Vision Loss Impact on Navigation in Virtual Reality

Summary

The purpose of this research is to better understand the impact of cortically-induced blindness (CB) and the compensatory strategies subjects with this condition may develop on naturalistic behaviors, specifically, driving. Using a novel Virtual Reality (VR) program, the researchers will gather data on steering behavior in a variety of simulated naturalistic environments. Through the combined use of computer vision, deep learning, and gaze-contingent manipulations of the visual field, this work will test the central hypothesis that changes to visually guided steering behaviors in CB are a consequence of changes to the visual sampling and processing of task-related motion information (i.e., optic flow).

Conditions

• Stroke, Ischemic
• Quadrantanopia
• Hemianopsia, Homonymous
• Hemianopia, Homonymous
• Hemianopia
• Hemianopsia
• Occipital Lobe Infarct
• Visual Field Defect, Peripheral
• Vision Loss Partial
• Quadrantanopsia
• Stroke Hemorrhagic

Interventions

OTHER

Virtual Reality Driving Task

Participants will steer a virtual car with the goal of staying in the center of a single-lane roadway while traveling at a constant speed of 26.6 m/s (approximately 60 miles/hr). The roadway alternates between a series of straights and turns of different radii to both the left and the right. This allows for careful control of task difficulty, and for the repeated presentation of specific conditions across multiple "trials" (i.e. turns in the road) in a randomized order. In addition, the density of the visual texture elements in the virtual environment that provide optic flow (OF) signal is also varied. The low-density OF condition has no road texture or foliage, and only the solid road edges on a flat-black ground plane. The medium-density OF condition has sparse textural elements distributed on the ground plane, and the high-density OF condition has high density road texture and a canopy of road-side trees that provide texture extending far above the horizon.

Sponsors & Collaborators

• Rochester Institute of Technology

  collaborator OTHER

• University of Rochester

  lead OTHER

Study Design

Allocation

NON_RANDOMIZED

Purpose

BASIC_SCIENCE

Masking

NONE

Model

PARALLEL

Eligibility

Min Age

21 Years

Max Age

75 Years

Sex

ALL

Healthy Volunteers

Yes

Timeline & Regulatory

Start

2023-11-28

Primary Completion

2028-10-31

Completion

2028-10-31

Countries

• United States

Study Locations