A solid understanding of VR optics is highly valuable for designing usable and innovative immersive experiences, yet the underlying principles remain challenging for students due to their abstract, interdisciplinary nature. Conventional lecture materials often struggle to convey how parameters such as focal length and lens placement influence image perception. We built an accessible web-based HMD Simulator that lets users manipulate parameters and observe real-time effects on stereo image formation and frustum geometry. Using the simulator as a design probe, we conducted an exploratory study (n = 16) with staff and students to compare experiences against conventional learning materials. Thematic analysis revealed that participants perceived interactivity as stimulating curiosity to tinker, while real-time feedback was reported to reduce perceived cognitive effort, facilitating deeper inquiry. Participants further emphasized how the simulator complemented rather than replaced conventional instruction, highlighting guided integration features as priority. These findings inform initial design considerations for interactive tools in VR optics and other domains with complex hardware-software interactions.

Educator Perceptions of XRAuthor: An Accessible Tool for Authoring Learning Content with Different Immersion Levels

Despite the growing prominence of Artificial Intelligence (AI) chatbots used in education, there remains a significant gap in our understanding of how interface design elements, particularly avatar representations, influence learning experiences. This paper explores the impact of different AI chatbot avatar representations on students’ learning experiences through a mixed-methods within-subjects study, where participants interacted with three distinct types of AI chatbot interfaces with a common large language model (LLM) over a 14-week university course. Our findings reveal that preferences vary according to factors such as learning habits and learning activities. Avatar design also exhibits affordances for specific prompting behaviors, while the perceived human touch influenced learning experiences in nuanced ways. Additionally, real-world relationships with the individuals behind deepfakes influence these experiences. These insights suggest that the thoughtful integration of diverse avatar representations in AI chatbot systems for different learners and settings can greatly enhance learning experiences.

This workshop is part of the ACM Multimedia 2025 Conference and is organized by the ACM I2M Chapter, consisting of both industry and academia members. The rapid convergence of Artificial Intelligence (AI), Human-Computer Interaction (HCI), and immersive multimedia is redefining the landscape of intelligent and adaptive digital experiences. As ACM Multimedia 2025 emphasizes cutting-edge multimedia systems, this workshop directly contributes to its vision by exploring AI's transformative role in immersive media. Through AI-driven multimedia interaction, adaptive virtual environments, and intelligent content generation, this workshop will showcase how AI is enhancing the creation and experience of digital worlds. The workshop proceedings can be found at: https://dl.acm.org/doi/proceedings/10.1145/3728487

Structured curriculum in domain-specific knowledge and personal development of graduate attributes are both important components of tertiary education. Prior gamification research in tertiary education has mostly evaluated gamification as a system and largely in structured curriculum-based learning environments. There is insufficient understanding as to how different gamification mechanics affect learning experiences in self-driven personal development areas outside of the structured curriculum. We present a study with 20 tertiary students over seven days with AdventureLEARN, a gamified online platform to engage students in a self-driven journey of continuous personal development alongside their curriculum work. Through an analysis of data collected from experience sampling and focus group discussions, we found that, amongst other findings, gamification mechanics that were meticulously contextualized to specific platform features afforded the most positive experiences across various dimensions, leading to our main insight highlighting the importance of maintaining a co-development process between individual gamification mechanics and platform features.

Navigating large-scale virtual spaces is a major challenge in Virtual Reality (VR) applications due to real-world spatial limitations. Walking-in-place (WIP) locomotion solutions may provide a natural approach for VR use cases that require locomotion to share similar qualities with walking in real-life. However, there is limited knowledge on the range of experiences across common WIP methods to inform the design of usable WIP solutions using consumer-accessible components. This paper contributes to this knowledge via a user study with 40 participants that experienced several easy-to-setup WIP methods in a VR commuting simulation. A nuanced understanding of cybersickness and exertion relationships and walking affordances based on different tracker setups were among the findings derived from a corroborated analysis of think-aloud, interview, and observational data, supplemented with self-reports of VR sickness, presence and flow. Practical design insights were then constructed along the dimensions of cybersickness, affordances, space and user interfaces.

Think-aloud protocols are commonly used to evaluate player experiences of video games but suffer from a lack of objectivity and timeliness. On the other hand, quantitative captures of physiological data are effective; providing detailed, unbiased and continuous responses of players, but lack contexts for interpretation. This paper documents how both approaches could be used together in practice by comparing video-cued retrospective think-aloud data and physiological data collected during a video gameplay experiment. We observed that many interesting physiological responses did not feature in participants' think-aloud data, and conversely, reports of interesting experiences were sometimes not observed in the collected physiological data. Through learnings from our experiment, we present some of the challenges when combining these approaches and offer some guidelines as to how qualitative and quantitative data can be used together to gain deeper insights into player experiences.