Mitigation of Motion Sickness Symptoms by Adaptive Perceptual Learning: Implications for Space and Cyber Environments

A phenomenon regarding motion sickness mitigation, documented infrequently in the scientific literature on motion countermeasures, involves pre-exposing individuals to unusual motion, resulting in reduced symptoms on subsequent exposures to similar or even dissimilar motion events. The phenomenon does not seem to have the attention that a drug free and rapidly applied technique deserves in literature reviews of motion mitigation. This phenomenon is designated as Adaptive Perceptual Learning (APL) to highlight the idea that some, as yet unexplained, perceptual learning is involved in pre-adapting individuals to motion sickness. The experience of new motion environments that could greatly benefit humanity, such as space travel and cyberlearning, are hampered by symptoms of motion sickness. These environments would benefit from APL if a milder means to induce motion sickness could lessen the symptoms of another, more severe environment. We conducted a study to test APL using visually induced motion sickness (VIMS). In order to prevent order effects, half the participants in this study received a virtual reality (VR) version of a traditional VIMS first and the other half received a traditional VIMS first. Later, the exposure was reversed. Significant effects were found on a standard motion symptoms questionnaire, supporting the idea of APL. We are testing the idea again in a shortened version of this study to see if a more rapid application can be found. A successful outcome would support soliciting more funding to expand on APL and determine the parameters that would be useful for cyberlearning or space motion sickness.