Comparing Vestibular Responses to Linear and Angular Whole-Body Accelerations in Real and Immersive Environments

The vestibular end organs differ in terms of anatomical and physiological characteristics. Sensory modalities’ stimuli including visual stimuli and vestibular sensation can influence these organs differently. This paper explores differences between vestibular responses to axial tilts in physical and virtual environments. Four passive whole-body movements (linear: up-down, and angular: yaw, pitch, and roll) were applied to twenty-seven healthy participants once using a hydraulic chair (physical) and once visually using a head-mounted display (virtual). Electrovestibulography (EVestG) was used as the outcome measure to investigate the magnitude of vestibular-response-change in both ears for physical and virtual stimuli. Three features including average action potential (AP) area, AP amplitude, and mean detected firing rate change were used as indices of response. The results show that for both physical and virtual stimuli (1) generally the pitch and roll tilts produce the largest EVestG changes compared to other tilts (2) roll and pitch tilt responses are not significantly different from each other and (3) right side and left side roll tilts’ responses are not significantly different. The findings indicate although visually- and physically-induced vestibular responses are different in terms of afferent activity, visual stimuli can still result in distinct responses when exposed to different axial tilts.