Presence in Video Game Play and Nighttime Dreams: An Empirical Inquiry

Abstract

Presence, or the sense of being there, is often studied in the virtual reality literature and increasingly measured in the video game studies literature. It has been suggested that night time dreams offer the gold standard upon which other measures of presence can be compared. This is an empirical examination of that claim. Self reported presence in a video game just played under different playing conditions, were compared to the same presence items solicited after a night time dream following the game play session. Results suggest that dreams may not be the gold standard of presence in today’s increasingly sophisticated world of virtual realities.