A comparative study of user performance in a map-based virtual environment

We present a comparative study of user performance with tasks involving navigation, visual search, and geometric manipulation, in a map-based battlefield visualization virtual environment (VE). Specifically, our experiment compared user performance of the same task across four different VE platforms: desktop, cave, workbench, and wall. Independent variables were platform type, stereopsis (stereo, mono), movement control mode (rate, position), and frame of reference (egocentric, exocentric). Overall results showed that users performed tasks fastest using the desktop and slowest using the workbench. Other results are detailed in the article. Notable is that we designed our task in an application context, with tasking much closer to how users would actually use a real-world battlefield visualization system. This is very uncommon for comparative studies, which are usually designed with abstract tasks to minimize variance. This is, we believe, one of the first and most complex studies to comparatively examine, in an application context, this many key variables affecting VE user interface design.