Viability of Virtual Reality Techniques in Identifying Environmental Stressors on Female Employees in an IT Workplace
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Teknik och samhälle Datavetenskap och medieteknik Examensarbete 15 högskolepoäng, grundnivå Viability of Virtual Reality techniques in identifying environmental stressors on female employees in an IT workplace Rikard Almgren Amin Harirchian Examen: Kandidatexamen 180hp Handledare: Zahra Ghaffari Huvudområde: Datavetenskap Examinator: Alberto Alvarez Program: Systemutvecklare Datum för slutseminarium: 2019-06-04 Sammanfattning Dagens IT-område är tungt mansdominerad trots att det arbetas med att introducera fler kvinnor till fältet och det arbetas för att behålla dessa kvinnliga anställda [2, 3, 5]. Denna forskning visar hur Virtual Reality (VR) tekniker kan användas som verktyg för att identifiera en av de faktorer som kan vara orsaken till att kvinnor lämnar, nämligen de fysiska miljöstressorerna som påverkar kvinnliga anställda inom IT-branschen. Målet med denna studie var att utvärdera genomförbarheten av ett VR-baserat tillvägagångssätt för att testa faktorer som miljöstressorer. Studien försöker också introducera mer information om VR-baserad testning och observation och vilka fördelar det kan medföra samt ge information till IT-baserade företag där fysiska miljöstressorer kan orsaka missnöje på arbetsplatsen bland kvinnliga anställda. Studien gjordes i fyra steg, en litteraturstudie för att samla in information om situationen för kvinnliga medarbetare samt aktuell forskning inom VR, ett design and creation steg för att skapa en prototyp för att identifiera stressorer på en arbetsplats, en pilotstudie för att bekräfta designbeslut och allmän testbarhet och slutligen ett fallstudie-experiment av kvinnliga anställda på ett IT-konsultföretag för att samla in data och utvärdera VR-lösningen som ett verktyg för att identifiera och utvärdera stressorer på kvinnliga anställda. Uppgifterna från experimentet samlades in genom inspelning av användarinteraktioner med den virtuella miljön och via enkäter. Två enkäter användes, en före VR-upplevelsen och en efter. Detta gjordes för att ta reda på hur VR-upplevelsen påverkat deltagarna och om de kunde identifiera olika stressorer. Resultaten av studien visar att alla fem av de utvärderade miljöstressorerna kunde identifieras med hjälp av VR-lösningen och att man kan potentiellt hitta sätt att minska stress som kvinnliga anställda upplever. Detta genom att tillämpa det som har hittats med en studie som denna studie. Lösningen kan också potentiellt anpassas för att vara tillämplig på andra områden än IT. 1 Abstract The Information Technology field of today is heavily male-dominated despite work to introduce more women to the field and work to retain these female employees [2, 3, 5]. This research shows how Virtual Reality (VR) techniques can be used as a tool to identify one of the factors that could be the cause of women leaving, namely the physical environmental stressors that affect female employees who work in IT industries. The goal of this study was to evaluate the viability of a VR based approach to testing real-life factors such as environmental stressors. The study also tries to introduce more information about VR based testing and observation and what advantages it may bring as well as provide information to IT-based companies on which physical environmental stressors could cause workplace dissatisfaction among their female employees. The study was done in four steps, a literature review to gather information about the situation for female employees and the current research in the field VR, a design and creation step to generate a prototype to gauge the viability of a VR based approach to identifying stressors in a workplace, a pilot study to confirm design decisions and general viability of testing and finally a case study experiment of female employees from one IT consultancy company to collect data and evaluate the VR solution as a tool for identifying and evaluating stressors on female employees. The data from the experiment was collected by recording the user interactions with the virtual environment and by questionnaires. Two questionnaires were used, one before the VR experience and one after. This was done in order to find out how the VR experience influenced the participants and whether they were able to identify various stressors. The results of the study show that all five of the evaluated environmental stressors could be identified using the VR solution and that one could potentially find ways of reducing stress experienced by female employees by applying what was learned using a solution such as this one. The solution could also potentially be further modified to be applicable to other fields than IT. Keywords: VR, IT, Stress, Stressors, Virtual Reality, Unity, Female Employees 2 Table of Contents 1 Introduction 6 1.1 Background and related work 6 1.2 Definition of problem 7 1.3 Purpose 7 1.4 Research Questions 7 2 Method 8 2.1 Method description 9 2.1.1 Exploratory research 9 2.1.2 Design mockups and prototype 9 2.1.3 Pilot Study 10 2.1.4 Case Study Experiment 10 2.1.4.1 Description of experiment process 12 2.1.5 Experiment Details 12 2.2 Method discussion 13 3 Literature Review 15 3.1 Virtual Reality 15 3.2 Women in IT 16 3.2.1 Current state of women in IT 16 3.2.2 Problem statement: Women are quitting 16 3.2.2.1 Why are women leaving? 16 3.3 Workplace Dissatisfaction: 16 3.4 Physical Environmental Stressors 17 4 Result 18 4.1 Findings identified through explorative research 18 4.2 Findings and challenges through prototype design and creation 19 4.3 Findings through Pilot Study 21 4.4 Findings through case study experiment 23 4.4.1 Usage of VR to test real-world scenarios 23 4.4.2 VR Controls: Ease of use 24 4.4.3 Satisfaction and enjoyment of the VR workplace 24 4.4.4 Physical environmental stressors 26 4.4.4.1 Lighting 27 4.4.4.2 Noise levels 28 4.4.4.3 Colour 29 4.4.4.4 Greenery 30 4.4.4.5 Spacing 32 3 4.4.5 Stressor identification 33 5 Analysis 34 5.1 Analysis of findings identified through explorative research 35 5.2 Analysis of findings identified through prototype design and creation 35 5.3 Analysis of findings identified through pilot study 36 5.4 Analysis of findings identified through case study experiment 37 5.4.1 Physical environmental stressor 38 5.4.1.1 Lighting 38 5.4.1.2 Noise levels 38 5.4.1.3 Colour 38 5.4.1.4 Greenery 39 5.4.1.5 Spacing 39 5.4.2 VR instructions 39 6 Discussion 40 6.1 VR Controls: Ease of use and limitations of the equipment 41 6.2 Limitations and challenges 41 6.2.1 General limitations 41 6.2.2 Limitations of physical environmental stressor testing 42 6.2.2.1 Lighting 42 6.2.2.2 Noise 42 6.2.2.3 Colour 43 6.2.2.4 Spacing 43 6.2.2.5 Greenery 43 6.2.3 General testing limitations 44 7 Conclusions and further research 45 7.1 RQ 1: “Which environmental stressors exist?” 45 7.2 RQ 2: “Which environmental stressors can be evaluated using Virtual Reality?” 45 7.3 RQ 3: “How can a Virtual Reality solution be applied to help identify physical environmental stressors on female employees in IT workplaces?” 46 7.4 RQ 4: “Can Virtual Reality be used to find ways of alleviating physical stressors on female employees in IT workplaces?” 46 7.5 Future work 47 8. References 48 Appendix A - Pre-experiment questionnaire 52 Pre-Experiment Section 1 52 Pre-Experiment Section 2 (Part 1) 53 Pre-Experiment Section 2 (Part 2) 54 4 Pre-Experiment Section 3 (Part 1) 55 Pre-Experiment Section 3 (Part 2) 56 Pre-Experiment Section 4 57 Appendix B - Post-experiment questionnaire 58 Post-Experiment Section 1 58 Post-Experiment Section 2 (Part 1) 59 Post-Experiment Section 2 (Part 2) 60 Post-Experiment Section 2 (Part 3) 61 Post-Experiment Section 3 (Part 1) 62 Post-Experiment Section 3 (Part 2) 63 Post-Experiment Section 4 (Part 1) 64 Post-Experiment Section 4 (Part 2) 65 Appendix C - Pre-experiment results 66 Appendix D - Post-experiment results 66 Appendix F - VR instruction manual 67 5 1 Introduction 1.1 Background and related work The Information Technology (IT) sector and its technologies advance at a rapid rate and to keep up, the workforce needs to grow rapidly as well. To tap into the full potential of the workforce, there is a need to employ both women and men [1] to unlock all perspectives and aid innovative processes. Unfortunately, the tech industry is currently male-dominated [2, 3, 4] and struggles to retain female employees [2, 3, 5]. Of the women who decide to pursue higher education in various Science, Engineering and Technology (SET) fields, including Computer Science, reports show that 32% feel stalled and are likely to leave their jobs in SET fields within a year and that half of these women decide to pursue a career in a non-SET field [2, 5]. Over a longer period, 41% of women leave their jobs in SET-fields, as opposed to 17% of men [2, 5]. The reason behind this, according to Women in Tech, is workplace dissatisfaction with the causes appearing to be multifaceted with social, economic and environmental factors [2] all playing a part in increasing stress levels and as a result, several women feel uncomfortable in their workplace. Environmental factors such as poor lighting, odors, cramped spaces, and noise pollution have previously been identified as problems and have made people feel uncomfortable in their workplaces across multiple fields [6, 7]. Identifying factors that can cause stress becomes increasingly important in today’s society, for the individual it can be personal health and growth [8], whereas for employers it may pertain to the efficiency and overall health of a company as well as employee retainment.