Measuring trust with the Wayfinding Task: Implementing a novel task in immersive virtual reality and desktop setups across remote and in-person test environments.

Trust is a key feature of social relationships. Common measures of trust, questionnaires and economic games, lack ecological validity. Hence, we sought to introduce an immersive, virtual reality (VR) measure for the behavioral assessment of trust across remote and in-person settings, building on the...

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Main Authors: Michael F Clements, Larissa Brübach, Jessica Glazov, Stephanie Gu, Rahila Kashif, Caroline Catmur, Alexandra L Georgescu
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Public Library of Science (PLoS) 2023-01-01
Series:PLoS ONE
Online Access:https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0294420&type=printable
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author Michael F Clements
Larissa Brübach
Jessica Glazov
Stephanie Gu
Rahila Kashif
Caroline Catmur
Alexandra L Georgescu
author_facet Michael F Clements
Larissa Brübach
Jessica Glazov
Stephanie Gu
Rahila Kashif
Caroline Catmur
Alexandra L Georgescu
author_sort Michael F Clements
collection DOAJ
description Trust is a key feature of social relationships. Common measures of trust, questionnaires and economic games, lack ecological validity. Hence, we sought to introduce an immersive, virtual reality (VR) measure for the behavioral assessment of trust across remote and in-person settings, building on the maze task of Hale et al. (2018). Our 'Wayfinding Task' consists of an interconnected urban environment for participants to navigate on the advice of two characters of differing trustworthiness. We present four studies implementing the Wayfinding Task in remote and in-person testing environments and comparing performance across head-mounted display (HMD)-based VR and desktop setups. In each study, the trustworthiness of two virtual characters was manipulated, through either a fact sheet providing trustworthiness information, or a behavior-based trustworthiness manipulation task termed the Door Game, based on Van der Biest et al., 2020. Participants then completed the Wayfinding Task. Overall, we found that participant behavior in the Wayfinding Task reflected the relative trustworthiness of the two characters; in particular, the trustworthy character was approached more often for advice, reflecting data from our Door Game. We found mostly null results for our novel outcome measure, interpersonal distance. Remote testing successfully achieved these effects. While HMD-based VR and desktop setups both showed these effects, there was a stronger effect of trustworthiness in the HMD VR version of the task. These results have implications for the measurement of trust in behavioral settings and the use of remote and VR-based testing in social experiments.
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spelling doaj-art-ffb17653ea4a41ddbca5baed9cd2d0552025-08-20T01:47:37ZengPublic Library of Science (PLoS)PLoS ONE1932-62032023-01-011811e029442010.1371/journal.pone.0294420Measuring trust with the Wayfinding Task: Implementing a novel task in immersive virtual reality and desktop setups across remote and in-person test environments.Michael F ClementsLarissa BrübachJessica GlazovStephanie GuRahila KashifCaroline CatmurAlexandra L GeorgescuTrust is a key feature of social relationships. Common measures of trust, questionnaires and economic games, lack ecological validity. Hence, we sought to introduce an immersive, virtual reality (VR) measure for the behavioral assessment of trust across remote and in-person settings, building on the maze task of Hale et al. (2018). Our 'Wayfinding Task' consists of an interconnected urban environment for participants to navigate on the advice of two characters of differing trustworthiness. We present four studies implementing the Wayfinding Task in remote and in-person testing environments and comparing performance across head-mounted display (HMD)-based VR and desktop setups. In each study, the trustworthiness of two virtual characters was manipulated, through either a fact sheet providing trustworthiness information, or a behavior-based trustworthiness manipulation task termed the Door Game, based on Van der Biest et al., 2020. Participants then completed the Wayfinding Task. Overall, we found that participant behavior in the Wayfinding Task reflected the relative trustworthiness of the two characters; in particular, the trustworthy character was approached more often for advice, reflecting data from our Door Game. We found mostly null results for our novel outcome measure, interpersonal distance. Remote testing successfully achieved these effects. While HMD-based VR and desktop setups both showed these effects, there was a stronger effect of trustworthiness in the HMD VR version of the task. These results have implications for the measurement of trust in behavioral settings and the use of remote and VR-based testing in social experiments.https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0294420&type=printable
spellingShingle Michael F Clements
Larissa Brübach
Jessica Glazov
Stephanie Gu
Rahila Kashif
Caroline Catmur
Alexandra L Georgescu
Measuring trust with the Wayfinding Task: Implementing a novel task in immersive virtual reality and desktop setups across remote and in-person test environments.
PLoS ONE
title Measuring trust with the Wayfinding Task: Implementing a novel task in immersive virtual reality and desktop setups across remote and in-person test environments.
title_full Measuring trust with the Wayfinding Task: Implementing a novel task in immersive virtual reality and desktop setups across remote and in-person test environments.
title_fullStr Measuring trust with the Wayfinding Task: Implementing a novel task in immersive virtual reality and desktop setups across remote and in-person test environments.
title_full_unstemmed Measuring trust with the Wayfinding Task: Implementing a novel task in immersive virtual reality and desktop setups across remote and in-person test environments.
title_short Measuring trust with the Wayfinding Task: Implementing a novel task in immersive virtual reality and desktop setups across remote and in-person test environments.
title_sort measuring trust with the wayfinding task implementing a novel task in immersive virtual reality and desktop setups across remote and in person test environments
url https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0294420&type=printable
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