Registration and dinner signups

Welcomes and introductions

Randall Hill, Director, ICT
Matthew Lombard, President, ISPR
Jacki Morie and Belinda Lange, Conference Co-Chairs, ICT

Keynote address 1: Barbara Hayes-Roth, Lifelike Solutions, Inc.

Barbara "Bella" Hayes-Roth is a Computer Scientist and Cognitive Psychologist. Early in her career, Dr. Hayes-Roth did basic research on learning and cognition at Bell Laboratories and Rand Corporation. During 1982-2003, she directed the Adaptive Agents and Virtual Theater Projects at Stanford University. She developed the BB1 architecture for intelligent agents that use opportunistic control strategies to manage diverse knowledge sources in dynamic situations. Applications include the Guardian agent for monitoring ICU patients. She subsequently extended and refined the architecture to support rounded, improvisational characters. Applications include the Improv Puppets for improving children's literacy and social empathy through play. In 1996, Dr. Hayes-Roth founded Extempo Systems, Inc., where she led development of the Imp Character Technology and Tools, with commercial applications in education, training, and customer care. In 2007, she founded Lifelike Solutions, Inc., where she works on virtual coaches and role-players to help people improve their health behaviors and interaction skills. Dr. Hayes-Roth has taught Computer Science and Psychology at Stanford, UCLA, and the University of Michigan. She has published over 100 peer-reviewed articles. She holds two patents on interactive characters. She is a Fellow of the AAAI.

Paper Session 1: Understanding and measuring presence

Self-presence Standardized: Introducing the Self-Presence Questionnaire (SPQ)
Rabindra Ayyan Ratan and Béatrice Hasler

On the Use of Adjustable Distraction as a Measure to Determine Sustained Attention during Movie Clips
Rolf Nordahl and Dannie Korsgaard

Measuring Telepresence: The Temple Presence Inventory
Matthew Lombard, Theresa Ditton and Lisa Weinstein

The Meaning of Being There is Related to a Specific Activation in the Brain Located in the Parahypocampus
Stéphane Bouchard, Jeanne Talbot, André-Anne Ledoux, Jennifer Phillips, Matteo Cantamese and Geneviève Robillard

Spatial Presence in Dynamic Environments: Tracking the Visual Attention Allocation During Exposure
Bartholomäus Wissmath, David Weibel, Daniel Stricker and Fred W. Mast

Paper Session 2: Hybrid workshop format
(5 minute summary presentations followed by informal discussion)

Natural Interactive Walking in Porto
Rolf Nordahl, Stefania Serafin and Federico Fontana

Second Life as a Learning & Teaching Environment
Minhua Ma, Andreas Oikonomou and Huiru Zheng

Outsiders, Interlopers, and Employee-Identified Avatars
Victoria McArthur and Melanie Baljko

An Essay on Thinking Aloud Technique for Presence
Matteo Cantamesse

The Effect of Avatar Categorization on Perceptions
Rory P. McGloin, Kristine L. Nowak, Stephen C. Stifano and Gretta Flynn

Attention, Spatial Presence and Engagement: Implications for Virtual Environment Learning Platforms
Steven Hornik

Paper Session 3: Creating presence

Who´s there? Can a Virtual Agent Really Elicit Social Presence?
Astrid M. von der Pütten, Nicole C. Krämer and Jonathan Gratch

"I'm Always Touched by Your Presence, Dear":  Combining Mediated Social Touch with Morphologically Correct Visual Feedback
Antal Haans and Wijnand IJsselsteijn

Image vs. Sound: A Comparison of Formal Feature Effects on Presence, Video Game Enjoyment, and Player Performance
Paul Skalski, Rob Whitbred and Pete Lindmark

Tangible Presence in Blended Reality Space
Kei Hoshi and John A Waterworth

Registration

Keynote Address 2: Howard Lichtman, Human Productivity Lab (with DVE Telepresence demonstration)

Howard S. Lichtman (HSL) is a productivity-focused technologist, publisher and consultant with specialties in Telepresence and Visual Collaboration and Organizational & Personal Productivity. He is the founder and President of the Human Productivity Lab, an independent consultancy covering the telepresence and effective visual collaboration industries.
Mr. Lichtman is the editor and publisher of the Telepresence Options website and the Telepresence Options Telegraph also the author of Telepresence, Effective Visual Collaboration and the Future of Global Business at the Speed of Light (2006) on the emerging telepresence industry and was a contributing author to Emerging Technologies for Teleconferencing and Telepresence (2005) he is currently working on Telepresence Options 2009 and The Inter-company Telepresence and Videoconferencing Handbook. Mr. Lichtman is a frequent commentator on telepresence, videoconferencing and effective visual collaboration and his writings on and analysis of the industry have been featured by US News and World Report, Telephony Magazine, CXO Magazine, The Chicago Tribune, Reuters, Pro AV Magazine, Killer App Magazine, ABA Banking Journal, Bank Systems and Technology Magazine, Next Generation Pharmaceuticals Magazine, AV Technology Magazine, and CFO Magazine among others.

Paper Session 4: The real world translated to virtual

Presence and the Victims of Cybercrime in Virtual Worlds
Grainne Kirwan

Social Presence in Virtual World Surveys
Elizabeth Dean, Joe Murphy and Sarah Cook

The Role of Realism and Anthropomorphism in the Selection of Avatars
Mark A. Hamilton and Kristine L. Nowak

Presence and the Meaning of Life: Exploring (Tele)Presence Simulation Scenarios and their Implications
Matthew T. Jones, Matthew Lombard and Joan Jasak

Paper Session 5: Effects and roles of presence

Moderating Effects of Social Presence on Behavioral Conformation in Virtual Reality Environments: A Comparison between Social Presence and Identification
Younbo Jung

Perceived Affordances:  Why do people wear virtual cooking pots on their heads?
Kirsten Albrecht, Kristopher J. Blom and Steffi Beckhaus

Advertising Effects through Virtual Violence
Eui Jun Jeong, Frank Biocca and Corey Bohil

The Effects of Competition on Intrinsic Motivation in Exergames and the Conditional Indirect Effects of Presence
Hayeon Song, Jihyun Kim, Kelly Elizabeth Tenzek and Kwan Min Lee

Registration

Keynote Address 3: Albert ‘Skip’ Rizzo, University of Southern California Institute for Creative Technologies

Clinical Virtual Reality: A Brief Review of the Future!

Virtual reality (VR) has undergone a transition in the past 15 years that has taken it from the realm of expensive toy and into that of functional technology. Revolutionary advances in the underlying VR enabling technologies (i.e., computation speed and power, graphics and image rendering technology, display systems, interface devices, immersive audio, haptics tools, tracking, intelligent agents, and authoring software) have supported development resulting in more powerful, low-cost PC-driven VR systems. Such advances in technological “prowess” and accessibility have provided the hardware platforms needed for the conduct of human research and treatment within more usable, useful and lower cost VR systems.

At the same time, there has been a growing awareness of the potential value of VR by scientists and clinicians, in addition to the general public. While much of this recognition may be due to the high visibility of digital games and massive shared internet-based virtual worlds (World of Warcraft, Halo and 2nd Life, etc.), clinical research applications routinely come into the public consciousness via the popular media. Whether this can be considered as “hype” or “help” to a field that has a storied history of alternating periods of public enchantment and disregard, still remains to be seen. Regardless, growing public awareness coupled with solid scientific results delivered from VR clinical and research applications, have brought the field past the point where skeptics can be taken seriously when they characterize VR as a  “fad technology”. It is not 1994 anymore!

When discussion of the potential for VR applications in the human clinical and research domains first emerged in the early-1990s, the technology needed to deliver on the anticipated “visions” was not in place. Consequently, during these early years, VR suffered from a somewhat imbalanced “expectation-to-delivery” ratio, as most users trying systems during that time will attest. The “real” thing never quite measured up to expectations generated by some of the initial media hype, as delivered for example in the films “The Lawnmower Man” and “Disclosure”! Yet the idea of producing simulated virtual environments that allowed for the systematic delivery of ecologically relevant stimulus events and challenges was compelling and made intuitive sense. As well, a long and rich history of encouraging findings from the aviation simulation literature lent support to the concept that testing, training and treatment in highly proceduralized VR simulation environments would be a useful direction for psychology and rehabilitation to explore.  Since that time, we have seen the development of VR systems that have demonstrated added-value for addressing a variety of clinical conditions and research objectives including: fear reduction with phobic clients, stress management in cancer patients, acute pain reduction during wound care with burn patients, exposure therapy for Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, body image disturbances in patients with eating disorders, navigation and spatial training in children and adults with motor impairments, functional skill training and motor rehabilitation with patients having central nervous system dysfunction (stroke, TBI, SCI cerebral palsy, multiple sclerosis, etc.) and in the assessment (and in some cases, rehabilitation) of attention, memory, spatial skills and executive cognitive functions in both clinical and unimpaired populations. To do this, scientists have constructed virtual airplanes, skyscrapers, spiders, battlefields, social events populated with virtual humans, fantasy worlds and the mundane (but highly relevant) functional environments of the schoolroom, office, home, street and supermarket. These efforts are no small feat in light of the technological challenges, scientific climate shifts and funding hurdles that many researchers have faced during the early development of this emerging technology.

This presentation will provide a brief overview of the many forms of Virtual Reality that have been applied across a diverse range of clinical disorders and research questions. I will then present a detailed overview of the use of VR for Exposure Therapy for anxiety disorders, addictive behaviors and with OIF/OEF military personnel with PTSD. This will be followed by overviews of research and clinical applications of VR for cognitive assessment/rehabilitation, motor rehabilitation, pain distraction and social interaction. The social interaction overview will conclude with the detailing of an emerging project area that involves the creation of artificially intelligent virtual human “patients” for clinical training.

---

Albert “Skip” Rizzo received his Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology from the State University of New York at Binghamton. He is a Research Scientist at the University of Southern California Institute for Creative Technologies and has Research Professor appointments with the USC Dept. of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, and at the USC School of Gerontology. Dr. Rizzo conducts research on the design, development and evaluation of Virtual Reality systems targeting the areas of clinical assessment, treatment and rehabilitation. This work spans the domains of psychological, cognitive and motor functioning in both healthy and clinical populations. In the psychological domain, his latest project has focused on the translation of the graphic assets from the Xbox game, Full Spectrum Warrior, into an exposure therapy application for combat-related PTSD with Iraq War veterans. Additionally, he is conducting research on VR applications that use 360 Degree Panoramic video for exposure therapy (social phobia), role-playing applications (anger management, etc.), and recently has used this technology to capture news scenes for future multimedia journalism applications. He is also working with a team that is creating artificially intelligent virtual patients that clinicians can use to practice skills required for challenging clinical interviews and diagnostic assessments (sexual assault, resistant patients, suicide lethality, etc.). His cognitive work has addressed the use of VR applications to test and train attention, memory, visuospatial abilities and executive function. In the motor domain, he has developed VR Game systems to address physical rehabilitation post stroke and Traumatic Brain Injury and for prosthetic use training. He is also investigating the use of VR for pain distraction at LA Children’s Hospital and is currently designing game-based VR scenarios to address issues of concern with children having autistic spectrum disorder. His research also involves designing and evaluating 3D User Interface devices and interaction methods and he has created a graduate level Industrial and Systems Engineering course at USC entitled, “Human Factors and Integrated Media Systems”. In the area of Gerontology, Dr. Rizzo has served as the program director of the USC Alzheimer’s Disease Research Center and is currently conducting a VR study of visuospatial and wayfinding ability with persons with Alzheimer’s.

He is the associate editor of the journals, CyberPsychology and Behavior; and The International Journal of Virtual Reality, is Senior Editor of the MIT Press journal, Presence: Teleoperators and Virtual Environments, is on a number of editorial boards for journals in the areas of cognition and computer technology (Cognitive Technology; Journal of Computer Animation and Virtual Worlds; Media Psychology) and is the creator of the Virtual Reality Mental Health Email Listserve (VRPSYCH). He has recently guest-edited theme issues for Applied Psychophysiology and Biofeedback on “VR and Psychophysiology”, two new journal issues on “Virtual Rehabilitation” (in CyberPsychology and Behavior and in the International Journal on Disability and Human Development) and one for the MIT journal Presence:Teleoperators and Virtual Environments on "Virtual Reality and Neuropsychology". Previously, he guest edited a theme issue in CyberPsychology and Behavior on “Aging and Information Technology”. He served as General Chair for the IEEE VR2003 conference in Los Angeles and co-chaired this conference in 2004. He was also the Conference Chair of the 4th Annual Workshop on Virtual Rehabilitation on Catalina Island, Los Angeles in Sept. of 2005. He will be chairing a military sponsored conference on “Technological Approaches for the Treatment of Wounded Warriors” in November of 2009. In his spare time, he plays rugby, listens to music and rides his motorcycle.

Invited talk: Shawn Edmondson, Founder and CEO, thereNow Inc.

Dr. Edmondson received his Ph.D. in Research and Evaluation Methodology from the Psychology Department at Utah State University. Has served as an instructor at Utah State University and as an evaluator for a wide variety research and evaluation projects. For his doctoral dissertation research he explored the use of a telepresence-enabled, cognitive apprenticeship model of teacher professional development. This research led to the formation of thereNow, Inc., which provides innovative professional development services to state, regional, and local educational agencies. Dr. Edmondson is currently the Principal Investigator for a U.S. Department of Education Institute of Education Sciences research study investigating the efficacy of IRIS. 

The IRIS system consists of two primary components: a portable hardware device and a web application. 

Using our proprietary hardware and web application, a coach can see and hear a remote classroom without ever leaving the office.  The coach can observe classrooms live, make video recordings, and provide feedback to teachers using text notes, video, audio, and more.  The feedback is immediate and embedded in the video, so the teacher can see when a comment was made and save time by only clicking on the comments. IRIS serves as a secure, non-obtrusive, and scalable tool that facilitates classroom based and individualized professional development. IRIS is currently being used by educators and education researchers at schools and universities throughout the U.S, England, and in China.

During his presentation, Dr. Edmondson will briefly outline the theoretical basis for IRIS, touching on the research literature from cognitive psychology, education, and the psychology of learning. He will also provide an overview and demonstration of how IRIS is currently being used around the world.

For more information about IRIS, please visit www.therenow.net

Paper Session 6: Applications: Contexts of presence

Social And Spatial Presence: An Application to Optimize Human-Computer Interaction
Karl Horvath and Matthew Lombard

Discussion Session 2: Where we’ve been, where we’re going

Conference close