To me, this is a typical example of a lack of reflection – of doing something because one thinks one can, and not thinking that it has any consequences. I also think this behaviour happens because we follow what we think we are supposed to do in the game, not taking the moral responsibility for the actions. By not offering me any other agency, the experience is, in a way, legitimising my actions. Was it then my fault – or can I blame it on the context or the expectations of the creator of the experience?

A different possibility is to play on the way we interpret our surroundings to identify expectations from others. I started thinking about the book “Der Prozess”, by Franz Kafka. It describes a man struggling to prove his innocence without being able to find out the what the charges against him are. In my understanding of the book, the absurdity of his surroundings is indicating that he is seen as guilty because he himself feels guilty. He might, in a way, be conjuring up the charges against him himself because he is convinced that they are true.

Personally, I sometimes discover that I feel that there are expectations made of me that steer my behaviour, but that I cannot pin-point their origin if I try to analyse them. I seem to be trying to define what I am ‘supposed to do or mean’ based on the culture around me. This partly subconscious search for ‘acceptable behaviour’ and synchronising with my culture is one way in which I might be adopting biases.

To try to avoid communicating any intentions or expectations from the creator, the VR experience attempts to create an otherworldly ecology without any familiar elements. The aim is to provide an environment in which the participant will decide how to interact based either on active reflection or on a feeling of ‘sensing what to do’, according to their own instinctive decision-making.

My hypothesis is that the participant will instinctively think that the intended goal of the experience is to reach the water surface, motivated by all humans’ need air to breathe. However, there will be no other nudging towards this decision than the situation the participant is placed in. By allowing the user’s potentially automated decision to try to swim upwards initiate the user journey, I can help to ensure that all the interactions in the experience are reactions to the user’s decision-making.

Our culture also shapes the ways in which we interact with other people and how we sort them into friend or foe. I continued to pursue the idea of the companion, which would now serve a threefold purpose: the companion would encourage the participant to reflect by questioning the choices the participant makes, it would strengthen motivation and emotional intensity in the user journey, and lastly, it’s behaviour could make the participant question the companion’s loyalty and belonging – are they trustworthy or not? My intention is that the main user journey of ‘Otherself’ will take place within the participant, with the VR experience creating an environment that will stimulate the participant’s reflections and feelings when interacting with the material. This also makes it a hard concept to visualise.

Seeing the decision-making process of the participant as representing the core of the experience (and removing all potential distractions) also meant that I saw less need for elements such as pulse or sweat monitors to immerse the participant within the environment. At the same time, the design idea of equipping the participant with a strange diving mask would be strengthened by the physical weight that was already present from wearing the VR headset, thereby creating a physical element that might increase the sense of immersion. An added benefit of avoiding biometric equipment could be the potential for much broader distribution. 

I was also unhappy with the linear structure of the tunnel, where the shape of the tunnel was to direct and steer the participant. It signalled that the participant was being evaluated and controlled by a creator. I wished to be able to offer a open world where the participant could move and interact freely, without any hint of expectations from a creator. It occurred to me that this would create the possibility to try to explore a participant’s unconscious decision-making.

Study the description of Concept 4: "Otherself"

under the cloche in the kitchen.