Immersing Students: The Impact of Virtual Reality on Student Engagement and Team Dynamics in a Business Simulation
, Elizabeth E ParkResearch has shown that students using virtual reality (VR) have improved engagement, but most work has focused primarily on STEM curricula. This research assesses the implementation of VR within business courses to identify whether student engagement and team dynamics are associated and whether VR differs from in-person interaction.
VR utilization has increased in recent years to improve educational endeavors. Businesses are also adopting immersive technologies, and current business students will likely encounter this VR technology.
Students from two universities, with inter-university teams, played an enterprise simulation game using VR headsets, thus pulling together VR technology and business simulation.
Statistical analysis of survey responses indicates a positive association between engagement and team dynamics using VR.
The study’s results indicate that VR use in inter-university teams has significantly higher perceived student engagement and team dynamics than in-person non-VR utilization.
This study found that students were more engaged with improved teamwork using VR headsets, indicating a more captivating involvement than students in-person (non-VR). This has broader implications for business and education concerning engagement and collaboration for in-person and remote active learning experiences.
VR has the potential to enhance learning environments and create improved experiences for remote learners, making it an imperative research stream. Future research needs to validate that VR is appropriately integrated for improved learning experiences.
While businesses’ adoption of VR is gaining popularity, universities need to investigate VR utilization in their curricula to remain competitive.
Future research plans are to collect data from a larger pool of students and include measuring learning objectives when using VR. In addition, plans include investigating the impact of VR utilization differences for students in an in-person class and those in an online class. Specifically, will online students obtain the same or improved VR experience compared to being online without VR?
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