Toward Measuring Empathy in Virtual Reality
Jacob RosenbloomCarnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA, USA
Jessica HammerCarnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA, USA
Abstract
While VR is often described as an empathy-inducing medium, it is difficult to link specific features of a VR experience to empathy outcomes. This is due in large part to the challenges of measuring empathy constructs, and the difficulty of capturing the subjective emotional experience of a player in VR.
In response, the authors propose a lightweight, inexpensive framework that researchers can use to easily establish a VR testing environment and begin gathering data on the subjective empathic response of users in VR. The authors also propose future research needed to expand, modify, and validate the proposed user-testing protocol.