SUD Cue Reactivity
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Overview
Type : Professional
Technology : Unity, HTC Vive Pro Eye for eyetracking
Platforms : PC VR, SteamVR
Project
The project was developed by MindMaze for the Rockefeller Neuroscience Institute. The aim was to use virtual reality to immerse patients suffering from substance use disorders in controlled environments where they are exposed to stimuli associated with drug use. This project enables observation of patients’ reactivity to stimuli, such as craving, physiological and emotional reactions. At the end of each session, patients complete a self-assessment of their craving, enabling therapists to analyze the evolution of their response to stimuli.
My role in this project was to support the existing application. In fact, it had been developed by another team that no longer existed, and nobody really knew how it worked. My first task was to analyze and understand its architecture, so that I could then make modifications and correct the problems reported by Rockefeller Neuroscience Institute therapeuts.
Improvements
I’ve made numerous fixes and improvements to the application:
- Compatibility with different resolutions,
- Drag-and-drop functionality,
- End-of-session crash resolution,
- Object lighting management,
- VR controller behavior and avatar IK. In addition, the application’s overall performance has been optimized, improving its stability.
Many of the changes concern the user interface, making the experience more fluid and intuitive. One of the major improvements concerns the stimulus category selection menu, which now allows additive or exclusive selection. Another important change concerns the session control screen, with revised behavior of the start, stop and pause buttons, and the addition of previous/next buttons for more efficient navigation.
