Presence Is the Key to Understanding Immersive Learning

Abstract

Presence as the subjective feeling of ‘being there’ is one of the main psychological components in immersive virtual environments. Research shows that presence can have an effect on learning outcomes in educational virtual environments. As presence can be considered as an individual psychological variable, its crucial role in the process of immersive learning is influenced by numerous subjective and objective factors. On the basis of the Educational Framework for Immersive Learning (EFiL), we developed a research model including the factors presence, immersion, cognitive abilities, motivation, and emotion. The hypotheses of the research model have been examined in a study with 23 students testing three different immersive educational virtual environments for learning computer science. The results of 67 presence questionnaires could confirm the hypotheses of the research model deriving from the EFiL partly. The factors immersion, emotion, and cognitive abilities were predictors for presence. An assumed, predictive effect of intrinsic motivation towards learning computer science on presence could not be verified.