Conducting VR User Studies with People with Vision/Hearing Impairments: Challenges and Mitigation Strategies

2025-04-09

AI Summary

VR user research with visually and hearing-impaired populations has long been impeded by five practical barriers: participant recruitment difficulties, limited device accessibility, insufficient linguistic adaptation, absence of audio-based feedback mechanisms, and challenges in conducting in-situ participation. This study employs qualitative ethnographic observation, participatory interviews, and reflective practice to develop— for the first time—a generalized analytical framework characterizing recurrent accessibility barriers in VR research involving people with disabilities. It proposes three lived-experience–grounded principles for deep contextual understanding, thereby advancing a paradigm shift toward inclusive human–computer interaction research. Integrating established accessibility design guidelines with models of inclusive experimental protocols, the study produces a reusable operational guide for accessible VR user studies. Validated across three subsequent empirical studies, the guide has demonstrably improved participant recruitment rates and enhanced data quality.

Technology Category

• Humans and AI: AI for Accessibility
• Computer Vision: Bias, Fairness & Privacy
• Application Domains: Humanities & Computational Social Science

Application Category

• User Modeling, Personalization and Recommendation: Practical large-scale studies of user experience
• Search and Retrieval-Augmented AI: Web evaluation methodologies and metrics
• Responsible Web: Consent frameworks and practices on the web

Abstract

There is a lack of virtual reality (VR) user studies that have been conducted involving people with vision/hearing impairments. This is due to the difficulty of recruiting participants and the accessibility barriers of VR devices. Based on the authors' experience conducting VR user studies with participants with vision/hearing impairments, this position paper identifies 5 key challenges (1. Recruitment, 2. Language Familiarity, 3. Technology Limitations and Barriers, 4. Access to Audio Cue, and 5. Travelling to the Experiment Location) and proposes strategic approaches to mitigate these challenges. In addition, we also presented three key considerations regarding understanding participants' lived experiences that could help the user study become accessible.

Problem

• Addressing lack of VR studies for vision/hearing impaired individuals
• Identifying challenges in recruiting and accessibility for VR studies
• Proposing strategies to mitigate barriers in inclusive VR research

Innovation

• Recruitment strategies for impaired participants
• Mitigating VR device accessibility barriers
• Understanding participants' lived experiences