Virtual Reality Serious Game as an Assistive Technology to Support Pediatric Visual Perceptual Training

Abstract

Amblyopia is a neurological impairment where children suffer from the insufficient visual gathering. Recent studies investigated the ability to improve amblyopic children's visual acuity. However, according to previous theories, visual acuity is the foundation for an excellent visual system, but more lies beyond acuity improvements, such as their visual cognition and perceptual skills. Virtual Reality acts as a serious game medium for active learning of virtual depth perceptions built after a solid improvement for visual acuity. This paper aims to provide a pediatric-centered practical approach for amblyopic children. We designed a game system in the form of a virtual depth hierarchical game pyramid based upon the classical visual perception hierarchical pyramid and standardized procedures for perceptual training. The bottom-up setup gradually trains for each level up the VR-designed hierarchy while building up a solid foundation.