Tohidul Islam

Professor von Uhl

English 21007

March 19, 2019

Lab Report Analysis: First Draft

            Technological advances in the video game industry have made modern day gaming devices capable of performing tasks that would have been deemed impossible a decade ago. From tracking hand and body movement to simulating a virtual world where anything is possible, the hardware used for gaming today is unlike anything that existed in the past. This raises the question of whether such technology can also be applied for purposes other than gaming. The researchers in the lab reports “The effects of video game therapy on balance and attention in chronic ambulatory traumatic brain injury”, “Effectiveness of Virtual Reality Exercises in Stroke Rehabilitation,” and “Study on response time measurement of distracted driving by virtual reality driving simulator” try to determine if modern day gaming consoles can be used for therapy and assessment. The way in which each report informs the reader of the outcomes of its experiments can be compared and contrasted.

The reports titled “Study on response time measurement of distracted driving by virtual reality driving simulator” by Junghwan Sung and “The effects of video game therapy on balance and attention in chronic ambulatory traumatic brain injury” by Sofia Straudi introduce its readers to the topic by including an abstract. The abstract briefs the reader on why the report is being written and what the author hopes to find in their research. Straudi further simplifies the abstract by breaking up the information into five categories which were background, methods, results, conclusions, and keywords; this allows the reader to easily comprehend the purpose and outcome of the report, making the report suited to a broader audience. The report by Gustavo Saposnik, titled “Effectiveness of Virtual Reality Exercises in STroke Rehabilitation (EVREST),” also incorporates an abstract in a similar fashion as Straudi’s, but groups the various categories together without any spaces or indentation, making the different sections hard to distinguish between. Professor Sung’s report fails to divide its abstract into smaller parts and instead presents everything in one large paragraph. This may make it harder for the readers to understand the purpose of the report compared to the other two.

One thing that only Professor Sung’s report incorporates is the use of information collected outside of their experiment. The reason for this was to have prior data that could be compared to the results of the experiment. Since Professor Sung’s report was trying to determine whether virtual reality consoles were effective in simulating a distracted driving situation and then measuring response time, having prior data acting as a control group would help them to determine if the results are reliable. The report is also the only one that defines their topic, distracted driving, by presenting a table that categorizes different types of distractions, defines each category, and presents several examples of distractions within that category.

All three of the reports explain the methods that were used in conducting their experiments; however, only the reports by Dr. Saposnik and Dr. Straudi had randomized groups with criteria for participating. Dr. Saposnik’s experiment had more criteria than the other two reports, he includes a table of more than ten factors that would determine the inclusion or exclusion of the patient in the study. Professor Sung’s report makes use of various visuals to illustrate the devices and techniques that they used to perform their experiment; pictures of equipment as well as graphs and charts were presented which helps the reader understand what the researchers were working with.

The authors of each lab report were able to support their hypothesis through their experiment; however, Dr. Saposnik and Professor Sung had several factors that affected the reliability of their experiments. The virtual reality simulators in Professor Sung’s experiment had a blurry peripheral vision which took away from the immersion of the participants. The other issue was with the steering wheel that was used, it had a wider angle of rotation and was smaller in diameter than actual steering wheels. The issue for Dr. Suposnik’s experiment was within the design of the randomized trials; double blinding was not possible and limitations in target polulation and selection of patients all limited sample sizes, which may have skewed the results of the experiment. Despite these drawbacks, all of the studies were able to extract useful information from the experiments.

While each of the three lab reports performed experiments for different topics, they all had the same purpose which was to determine whether current video gaming devices could be used for rehabilitation or assessment of one’s response time. The reports differed slightly in the way that they explained their study, but also shared many similarities such as structure and tone. The result of these reports will hopefully help to encourage the use of video gaming devices for scientific purposes in the future.

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Bibliography

Junghwan Sung2, anitooni@gmail. co., Seongsoo Park1, kawaiipss@crossdesignlab. co.,                  Hyowon Jeong1, jhw0908@crossdesignlab. co., &Sunwoo Kim1, artbysung@ssu. ac. k.              (2019). Study on response time measurement of distracted driving by virtual reality                driving simulator. International Journal of Advanced Computer Research, 9(40), 37–45.                  https://doi-org.ccny-proxy1.libr.ccny.cuny.edu/10.19101/IJACR.MUL16002

Saposnik, G., Mamdani, M., Bayley, M., Thorpe, K. E., Hall, J., Cohen, L. G., & Teasell, R. (2010).          Effectiveness of Virtual Reality Exercises in Stroke Rehabilitation (EVREST): Rationale,                Design, and Protocol of a Pilot Randomized Clinical Trial Assessing the Wii Gaming                  System. International Journal of Stroke, 5(1), 47 – 51. https://doi-org.ccny-                                    proxy1.libr.ccny.cuny.edu/10.1111/j.1747-4949.2009.00404.x

Straudi, S., Severini, G., Sabbagh Charabati, A., Pavarelli, C., Gamberini, G., Scotti, A., &                    Basaglia, N. (2017). The effects of video game therapy on balance and attention in                    chronic ambulatory traumatic brain injury: an exploratory study. BMC Neurology, 17(1),          86. https://doi-org.ccny-proxy1.libr.ccny.cuny.edu/10.1186/s12883-017-0871-9