Evaluating the effects of Virtual Reality on perceived effort during cycling: preliminary results on healthy young adults

Virtual Reality (VR) has proven effective in improving rehabilitation by providing engaging and customized inter-ventions. The application of VR in pulmonary rehabilitation is still limited, although it may increase patients' exercise tolerance. Studies on other target groups prove that VR can modify exercise performance and reduce perceived effort. Despite encouraging, the methodological differences among studies prevent reaching definitive conclusions on whether VR can influence exercise tolerance and which factors are more impactful. Our work aims to define and validate an experimental protocol for quantitative evaluation of the effects of VR on perceived effort. Secondary goals are to investigate whether a higher degree of immersion or interaction induces a lower perceived exertion. The experimental protocol consists of cycling at light/moderate intensity under four conditions: no VR, non-immersive VR, immersive VR with and without a dual-task. Heart rate, breathing response (breathing rate, tidal volume, and minute ventilation), cycling cadence, and rate of perceived exertion (RPE) are measured. Thirteen healthy adults (25.08pm 5.50 years) participated in the study. Results show that the protocol is sustainable and suitable for the aims set. All participants maintained the predefined exercise intensity and the desired cadence. RPE was not influenced by any VR factor (p = 0.224), although showing a tendency to decrease in the case of immersive VR (RPE = 11). In the future, a broader sample will allow drawing more definitive results. Further investigations include more factors in the analysis and replicate the study to healthy elderly and respiratory patients