Developing and Evaluating a Virtual Reality Videogame Using Biofeedback for Stress Management in Sports

Stress is a reaction of the body to external challenges, whether physical or psychological. In sports, there are stress factors that affect the athlete's performance, especially in team sports that involve short, high-intensity exercise cycles followed by short recovery periods, such as American football. The lack of stress regulation mechanisms can be detrimental to the individual and collective performance of athletes. Biofeedback systems have shown promising clinical results in regulating stress for sports competitions. However, there is a lack of scientific evidence to support their efficacy, and technologies, such as virtual reality videogames, have not been extensively explored. In this article, we present the development and pilot testing of Virtual Autonomic Nervous System (VANS), a virtual reality videogame using biofeedback that supports stress management training in athletes. VANS uses an optical heart rate sensor and aims at keeping the heart rate below a given threshold to control features within the game. We evaluated the usability and user experience of VANS through a 1-week deployment study with 10 American footballers. Our results show that VANS outperformed a commercial videogame used for biofeedback training and considerably reduced stress in our participants. Therefore, VANS could provide stress management training for future matches and competitions. Finally, we reflect on aspects of our design and discuss future directions of our work.