Dataset Information

Virtual navigation tested on a mobile app is predictive of real-world wayfinding navigation performance.

ABSTRACT: Virtual reality environments presented on tablets and smartphones have potential to aid the early diagnosis of conditions such as Alzheimer's dementia by quantifying impairments in navigation performance. However, it is unclear whether performance on mobile devices can predict navigation errors in the real world. We compared the performance of 49 participants (25 females, 18-35 years old) at wayfinding and path integration tasks designed in our mobile app 'Sea Hero Quest' with their performance at similar tasks in a real-world environment. We first performed this experiment in the streets of London (UK) and replicated it in Paris (France). In both cities, we found a significant correlation between virtual and real-world wayfinding performance and a male advantage in both environments, although smaller in the real world (Cohen's d in the game = 0.89, in the real world = 0.59). Results in London and Paris were highly similar, and controlling for familiarity with video games did not change the results. The strength of the correlation between real world and virtual environment increased with the difficulty of the virtual wayfinding task, indicating that Sea Hero Quest does not merely capture video gaming skills. The fact that the Sea Hero Quest wayfinding task has real-world ecological validity constitutes a step toward controllable, sensitive, safe, low-cost, and easy to administer digital cognitive assessment of navigation ability.

SUBMITTER: Coutrot A

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6422266 | biostudies-literature | 2019

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Virtual navigation tested on a mobile app is predictive of real-world wayfinding navigation performance.

Coutrot Antoine A Schmidt Sophie S Coutrot Lena L Pittman Jessica J Hong Lynn L Wiener Jan M JM Hölscher Christoph C Dalton Ruth C RC Hornberger Michael M Spiers Hugo J HJ

PloS one 20190318 3

Virtual reality environments presented on tablets and smartphones have potential to aid the early diagnosis of conditions such as Alzheimer's dementia by quantifying impairments in navigation performance. However, it is unclear whether performance on mobile devices can predict navigation errors in the real world. We compared the performance of 49 participants (25 females, 18-35 years old) at wayfinding and path integration tasks designed in our mobile app 'Sea Hero Quest' with their performance ...[more]

PMID: 30883560

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Project description:BackgroundBy enabling individuals with hearing loss to collect their own hearing data in their personal real-world settings, there is scope to improve clinical care, empower consumers, and support shared clinical decision-making and problem-solving. Clinician support for this approach has been established in a separate study.ObjectiveThis study aims to explore, for consumers with hearing loss, their (1) experiences of listening difficulties, to identify the data an app could usefully collect; (2) preferences regarding the features of mobile apps in general; and (3) opinions on the potential value and desirable features of a yet-to-be designed app for documenting listening difficulties in real-world settings.MethodsA total of 3 focus groups involved 27 adults who self-reported hearing loss. Most were fitted with hearing devices. A facilitator used a topic guide to generate discussion, which was video- and audio-recorded. Verbatim transcriptions were analyzed using inductive content analysis.ResultsConsumers supported the concept of a mobile app that would facilitate the documenting of listening difficulties in real-world settings important to the individual. Consumers shared valuable insights about their listening difficulties, which will help determine the data that should be collected through an app designed to document these challenges. This information included early indicators of hearing loss (eg, mishearing, difficulty communicating in groups and on the phone, and speaking overly loudly) and prompts to seek hearing devices (eg, spousal pressure and the advice or example provided by others, and needing to rely on lipreading or to constantly request others to repeat themselves). It also included the well-known factors that influence listening difficulties (eg, reverberation, background noise, group conversations) and the impacts and consequences of their difficulties (eg, negative impacts on relationships and employment, social isolation and withdrawal, and negative emotions). Consumers desired a visual-based app that provided options for how data could be collected and how the user could enter data into an app, and which enabled data sharing with a clinician.ConclusionsThese findings provide directions for the future co-design and piloting of a prototype mobile app to provide data that are useful for increasing self-awareness of listening difficulties and can be shared with a clinician.

Project description:BackgroundAs war and famine are population level stressors that have been historically linked to menstrual cycle abnormalities, we hypothesized that the COVID-19 pandemic could similarly affect ovulation and menstruation among women.MethodologyWe conducted a retrospective cohort study examining changes in ovulation and menstruation among women using the Natural Cycles mobile tracking app. We compared de-identified cycle data from March-September 2019 (pre-pandemic) versus March-September 2020 (during pandemic) to determine differences in the proportion of users experiencing anovulation, abnormal cycle length, and prolonged menses, as well as population level changes in these parameters, while controlling for user-reported stress during the pandemic.FindingsWe analyzed data from 214,426 cycles from 18,076 app users, primarily from Great Britain (29.3%) and the United States (22.6%). The average user was 33 years of age; most held at least a university degree (79.9%). Nearly half (45.4%) reported more pandemic-related stress. Changes in average cycle and menstruation lengths were not clinically significant, remaining at 29 and 4 days, respectively. Approximately 7.7% and 19.5% of users recorded more anovulatory cycles and abnormal cycle lengths during the pandemic, respectively. Contrary to expectation, 9.6% and 19.6% recorded fewer anovulatory cycles and abnormal cycle lengths, respectively. Women self-reporting more (32.0%) and markedly more (13.6%) stress during the pandemic were not more likely to experience cycle abnormalities.ConclusionsThe COVD-19 pandemic did not induce population-level changes to ovulation and menstruation among women using a mobile app to track menstrual cycles and predict ovulation. While some women experienced abnormalities during the pandemic, this proportion was smaller than that observed prior to the pandemic. As most app users in this study were well-educated women over the age of 30 years, and from high-income countries, their experience of the COVID-19 pandemic might differ in ways that limit the generalizability of these findings.

Dataset Information

Virtual navigation tested on a mobile app is predictive of real-world wayfinding navigation performance.

Publications

Virtual navigation tested on a mobile app is predictive of real-world wayfinding navigation performance.

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