The Influence of Olfactory and Visual Stimuli on Students’ Performance and Mood in Virtual Reality Environment

Abstract

Exposure to sensory stimuli such as aromatherapy and immersion in Virtual Reality (VR) has shown impacts on task performance and emotional state. In this study, we examined the effects of stimuli types (olfactory, visual, and both) and themes (forest and café) in a VR environment to improve students’ performance and mood. While both the stimuli type and theme had no influence on the performance of the Stroop Test, providing olfactory with visual stimuli did increase the level of awakeness compared to providing visuals only or olfactory only. The choice of theme was an important factor in affecting mood; presenting the forest theme made participants feel better, more awake, and calmer compared to presenting the café theme. No interaction effect of stimuli and the theme was observed in any of the studied measurements. More complex tasks should be further tested to see whether aforementioned stimuli can have effects on students’ performance.