Abstract:
“Art is our one true global language. It knows no nation, it favors no race, and it acknowledges
no class. It speaks to our need to reveal, heal, and transform. It transcends our ordinary
lives and lets us imagine what is possible.” (Richard Kamler, Artist). Art appears to be a
stimulating and engaging activity from all walks of life. Art therapy enables people with stroke
to communicate non-verbally and visually, and helps them to creatively express emotions.
Virtual Reality (VR) art takes this form of expression a step further by enabling its users
to enter a fully immersive environment in which they can interact with art in ways beyond the
physical limitations of the real world. Currently, VR art applications in the market are designed
to cater to people without any physical disabilities. All applications assume that the user is
capable of using two hands to draw, and the ability to select the colours and art tools through
various settings within the application. Moreover, there is a lack of tools in the current VR
art-making applications that allows its users to form any social connections while they are using
it. Therefore, in this thesis we explore the Human Computer Interaction (HCI) aspects and
investigate design opportunities for a VR art-making tool as therapeutic uses. We also decided
to explore the inclusion of an artificial companion within the VR art-making tool because social
companionship has been shown to be beneficial for patients undergoing rehabilitation, even if
their companions are artificial, as it alleviates social isolation and increases engagement.
A field study was conducted to understand the process of therapeutic art and the accessibility
of existing VR art-making tools within a stroke rehabilitation environment. An exploratory and
pre-adoption study was also conducted with older individuals with stroke-related impairments
to investigate first impressions and likeability of artificial companions in a stroke rehabilitation
context. Using the design feedback from the studies conducted, we developed a VR art-making
tool with an improved interface (i.e., discrete picker) and virtual companion. We then examined
people’s feedback on our discrete picker and virtual companion via a user study and survey.
We concluded that VR art-making can be an engaging and accessible activity. Results
showed that our discrete picker benefits novice users who have no prior experience in colour
theory. While the virtual companion was liked more by the elderly, we found no significant effect
in its ability to improve the participants’ overall art-making experience. We discussed how our
findings answered our research questions, our limitations, our contributions, implications of our
findings on future research, and recommended future directions.