The effect of olfaction on immersion into virtual environments

This study was part of Research in Augmented & Virtual Environment Systems (RAVES), a cross-disciplinary project researching multi-modal virtual environments. The purpose of this research was to test the impact of olfaction on a human operator's sense of immersion into a virtual environment. The application of which could enhance military training environments to optimize performance in the field. The study was a 2 x 3 x 2 mixed factorial design with gender (i.e., male, female), condition (i.e., control/no scent, experimental/concordant scents, discordant scent), and time (before vs. after) as the independent variables. Scores from an augmented immersion questionnaire served as the dependent variable. The experimental group did not differ significantly from the control or discordant groups in any analyses but the conditions differed significantly on their ratings of the augmented virtual environment and genders differed significantly in their experience in the augmented virtual environment, but not by condition.