J Korean Ophthalmol Soc.  2020 Feb;61(2):125-137. 10.3341/jkos.2020.61.2.125.

Relationship between Ocular Fatigue and Use of a Virtual Reality Device

• Lee SH
• Kim M
• Kim H
• Park CY

• KMID: 2470734
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.3341/jkos.2020.61.2.125

Abstract

PURPOSE
To investigate ocular fatigue after the use of a head-mounted display (HMD)-type virtual reality device.
METHODS
Healthy adult volunteers were examined for ocular fatigue before and after watching videos for 10 min with an HMD-type virtual reality device. Subjective ocular fatigue was measured using a questionnaire. Objective fatigue was measured using the critical flicker fusion frequency (CFF), high frequency component of accommodative microfluctuation, and accommodation amplitude. The accommodation amplitude was measured using the push-up method and the dynamic measurement mode of the autorefractometer. Changes in the spherical equivalent were also measured.
RESULTS
The questionnaire-based subjective ocular fatigue increased (p = 0.020) after use of the HMD device. In the dominant eye, the high frequency component of accommodative microfluctuation increased (p < 0.05). The accommodation amplitude using the push-up method was decreased in the nondominant eye (p = 0.007), and temporary myopia was observed (p < 0.05). However, there was no increase in ocular fatigue in the CFF or the accommodation amplitude using the dynamic measurement mode, which showed no significant difference before and after using the HMD device (p > 0.05).
CONCLUSIONS
A subjective test and some objective tests suggested that use of the HMD-type virtual reality display increased ocular fatigue. However, no increase in ocular fatigue was measured using CFF nor in the accommodation amplitude using the dynamic measurement mode which was a limitation of the study. More studies with the aim to alleviate ocular fatigue after using HMD-type virtual reality devices are therefore needed.

Keyword

Asthenopia; Head mounted display; Virtual reality

MeSH Terms

Adult
Asthenopia
Fatigue*
Flicker Fusion
Humans
Methods
Myopia
Volunteers

Figure

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  Figure 1 Head mounted display (HMD) based virtual reality (VR) display (XQ800ZAA-HC1KR, Samsung Electronics, Yongin, Korea). Subjects watched video for 10 minutes with VR device.

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  Figure 2 Measurement report of auto refractormeter (Speedy-i, Right MfgCo., Tokyo, Japan). The horizontal axis of the graph represents target distance and vertical axis of the graph represents accommodation responses.

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  Figure 3 Flicker fusion frequency tester (Model 12021A, Lafayette Instrument Company, Lafayette, IN, USA). It can measure threshold frequency where a flickering light is perceived as continuous, defined as the critical flicker fusion frequency.

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  Figure 4 Auto refractormeter (WAM-5500 Grand Seiko, Hiroshima, Japan). Objective refraction was measured under single viewing conditions. Moving target stimulate accommodation and auto refractormeter measure amplitude of accommodation dynamically.

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