Knowing what collaborators attend to is essential. Previous studies demonstrated that shared gaze enhances coordination and social connectedness in remote settings. In collocated settings, gaze can be both naturally observable and technologically augmented. AR enables gaze cues to be rendered explicitly in the environment. To investigate if and how such cues are beneficial in collocated AR collaboration, we examined both qualitative and quantitative effects across three task types (puzzle, negotiation, search) and two spatial setups (plane, room), focusing on task completion time and the collaborative experience. In our user study with 24 dyads (n=48), we varied gaze visibility and measured task performance, user preference, social connectedness, and shared attention. Our results show that sharing gaze in collocated collaborative AR can increase shared attention, is perceived as helpful, and improves the user experience, similar to remote collaboration, but has a limited impact on the actual task completion time across the chosen tasks.

Embodying natural entities in Virtual Reality (VR) shows potential to enhance nature connectedness, but design factors that support such embodiment remain underexplored. This study examined whether transitional elements in the physical setting before and after VR and multisensory stimuli during VR can strengthen nature connectedness in a transformative tree-embodiment experience. Through a mixed-methods approach (N = 20), where we varied the pre- and post-VR experience (Neutral vs. Transitional) and sensory modalities (Audiovisual vs. Multisensory), we found that both transitional and multisensory experiences significantly enhanced presence, embodiment, and nature connectedness, with increases in emotional connectedness sustained one week later. Drawing on interview insights and impact ratings of specific design features, we derive design recommendations for integrating transitional and multisensory elements. Our findings demonstrate the value of holistic design for enhancing the emotional and transformative potential of VR nature embodiment for fostering environmental awareness.

Generative AI in Virtual Reality offers the potential for collaborative object-building, yet challenges remain in aligning AI contributions with user expectations. In particular, users often struggle to understand and collaborate with AI when its actions are not transparently represented. This paper thus explores the co-creative object-building process through a Wizard-of-Oz study, focusing on how AI can effectively convey its intent to users during object customization in Virtual Reality. Inspired by human-to-human collaboration, we focus on three representation modes: the presence of an embodied avatar, whether the AI's contributions are visualized immediately or incrementally, and whether the areas modified are highlighted in advance. The findings provide insights into how these factors affect user perception and interaction with object-generating AI tools in Virtual Reality as well as satisfaction and ownership of the created objects. The results offer design implications for co-creative world-building systems, aiming to foster more effective and satisfying collaborations between humans and AI in Virtual Reality.

With the increasing spread of AR head-mounted displays suitable for everyday use, interaction with information becomes ubiquitous, even while walking. However, this requires constant shifts of our attention between walking and interacting with virtual information to fulfill both tasks adequately. Accordingly, we as a community need a thorough understanding of the mutual influences of walking and interacting with digital information to design safe yet effective interactions. Thus, we systematically investigate the effects of different AR anchors (hand, head, torso) and task difficulties on user experience and performance. We engage participants (n=26) in a dual-task paradigm involving a visual working memory task while walking. We assess the impact of dual-tasking on both virtual and walking performance, and subjective evaluations of mental and physical load. Our results show that head-anchored AR content least affected walking while allowing for fast and accurate virtual task interaction, while hand-anchored content increased reaction times and workload.

Transferring knowledge across generations is fundamental to human civilization, yet the challenge of passing on complex practical skills persists. Methods without a physically present instructor, such as videos, often fail to explain complex manual tasks, where spatial and social factors are critical. Technologies such as eXtended Reality and Artificial Intelligence hold the potential to retain expert knowledge and facilitate the creation of tailored, contextualized, and asynchronous explanations regardless of time and place. In contrast to videos, the learner's perspective can be different from the recorded perspective in XR. This paper investigates the impact of asynchronous first- and third-person perspectives and gaze visualizations on efficiency, feeling of embodiment, and connectedness during manual tasks. The empirical results of our study ($\mathrm{N}=36$) show that the first-person perspective is better in quantitative measures and preferred by users. We identify best practices for presenting preserved knowledge and provide guidelines for designing future systems.

As autonomous agents, from self-driving cars to virtual assistants, become increasingly present in everyday life, safe and effective collaboration depends on human understanding of agents’ intentions. Current intent communication approaches are often rigid, agent-specific, and narrowly scoped, limiting their adaptability across tasks, environments, and user preferences. A key gap remains: existing models of what to communicate are rarely linked to systematic choices of how and when to communicate, preventing the development of generalizable, multi-modal strategies. In this paper, we introduce a multidimensional design space for intent communication structured along three dimensions: Transparency (what is communicated), Abstraction (when), and Modality (how). We apply this design space to three distinct human-agent collaboration scenarios: (a) bystander interaction, (b) cooperative tasks, and (c) shared control, demonstrating its capacity to generate adaptable, scalable, and cross-domain communication strategies. By bridging the gap between intent content and communication implementation, our design space provides a foundation for designing safer, more intuitive, and more transferable agent-human interactions.

Effective self-reflection is crucial for motor skill acquisition, yet it is challenging to facilitate in single-user VR training environments. We investigate this through a method where users are embodied as a virtual trainer and prompted to actively evaluate a recorded performance. In an empirical study, we systematically varied the trainee’s appearance and their movements. Our mixed-methods analysis reveals that confronting one’s own performance triggers a fundamental role conflict between the user’s identity as the performer and their new role as the evaluator. Most importantly, this conflict challenges a binary view of embodiment. Participants experienced a multi-faceted sense of self, oscillating between identifying with the trainee and detaching as the trainer. Our work contributes a novel characterization of embodied self-evaluation, revealing a psychological duality at its core and offering clear design implications for VR systems that foster self-insight in training and therapy.

Our sense of touch plays a crucial role in physical collaboration, yet rendering realistic haptic feedback in collaborative extended reality (XR) remains a challenge. Co-located XR systems predominantly rely on prefabricated passive props that provide high-fidelity interaction but offer limited adaptability. Haptic Illusions (HIs), which leverage multisensory integration, have proven effective in expanding haptic experiences in single-user contexts. However, their role in XR collaboration has not been explored. To examine the applicability of HIs in multi-user scenarios, we conducted an experimental user study (N=30) investigating their effect on a collaborative object handover task in virtual reality. We manipulated visual shape and size individually and analyzed their impact on users' performance, experience, and behavior. Results show that while participants adapted to the illusions by shifting sensory reliance and employing specific sensorimotor strategies, visuo-haptic mismatches reduced both performance and experience. Moreover, mismatched visualizations in asymmetric user roles negatively impacted performance. Drawing from these findings, we provide practical guidelines for incorporating HIs into collaborative XR, marking a first step toward richer haptic interactions in shared virtual spaces.

Recurrent negative thoughts can significantly disrupt daily life and contribute to negative emotional states. Facing, confronting, and noticing such thoughts without support can be challenging. To provide a playful setting and leverage the technical maturation of Virtual Reality (VR), our Virtual Reality (VR) experience, Mind Mansion, places the user in an initially cluttered virtual apartment. Here we utilize established concepts from traditional therapy and metaphors identified in prior works to let users engage metaphorically with representations of thoughts, gradually sorting the space, fostering awareness of thoughts, and supporting mental self-care. The results of our user study (n = 30) reveal that Mind Mansion encourages the exploration of alternative perspectives, fosters acceptance, and potentially offers new coping mechanisms. Our findings suggest that this Virtual Reality (VR) intervention can reduce negative affect and improve overall emotional awareness.

With the proliferation of VR and a metaverse on the horizon, many multi-user activities are migrating to the VR world, calling for effective collaboration support. As one key feature, traditional collaborative systems provide users with undo mechanics to reverse errors and other unwanted changes. While undo has been extensively researched in this domain and is now considered industry standard, it is strikingly absent for VR systems in research and industry. This work addresses this research gap by exploring different undo techniques for basic object manipulation in different collaboration modes in VR. We conducted a study involving 32 participants organized in teams of two. Here, we studied users’ performance and preferences in a tower stacking task, varying the available undo techniques and their mode of collaboration. The results suggest that users desire and use undo in VR and that the choice of the undo technique impacts users’ performance and social connection.

When we get lost in Virtual Reality (VR) or want to return to a previous location, we use the same methods of locomotion for the way back as for the way forward. This is time-consuming and requires additional physical orientation changes, increasing the risk of getting tangled in the headsets’ cables. In this paper, we propose the use of undo actions to revert locomotion steps in VR. We explore eight different variations of undo actions as extensions of point&teleport, based on the possibility to undo position and orientation changes together with two different visualizations of the undo step (discrete and continuous). We contribute the results of a controlled experiment with 24 participants investigating the efficiency and orientation of the undo techniques in a radial maze task. We found that the combination of position and orientation undo together with a discrete visualization resulted in the highest efficiency without increasing orientation errors.

Exploring virtual worlds together with others adds a social component to the Virtual Reality (VR) experience that increases connectedness. In the physical world, joint locomotion comes naturally through implicit intention communication and subsequent adjustments of the movement patterns. In VR, however, discrete locomotion techniques such as point&teleport come without prior intention communication, hampering the collective experience. Related work proposes fixed groups, with a single person controlling the group movement, resulting in the loss of individual movement capabilities. To close the gap and mediate between these two extremes, we introduce three intention communication methods and explore them with two baseline methods. We contribute the results of a controlled experiment (n=20) investigating these methods from the perspective of a leader and a follower in a dyadic locomotion task. Our results suggest shared visualizations support the understanding of movement intentions, increasing the group feeling while maintaining individual freedom of movement.

The parallel improvements in multi-material 3D printers and the quality of conductive filament open new possibilities for the fabrication of tangible and functional objects. In this studio, we discuss best practices for 3D printed electronics, talk about encountered problems, and derive design recommendations. We will guide the participants through a fabrication process by practically designing and printing objects. Consequently, we contemplate individual functional fabricated components, including small printed circuits and multi-material prints. We aim to spark a discussion about individually experienced challenges participants encountered during their design and fabrication process. This discussion includes problem-solving strategies, whose insights benefit other participants. Finally, we show the potential of printed electronics and discuss encouraging new opportunities in this field.

Haptic Feedback is essential for lifelike Virtual Reality (VR) experiences. To provide a wide range of matching sensations of being touched or stroked, current approaches typically need large numbers of different physical textures. However, even advanced devices can only accommodate a limited number of textures to remain wearable. Therefore, a better understanding is necessary of how expectations elicited by different visualizations affect haptic perception, to achieve a balance between physical constraints and great variety of matching physical textures.