A fully immersive gamified virtual reality assessment of functional cognition

Neurodegenerative diseases have become a major challenge to healthcare systems worldwide, and scalable, cost-effective screening tools are needed to manage them with minimal resource expenditure. In this feasibility study, we developed and evaluated vKitchen, a fully immersive, gamified virtual reality (VR) cognitive assessment system designed to simulate real-life kitchen tasks through a sushi- making simulation. Twenty-five healthy young adults (18–45 years) completed the vKitchen task in three different environments: a VR environment using a head-mounted display, a traditional 2D tablet interface, and a real kitchen envi- ronment. Key performance indicators were recorded, including task completion times, movement success rates and overall performance scores, and the results were compared across the three conditions. In addition, participants completed a Cognitron test to explore the correlation between task performance and standard cognitive measures. Our analysis showed that there were no significant differences in movement success rates or performance scores between the VR, 2D and real kitchen environ- ments, suggesting that the VR simulation can realistically reproduce real-life task performance. Notably, completion times differed: tasks were completed fastest in the 2D environment, while VR performance was closer to real-life results. Regression analyses showed that familiarity with technology and cooking largely determined task completion. However, the study also identified limitations, such as the small and relatively young participant sample, irregular data distributions and challenges inherent to VR simulations (e.g. reduced multisensory feedback and insufficient matching of certain task steps to real actions). These findings suggest that vKitchen has the potential to become an effective and scalable screening tool for neurodegenerative diseases, providing a user-friendly and cost-effective alternative to traditional cognitive assessments. Future research should focus on enhancing multisensory integration, expanding the participant demographics, and incorporating more complex cognitive tasks to further validate and refine this innovative approach.