Seeing the faces is so important—Experiences from online team meetings on commercial virtual reality platforms
During the COVID-19 pandemic, online meetings became common for daily teamwork in the home office. To understand the opportunities and challenges of meeting in virtual reality (VR) compared to videoconferences, we conducted the weekly team meetings of our human-computer interaction research lab on f...
| Main Authors: | , , , , , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Frontiers Media S.A.
2023-01-01
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| Series: | Frontiers in Virtual Reality |
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/frvir.2022.945791/full |
| _version_ | 1797956179023888384 |
|---|---|
| author | Michael Bonfert Anke V. Reinschluessel Susanne Putze Yenchin Lai Dmitry Alexandrovsky Rainer Malaka Tanja Döring |
| author_facet | Michael Bonfert Anke V. Reinschluessel Susanne Putze Yenchin Lai Dmitry Alexandrovsky Rainer Malaka Tanja Döring |
| author_sort | Michael Bonfert |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | During the COVID-19 pandemic, online meetings became common for daily teamwork in the home office. To understand the opportunities and challenges of meeting in virtual reality (VR) compared to videoconferences, we conducted the weekly team meetings of our human-computer interaction research lab on five off-the-shelf online meeting platforms over 4 months. After each of the 12 meetings, we asked the participants (N = 32) to share their experiences, resulting in 200 completed online questionnaires. We evaluated the ratings of the overall meeting experience and conducted an exploratory factor analysis of the quantitative data to compare VR meetings and video calls in terms of meeting involvement and co-presence. In addition, a thematic analysis of the qualitative data revealed genuine insights covering five themes: spatial aspects, meeting atmosphere, expression of emotions, meeting productivity, and user needs. We reflect on our findings gained under authentic working conditions, derive lessons learned for running successful team meetings in VR supporting different kinds of meeting formats, and discuss the team’s long-term platform choice. |
| first_indexed | 2024-04-10T23:44:53Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-861a66c8b91343b4882273ca448796f8 |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 2673-4192 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-04-10T23:44:53Z |
| publishDate | 2023-01-01 |
| publisher | Frontiers Media S.A. |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Frontiers in Virtual Reality |
| spelling | doaj.art-861a66c8b91343b4882273ca448796f82023-01-11T04:54:42ZengFrontiers Media S.A.Frontiers in Virtual Reality2673-41922023-01-01310.3389/frvir.2022.945791945791Seeing the faces is so important—Experiences from online team meetings on commercial virtual reality platformsMichael BonfertAnke V. ReinschluesselSusanne PutzeYenchin Lai Dmitry AlexandrovskyRainer Malaka Tanja DöringDuring the COVID-19 pandemic, online meetings became common for daily teamwork in the home office. To understand the opportunities and challenges of meeting in virtual reality (VR) compared to videoconferences, we conducted the weekly team meetings of our human-computer interaction research lab on five off-the-shelf online meeting platforms over 4 months. After each of the 12 meetings, we asked the participants (N = 32) to share their experiences, resulting in 200 completed online questionnaires. We evaluated the ratings of the overall meeting experience and conducted an exploratory factor analysis of the quantitative data to compare VR meetings and video calls in terms of meeting involvement and co-presence. In addition, a thematic analysis of the qualitative data revealed genuine insights covering five themes: spatial aspects, meeting atmosphere, expression of emotions, meeting productivity, and user needs. We reflect on our findings gained under authentic working conditions, derive lessons learned for running successful team meetings in VR supporting different kinds of meeting formats, and discuss the team’s long-term platform choice.https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/frvir.2022.945791/fullCSCWvirtual realitysocial VRremote collaborationvirtual meetingsvideo conferencing |
| spellingShingle | Michael Bonfert Anke V. Reinschluessel Susanne Putze Yenchin Lai Dmitry Alexandrovsky Rainer Malaka Tanja Döring Seeing the faces is so important—Experiences from online team meetings on commercial virtual reality platforms Frontiers in Virtual Reality CSCW virtual reality social VR remote collaboration virtual meetings video conferencing |
| title | Seeing the faces is so important—Experiences from online team meetings on commercial virtual reality platforms |
| title_full | Seeing the faces is so important—Experiences from online team meetings on commercial virtual reality platforms |
| title_fullStr | Seeing the faces is so important—Experiences from online team meetings on commercial virtual reality platforms |
| title_full_unstemmed | Seeing the faces is so important—Experiences from online team meetings on commercial virtual reality platforms |
| title_short | Seeing the faces is so important—Experiences from online team meetings on commercial virtual reality platforms |
| title_sort | seeing the faces is so important experiences from online team meetings on commercial virtual reality platforms |
| topic | CSCW virtual reality social VR remote collaboration virtual meetings video conferencing |
| url | https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/frvir.2022.945791/full |
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