Movement-based Locomotion
Time: Fri 2025-10-31 14.00
Location: F3 (Flodis), Lindstedtsvägen 26 & 28, Stockholm
Video link: https://kth-se.zoom.us/j/62907718395
Language: English
Subject area: Human-computer Interaction
Doctoral student: Martin Hedlund , Medieteknik och interaktionsdesign, MID
Opponent: Associate Professor Daniel Zielasko, Technical University of Denmark (DTU), Kongens Lyngby, Denmark
Supervisor: Professor Cristian M Bogdan, Medieteknik och interaktionsdesign, MID; Assistant Professor Andrii Matviienko, Medieteknik och interaktionsdesign, MID; Affiliated Professor Gerrit Meixner, Medieteknik och interaktionsdesign, MID
QC 20251014
Abstract
The increasing prevalence of sedentary lifestyles has prompted a growing interest in technologies that integrate physical activity into digital experiences. This thesis focuses on how locomotion — the act of moving through physical and virtual environments — can be meaningfully integrated in applications through input from the user’s physical body movements. Through a Constructive Design Research approach, I have designed and prototyped locomotion techniques for Virtual Reality in four different projects, and conducted empirical evaluations through lab-based experimental studies to understand how this influences the user’s exertion, experience, and ability to navigate.
Each project explores different movement-based locomotion techniques for walking, jogging, rowing, and flying, culminating in four papers. Paper I demonstrates how a sedentary desktop activity can be redesigned to facilitate light to moderate intensity physical activity through walking. Papers II, III,and IV demonstrate how the prototypes provide means of movement-based locomotion in three-dimensional virtual environments beyond room scale, which is missing in exertion-focused games (exergames).
The results of the experimental studies provide additional insights into how the different design alternatives influenced the user’s ability to navigate, providing design implications for each context and for locomotion research more generally. Through reexamining the papers through the lens of fidelity -how accurate interactions correspond to real movements, the thesis addresses the question of how medium fidelity impacts the performance and experience of movement-based locomotion techniques. Additionally, the thesis addresses the question of how movement-based locomotion can provide means of exertion for both novel exergame design and non-exergame applications. Lastly, the thesis also offers a conceptual framework, intended as a support tool for both the design and analysis of movement-based interaction.