Immersive virtual reality for learning about ecosystems: effect of two signaling levels and feedback on action decisions.

Introduction: The goal of the present study was to test the effect of signaling associated with feed-back in learning forest ecosystems in the context of realistic living forest simulator, in IVR conditions for students in agriculture. Two signaling modalities, corresponding to two signaling levels, were investigated: visual flashing of forest elements (tree species, plants, flowers, fungi, wet-areas etc.) and marker-stones, both with text in pop-up windows, in a 2x2 experimental plan. Methods: Ninety-three pupils of an agricultural technological high school had to explore (including physically), interrogate (search for) and select (using the joysticks) relevant elements of the forest in three living forest areas (visually delimited inside of a broader forest area) in order to choose (and justify) the best area, among the three, in which an equipped public-tourist reception site (picnic, resting, reception site) could be built. The chosen site must have the least possible negative impact on the ecosystem of the forest and its development over time. After their decision (and justification) they were provided a feed-back with a series of VR desktop multimedia slides showing the effect of this choice on the ecosystem of the chosen area. After the feed-back they had to decide and justify again whether they would change or maintain their first decision. Finally, subjective scales were also used in order to investigate presence, cognitive complexity, sickness and overall enjoyment. Results and discussion: Results showed significant positive effects of both signaling levels, and of the feed-back on the correct decision answers. Further, the combination, and interaction, between signaling and feedback seemed to enhance, the activation and retrieval from memory, of the task-relevant concepts. In addition, the results indicated a significant positive effect (medium size) of presence on decision performances, a finding which is consistent with the immersion principle.

A narrative review of the interconnection between pilot acute stress, startle, and surprise effects in the aviation context: Contribution of physiological measurements.

Aviation remains one of the safest modes of transportation. However, an inappropriate response to an unexpected event can lead to flight incidents and accidents. Among several contributory factors, startle and surprise, which can lead to or exacerbate the pilot's state of stress, are often cited. Unlike stress, which has been the subject of much study in the context of driving and piloting, studies on startle and surprise are less numerous and these concepts are sometimes used interchangeably. Thus, the definitions of stress, startle, and surprise are reviewed, and related differences are put in evidence. Furthermore, it is proposed to distinguish these notions in the evaluation and to add physiological measures to subjective measures in their study. Indeed, Landman's theoretical model makes it possible to show the links between these concepts and studies using physiological parameters show that they would make it possible to disentangle the links between stress, startle and surprise in the context of aviation. Finally, we draw some perspectives to set up further studies focusing specifically on these concepts and their measurement.

Corrigendum: What breaks the flow of reading? A study on characteristics of attentional disruption during digital reading.

[This corrects the article DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2022.987964.].

What breaks the flow of reading? A study on characteristics of attentional disruption during digital reading.

Reading is increasingly taking place on digital media, which are vectors of attentional disruption. This manuscript aims to characterize attentional disruption during reading on a computer screen in an ecological environment. To this end, we collected information relating to reader interruptions (number, type, duration, position, mental effort, and valence) and self-caught mind wandering (occurrence, position) throughout the reading session for high and low media multitaskers in their own specific ecological environment, at home. Comprehension of the narrative text was assessed both with surface and inferential questions. In total, 74 participants (M = 22.16, SD = 2.35) took part in the experiment. They reported attentional disruptions on average every 4 mins during reading. Moreover, there were more attentional disruptions during the first half of the text. Most interruptions were short and little mental effort was required to process them. We made a distinction between media-related and media-unrelated related interruptions. Multiple linear regression analyses showed that media-unrelated interruptions were actually related to better performance for both inferential and surface level questions. Furthermore, media-related interruptions were more frequent for high than low media multitaskers. Pleasure experienced when reading the text was also a significant predictor of comprehension. The results are discussed with regard to Long-Term Working Memory and strategies that the readers could have implemented to recover the thread of their reading.

A Meta-analysis on the Effect of Expertise on Eye Movements during Music Reading.

The current meta-analysis was conducted on 12 studies comparing the eye movements of expert versus non-expert musicians and attempted to determine which eye movement measures are expertise dependent during music reading. The total dataset of 61 comparisons was divided into four subsets, each concerning one eye-movement variable (i.e., fixation duration, number of fixations, saccade amplitude, and gaze duration). We used a variance estimation method to aggregate the effect sizes. The results support the robust finding of reduced fixation duration in expert musicians (Subset 1, g = -0.72). Due to low statistical power because of limited effect sizes, the results on the number of fixations, saccade amplitude, and gaze duration were not reliable. We conducted meta-regression analyses to determine potential moderators of the effect of expertise on eye movements (i.e., definition of experimental groups, type of musical task performed, type of musical material used or tempo control). Moderator analyses did not yield any reliable results. The need for consistency in the experimental methodology is discussed.

Review on Eye-Hand Span in Sight-Reading of Music.

In a sight-reading task, the position of the eyes on the score is generally further ahead than the note being produced by the instrument. This anticipation allows musicians to identify the upcoming notes and possible difficulties and to plan their gestures accordingly. The eye-hand span (EHS) corresponds to this offset between the eye and the hand and measures the distance or latency between an eye fixation on the score and the production of the note on the instrument. While EHS is mostly quite short, the variation in its size can depend on multiple factors. EHS increases in line with the musician's expertise level, diminishes as a function of the complexity of the score and can vary depending on the context in which it is played. By summarizing the main factors that affect EHS and the methodologies used in this field of study, the present review of the literature highlights the fact that a) to ensure effective sight reading, the EHS must be adaptable and optimized in size (neither too long not too short), with the best sight readers exhibiting a high level of perceptual flexibility in adapting their span to the complexity of the score; b) it is important to interpret EHS in the light of the specificities of the score, given that it varies so much both within and between scores; and c) the flexibility of EHS can be a good indicator of the perceptual and cognitive capacities of musicians, showing that a musician's gaze can be attracted early by a complexity in a still distant part of the score. These various points are discussed in the light of the literature on music-reading expertise. Promising avenues of research using the eye tracking method are proposed in order to further our knowledge of the construction of an expertise that requires multisensory integration.

Cross-modal music integration in expert memory: Evidence from eye movements.

The study investigated the cross-modal integration hypothesis for expert musicians using eye tracking. Twenty randomized excerpts of classical music were presented in two modes (auditory and visual), at the same time (simultaneously) or successively (sequentially). Musicians (N = 53, 26 experts and 27 non-experts) were asked to detect a note modified between the auditory and visual versions, either in the same major/minor key or violating the key. Experts carried out the task faster and with greater accuracy than non-experts. Sequential presentation was more difficult than simultaneous (longer fixations and higher error rates) and the modified notes were more easily detected when violating the key (fewer errors), but with longer fixations (speed/accuracy trade-off strategy). Experts detected the modified note faster, especially in the simultaneous condition in which cross-modal integration may be applied. These results support the hypothesis that the main difference between experts and non-experts derives from the difference in knowledge structures in memory built over time with practice. They also suggest that these high-level knowledge structures in memory contain harmony and tonal rules, arguing in favour of cross-modal integration capacities for experts, which are related to and can be explained by the long-term working memory (LTWM) model of expert memory (e.g. (18; 22).

E-readers and visual fatigue.

The mass digitization of books is changing the way information is created, disseminated and displayed. Electronic book readers (e-readers) generally refer to two main display technologies: the electronic ink (E-ink) and the liquid crystal display (LCD). Both technologies have advantages and disadvantages, but the question whether one or the other triggers less visual fatigue is still open. The aim of the present research was to study the effects of the display technology on visual fatigue. To this end, participants performed a longitudinal study in which two last generation e-readers (LCD, E-ink) and paper book were tested in three different prolonged reading sessions separated by--on average--ten days. Results from both objective (Blinks per second) and subjective (Visual Fatigue Scale) measures suggested that reading on the LCD (Kindle Fire HD) triggers higher visual fatigue with respect to both the E-ink (Kindle Paperwhite) and the paper book. The absence of differences between E-ink and paper suggests that, concerning visual fatigue, the E-ink is indeed very similar to the paper.