What I do
My research interests include Human-Computer Interaction, Information Visualization and Data Analysis, User Experience Modeling, Reflective technologies, Interpretation systems, or Document and Knowledge Engineering.
Application domains are related to education, culture, health, humanities…
I focus on interdisciplinary approaches for the study of human-machine coupling and co-development and collaborate with people from sociology, psychology, ergonomy, anthropology, education science, philosophy, design, medecine, focusing on real world activities.
News (all)
Dec. 23: PhD Defense of Roman Malo. Roman Malo successfully defended his doctoral thesis in psychology titled “Psychological Flexibility, Psychopathology, and Virtual Reality - From Subjective Measurement to the Possibility of Objective Measurement of Transdiagnostic Processes”. I had the pleasure of co-supervising this thesis with Didier Acier (Psychology) and Samuel Bulteau (Psychiatry). Roman is particularly interested in the possibility of using ecological tasks (corresponding to real-life situations) in virtual reality to study how participants navigate problematic situations while demonstrating psychological flexibility. He employs both observational data and micro-phenomenological interviews to closely follow the specific experiences of his participants. This mixed approach has highlighted that “anxious” participants do not react in the same way as “healthy” participants, and their experiences differ, paving the way for a renewed understanding of flexibility.
Jun. 23: CARE IMX Workshop. Our Workshop on the “Future Immersive Healthcare Experience in Medical and Home Settings” was held successfully during the ACM IMX Conference in Nantes. We had a keynote by Mel Slater on “Virtual Reality in Mental Health – A Self-Counselling Approach”, 5 papers, and a panel on the topic “What will be healthcare with immersive technologies in 2033?” with Dr. Eric Malbos (Psychiatry), Pierre Gadea (C2CARE – VR software for healthcare), and Pr Mel Slater. More information on the workshop site
Jan. 23: Use of Virtual Reality for Evaluating Cognitive Functions for Diagnosis in Psychiatry and Clinical Psychology. Toinon Vigier and I were invited at the one week Phiteco (Philosophy Technology Cognition) seminar for a presentation of our work in psychotherapy and virtual reality. The seminar was recorded (in french)
Recent publications (all)
Toinon Vigier, Didier Acier, Samuel Bulteau, Solène Thevenet, Yannick Prié. (2024) Towards immersive teleclinics in the Metaverse: the case of neuropsychological consultation in European Metaverse Research Network: A Metaverse for the Good, Barcelona, Spain, 8-9 april, 6 pp. Show abstract The Metaverse is often deemed very important for the future of medicine and healthcare, yet there exist very few real health applications making use of social VR, its core feature. Here we first present our vision of what could be a virtual clinic in the Metaverse that would allow patients and practitioners to meet in VR and carry out various activities. We then introduce Tecnis, our implementation of such a clinic for psychotherapeutic consultation and neuropsychological testing. Our system features several spaces such as a waiting room, a consultation room, and standalone activities, as well as data-based dashboads for clinicians to lead the sessions.
Jean-Philippe Rivière, Roman Malo, Louis Vinet, Yannick Prié. (2024) Utiliser l’entretien d’explicitation pour collecter et comparer des expériences vécues en réalité virtuelle : un bilan de deux études in IHM 2024, 25e conférence internationale francophone sur l’interaction humain-machine, Paris, 25-29 mars, 20 pp. Show abstract Les utilisateurs de réalité virtuelle (RV) vivent des expériences bien réelles qui peuvent être étudiées en tant que telles. Nous présentons deux études dans lesquelles nous avons collecté au moyen d’entretiens d’explicitation, puis modélisé, et comparé des descriptions d’expériences subjectives vécues en RV. La première étude porte sur les expériences associées à un parcours ambulatoire en ophtalmologie en RV, la seconde sur celles associées à la prise de décision alternative lors d’une tâche de cuisine en RV. Nous discutons les enseignements principaux que nous tirons de ces deux études : les entretiens d’explicitation sont adaptés à la collecte d’expérience vécue en RV ; l’analyse de ces entretiens profite des données recueillies en RV ; les « ancres sensorielles » facilitent la tenue des entretiens et leur analyse ; l’expérience vécue en RV rapportée lors des entretiens d’explicitation concerne majoritairement la tâche.
Nicolas Ribeiro, Toinon Vigier, Jieun Han, Gyu Hyun Kwon, Hojin Choi, Samuel Bulteau, Yannick Prié. (2024) Three Virtual Reality Environments for the Assessment of Executive Functioning Using Performance Scores and Kinematics: an Embodied and Ecological Approach to Cognition in Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking, 27(2), 127-134. doi Show abstract Virtual reality is an attractive technology for cognitive assessment because it provides a more embodied experience than typical test situations using, for example, paper and pencil. In addition, virtual reality can immerse individuals in complex situations similar to real-life situations, thereby improving the ecological validity (i.e., face validity) of the assessment. Virtual reality can also provide improved scoring of tests as it facilitates the tracking of kinematic information and the temporal tracking of activities. This study assesses the correlation between scores on executive function assessments using standard neuropsychological tasks in paper-and-pencil format, on a tablet, and in three immersive virtual reality environments, each designed to involve specific aspects of executive function. This study also aims to assess the correlation between these performance scores and a set of kinematic measures (speed, duration, distance of the hand) collected in virtual reality. The outcomes (performance score and kinematic measure) correlate with previous assessment methods (paper and pencil and computerised 2D) and with each other, suggesting their potential usefulness in clinical and research contexts. The discussion focuses on the advantages of embodied, situated and spatialised tests for cognitive assessment and the benefits of kinematic tracking in virtual reality tests for the quality of this assessment.
Jieun Han, Gyu Hyun Kwon, Roman Malo, Yannick Prié, and Zied Kefi (Ed). (2023) Future Immersive Healthcare Experience in Medical and Home Setting in Proceedings of the 2023 ACM International Conference on Interactive Media Experiences Workshops (IMXw ‘23), Nantes, France, June doi Show abstract The rising accessibility of immersive media technologies opens the opportunity to use them easily in in-hospital and home environments for healthcare. The possibility to completely immerse users or patients in virtual environments, or to augment their surroundings, while tracking their movements and physiological reactions, provide new ways to induce or analyze user experiences. In the healthcare context, immersive media give new opportunities for diagnosis through the study of patient behaviors in controlled environments, as well as rehabilitation, by enabling patients to train in specific and personalized controlled tasks. In an at-home context, immersive media give opportunities to monitor and train mental and physical skills in order to improve users’ health and/or well-being. Care IMX is a half-day workshop of the IMX 2023 Conference, bringing together interdisciplinary medical, technological and social science researchers.