Abstract
Alan Turing supposed the “imitation game” which has also been called the Turing Test. In the game an interrogator is tasked with telling two similar stimuli apart by asking questions then, based on their responses, correctly identifying both stimuli. Applying this concept to virtual reality to create a similar test will be important as virtual reality becomes more and more like reality. It is also important to explore the conceptual and theoretical issues with the Turing Test in order to avoid such issues when creating a test for virtual reality. It will require an understanding of how humans perceive their environment and how the environment influences the human. Presence is a construct that has been used to measure how users feel, in terms of “being there” in virtual reality as compared to reality. Another less researched construct is known as “Reality Judgement”, this construct is meant to measure how people evaluate and attribute reality to virtual realities. When creating a test to distinguish a virtual reality from reality both concepts must be taken into consideration as well as the interaction between the two. Using presence to determine how present an individual feels in an environment and using reality judgement to determine how real an individual feels an environment is whether it is reality or virtual reality will be important in determining how well a virtual reality simulates reality, but humans are subjective so there is need for more objective measures of presence and reality judgment. Current research suggests the use of EEG and fMRI technology in order to determine if the virtual reality is being perceived the same as reality.
Alan Turing supposed the “imitation game” which has also been called the Turing Test. In the game an interrogator is tasked with telling two similar stimuli apart by asking questions then, based on their responses, correctly identifying both stimuli. Applying this concept to virtual reality to create a similar test will be important as virtual reality becomes more and more like reality. It is also important to explore the conceptual and theoretical issues with the Turing Test in order to avoid such issues when creating a test for virtual reality. It will require an understanding of how humans perceive their environment and how the environment influences the human. Presence is a construct that has been used to measure how users feel, in terms of “being there” in virtual reality as compared to reality. Another less researched construct is known as “Reality Judgement”, this construct is meant to measure how people evaluate and attribute reality to virtual realities. When creating a test to distinguish a virtual reality from reality both concepts must be taken into consideration as well as the interaction between the two. Using presence to determine how present an individual feels in an environment and using reality judgement to determine how real an individual feels an environment is whether it is reality or virtual reality will be important in determining how well a virtual reality simulates reality, but humans are subjective so there is need for more objective measures of presence and reality judgment. Current research suggests the use of EEG and fMRI technology in order to determine if the virtual reality is being perceived the same as reality.