Cybersickness in Augmented Reality: Subjective and physiological changes with the course of prolonged exposure

Augmented Reality (AR) creates unique user experiences by overlaying virtual elements onto the physical world. Despite growing interest in AR, the characteristics of AR-induced cybersickness remain unclear. This study examined how cybersickness and discomfort developed while participants watched racing game videos through an AR device. To investigate the effects of exposure duration and movement speed on cybersickness dynamics, participants were presented with slow and fast speed stimuli for 30 minutes each. A holistic evaluation was conducted by integrating subjective and objective measures, such as behavioral performance, self-reports of the Simulator Sickness Questionnaire (SSQ), and physiological signals from respiration pneumogram (RSP) and electrocardiogram (ECG). The results revealed that the effect of exposure duration was reflected in behavioral and subjective measures more consistently and robustly than in physiological responses. Gradual increases in cybersickness were reflected in slower response times and greater SSQ total scores with prolonged exposure. Notably, the eye-related symptoms emerged as a primary contributor to the temporal accumulation of AR cybersickness. In contrast, movement speed had a limited influence across all measures. Moreover, prior experience with AR was found to alleviate discomforting symptoms, suggesting that familiarity with the AR environment had contributed to reducing cybersickness. Correlational analyses further supported this notion, in which individuals more susceptible to visually induced motion sickness reported greater overall and oculomotor discomfort. Taken together, these findings underscore the distinct temporal and symptom-specific characteristics of AR-induced cybersickness, offering insights into managing user experience in the AR environment.