Abstract:

In the last decade, the growing interest in immersive virtual technologies has allowed these tools to be incorporated into educational institutions for improving teaching and learning practices [1]. As a remarkable example, in the UK, 96% of universities and 79% of colleges are now applying virtual environments. Immersive virtual technologies include virtual reality (VR), augmented reality (AR), and mixed realities (MR). In particular, virtual reality provides an immersive experience for users in a digital world with promising prospects in education, bringing substantial benefits from kindergarten through 12th grade (K-12 education) [2].

Beyond elementary school or high school, immersive virtual technologies in higher education are not widely known and applied as well as their effects on students are uncertain. Keeping this in mind, we have synthesized the available literature on the use of immersive virtual technologies in higher education, particularly, for teaching and/or learning physics at macro, micro, and atomistic scale. So, immersive virtual technologies can be used together with traditional education or remote learning.

In this systematic review, we aggregate the current knowledge of how virtual, augmented, and mixed reality technologies are applicable in higher education to cover physics topics worldwide. The main goal of the present work is to explore the impact of immersive virtual technologies on the performance of proficient and non-proficient students.

In this work, specifically, we have searched the Scopus, Web of Sciences, and Sciences Direct databases for articles describing the custom of virtual augmented and/or mixed reality technologies in physics learning for higher education and their impact on learning outcomes. We identified 183 articles in Scopus, 148 articles in Web of Science, and 19 articles in Science Direct. After multiple screening and eligibility phases, 25 articles were left for full-text reading, reaming only 13 articles for the extraction phase. As a main result, it was observed that 74% of immersive virtual technologies are applied in topics of general physics, and only two works have ventured into modern physics and thermodynamics. This result indicates the unusual application of virtual technologies in advanced physics courses.

It should also be noted that virtual reality is still a relatively complex and expensive technology and, although prices are coming down, equipping every student with virtual reality and augmented reality systems for learning is a complex and expensive task, which suggests that learning in the future may need semi-centralized labs equipped with VR/AR technologies, where students could come to work, but educators would connect remotely.

References:
[1] Radianti, Jaziar, et al. "A systematic review of immersive virtual reality applications for higher education: Design elements, lessons learned, and research agenda." Computers & Education 147 (2020): 103778.
[2] Sanderink, C. History class in virtual reality for elementary education. BS thesis. University of Twente, 2018.

Acknowledgments:
The authors would like to thank Corporación Ecuatoriana para el Desarrollo de la Investigación y Academia - CEDIA for the financial support given to the present research, development, and innovation work through its CEPRA program, especially for the “Proyecto 18-Tecnologias Inmersivas” fund.

Keywords:

Physics Education, Immersive Virtual Technologies, Teaching and Learning Practices.