Effects on balance disturbance of manipulating depth of an independent visual background in a stereographic display

Simulator sickness (SS) is a major impedimentto use of virtualenvironments(VEs). Procedures to alleviateSS have been of limitedvalue.The 'independentvisualbackground' (IVB) may reduceSS when people use a VE. Optimumcharacteristicsof IVBs remainto be determined.In this study,balancewas disturbedby roll oscillationof a black andwhite radialpattern.Disturbancewas reducedby simultaneous presentationof anIVB. Effects of locatingthe IVB in the foregroundor backgroundrelativeto the moving radial pattern using a stereographic display were determined.Nine subjects were tested at two IVB luminance levels and three different IVB conditions using a within-subjects design. An expected statisticallysignificantdifference betweenthe IVBandno-IVB conditionswas observed.No effect of IVB location was obtained. Effects of foreground / background manipulationson spatial orientation are addressed.