Development of Execution Function Measurement Scenarios through Bus Boarding in VR Environments: Focusing on ‘Work Memory’ and ‘Planning’

Abstract

Objective: Among the daily life tasks that require complex cognitive skills, the goal is to implement a Virtual Bus boarding Task(VBT) and develop content that measures Working memory and Planning. Background Research: Currently, tests for daily tasks using VR are being developed in various ways, including supermarkets, money tasks, and bus boarding tasks. Digit Span Task(DST) is a tool for measuring verbal working memory. Working memory was measured by memorizing and maintaining the numbers and digits presented. Trail Making Test (TMT) measures planning ability. Measure the cognitive areas of processing speed, sequencing, mental flexibility, and visual-motor ability. Method: The daily tasks were implemented in VR and tasks were designed based on existing measuring tools. Results: Although the expert evaluation evaluated that the adequacy of the VR environment setting and experimentation of VBT was appropriate, it received the opinion that it was necessary to adjust the cultural differences and difficulty levels. Conclusion: Pilot testing is needed to overcome the difficulty and cultural differences of experiments. Application: This work was supported by the Institute for Information & Communications Technology Promotion(IITP) grant funded by the Korean Government(MSIP) (No. 2019-0-01569, Development of VR and IoT-based Systems for Evaluation of Embodied Cognition)