Abstract

Training processes have a pivotal role for many businesses in helping them sustain uninterrupted operation. They are utilized not only to keep the employees on an adequate level of competencies, but also to support them in acquiring new skills and adopting novel methods. Organizations in many different industries depend on the efficient and effective training processes to ensure that their employees perform their tasks proficiently. While onsite training processes have been employed for this mission traditionally, virtual training has emerged with the advent of technology as an innovative approach addressing the limitations of their onsite counterpart. These type of training processes allow remote participation of individuals and eliminate the need for physical presence. With the increasing prevalence of remote work in particular, virtual training continues to become more relevant. In order to deliver content remotely, many organizations invest in frequently adopted virtual training processes such as webinars and e-learning courses that leverage digital platforms. Although their benefits are significant especially in domains with limited resources, they also suffer from a major drawback in comparison to onsite training. Due to the lack of physical presence, trainees participating in this type of training processes commonly suffer from low engagement, which in turn leads to suboptimal learning outcomes. Traditional virtual training processes adopt different strategies, focusing primarily on interactive elements to eliminate the adverse effects of low engagement on the learning outcome. Even though they establish relative success with regards to passive forms of instruction, the level of engagement offered by in-person training is still unmatched in most cases. In this thesis, we focus on the immersion and presence aspects of virtual training processes in order to realize high levels of engagement during training, in turn leading to positive effects on learning. We propose a virtual training process, comprising multiple versions with varying levels of immersion that utilize a Virtual Reality (VR) foundation, supplementary sensory feedback and a set of Augmented Virtuality (AV) techniques. We perform evaluations on the implemented process and propose future work to acquire further insights on the effect of immersion on the learning outcome during virtual training processes.

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