (with experience) generally effective task solutions but because they learned to leverage perceptual information in task space to swiftly adjust task solutions as conditions demand. Individuals with MCI seem to increase their attentional focus to the body and use a more deliberate, visually guided style of body control, which may restrict their ability to couple task solutions to circumstance. These findings support the central hypothesis of this dissertation: the impact of MCI on performance may depend on the extent to which individuals experiencing such impairment remain flexible and adapt task solutions to contextual change. To test this hypothesis, forty-five undergraduate students performed an object transportation task in virtual reality (VR). The task consists of using a virtual pad (controlled by hand movement) to move pucks across a bridge (extending forward) and into a container. Participants were free to choose their (global) task strategy: push the pucks and carefully position them inside the container, hit the puck from its initial position or any solutions in between (e.g., push the puck a particular distance before hitting). Participants performed the transportation task while standing on a force platform which provided a measure of their postural patterns used to describe their task solution at a lower scale of analysis. Sixty-five pucks were presented in each trial. Puck presentation rate was manipulated to vary contextual conditions. To induce the experience of reduc (open full item for complete abstract)

People who live with a concealable stigmatized identity (CSI) are frequently faced with the decision to share their unique attributes with others. These decisions, however, are sometimes difficult to make because a CSI is an identity that could be socially devaluing if it is made known. For example, revealing a depression diagnosis to an employer may lead to negative perceptions of the individual derived from common stereotypes associated with depression. However, not disclosing one's stigmatized identity may lead the individual to avoid seeking important medical or psychological help in order to keep their identity concealed. Along with mental health disorders, CSI's include a number of different identities such as a history of sexual assault, substance abuse disorder, sexual or gender minority identification, and HIV+ status. While each identity carries with it different degrees of stigmatization, life experiences, and health outcomes, everyone with a CSI shares the experience of decisions associated with the disclosure process. While disclosure, the sharing of personal information with others, is an important aspect of life for well-being and interpersonal relationships, it is crucial that people with a CSI disclose their identity in a way that avoids social rejection or physical harm (e.g., hate crimes). The disclosure process is typically a goal oriented, dyadic conversation in which people who want to disclose anticipate their confidant's reaction and adjust their goals and behaviors in order to gain the desired interpersonal and individual outcomes. Recent theory suggests that these goals arise from the activation of approach or avoidance motivational systems. Approach goals are aimed at achieving positive outcomes such as increased social support, while avoidance goals are interested in avoiding potential negative outcomes including social rejection. According to an embodied cognitive perspective, these different motivations may therefore lead to differen (open full item for complete abstract)

This research seeks to describe the postural sway performance of participants during quiet stance on a dynamic surface, longitudinally throughout a balance training program. A nonlinear method of data processing was presented, along with traditional linear statistics, as an effective movement descriptor. COP was measured on a compliant surface atop a force plate, during each laboratory visit. Results show no change in COP range, change in variability only in the anteroposterior direction, and reductions in both velocity and LyE in the mediolateral and anteroposterior directions. Reduced LyE values indicate a more periodic (self-similar) structure within the COP path. It appears that the participants were able to develop a more calculated approach to the maintenance of balance by moving both more slowly and with a more regular movement pattern. Support for the use of both a dynamic surface and a nonlinear analysis for the evaluation of postural sway has been provided.