Exploring the Effects of Self-Overlapping Spaces on Distance Perception and Action Judgments

Self-overlapping spaces, also known as impossible spaces, are a design mechanic in virtual reality (VR) that allows a user to naturally walk through an environment that is larger than the physical space available to them. Prior work has focused on generating these spaces and evaluating when their self-overlapping nature is detectable. Comparatively, little work has evaluated how the self-overlapping nature of these spaces impacts users’ spatial understanding and whether any misperceptions carry over into altered action judgments. We present a study evaluating how self-overlapping spaces influence action judgments related to relative distances within the virtual environment. Participants were presented with a variety of self-overlapping spaces and, after exploring them, were asked to judge which of the two locations was closer to their current position in the environment. Participants’ were more likely to make correct decisions as the relative difference in distance between the two locations increased; however, this effect was affected by both the amount of overlap present in a particular environment and by the relative position from which they made their decision.