Use of Incremental Adaptation and Habituation Regimens for Mitigating Optokinetic Side Effects

Abstract

The use of incremental and repeated exposures regimens have been put forth as effective means to mitigating visually induced motion sickness based on the Dual Process Theory (DPT) (Groves & Thompson, 1970) of neural plasticity. In essence, DPT suggests that by incrementing stimulus intensity the depression opponent process should exert greater control over the net outcome (e.g. motion sickness) than the sensitization opponent process, thereby minimizing side effects. This conceptual model was tested by empirically validating the effectiveness of adaptation, incremental adaptation, habituation, and incremental habituation regimens to mitigate side effects arising from exposure to an optokinetic drum. Forty college students from the University of Central Florida participated in the experiment and were randomly assigned to a treatment with efforts taken to balance for gender and motion sickness susceptibility. Results indicated that overall, the application of an incremental regimen is effective in reducing side effects (e.g. malaise and dropout rates) when compared to a non-incremented regimen, whether it be a one time or repeated exposure. Furthermore, application of the Motion History Questionnaire (MHQ) (Graybiel & Kennedy, 1965) to identify high and low motion sickness susceptible individuals proved effective. Finally, gender differences were not found in this experiment as a result of balancing susceptibility within the gender subject variable.