Use of immersive virtual environments for occupant behaviour monitoring and data collection

With the recent advancements in the field of virtual reality, occupants can now be immersed into virtual built environments, where they have the ability to visualize and interact with the environment. Researchers also have the ability to collect and observe various behavioural choices impacting performance of built environments (e.g. shading control, lighting preferences, use of appliances, etc.) in such environments. They can further create realistic occupant-related models for more accurate building performance simulation (BPS). This paper identifies the benefits and limitations of using immersive virtual environments (IVEs) for collecting and modelling occupant behaviours while highlighting how such information could improve BPS results. Furthermore, a number of lessons learned and best practices for designing IVE-based experiments, current shortcomings of such environments, and future research opportunities for adopting such technologies towards improving building design and operations, specifically for BPS purposes, are discussed in detail.