Eye Tracking in Virtual Reality: a Broad Review of Applications and Challenges

Overview

Journal Virtual Real

Publisher Springer

Date 2023 Aug 25

PMID 37621305

Authors

Isayas Berhe Adhanom

Paul MacNeilage

Eelke Folmer

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

Eye tracking is becoming increasingly available in head-mounted virtual reality displays with various headsets with integrated eye trackers already commercially available. The applications of eye tracking in virtual reality are highly diversified and span multiple disciplines. As a result, the number of peer-reviewed publications that study eye tracking applications has surged in recent years. We performed a broad review to comprehensively search academic literature databases with the aim of assessing the extent of published research dealing with applications of eye tracking in virtual reality, and highlighting challenges, limitations and areas for future research.

Citing Articles

Physicochemical and Sensory Evaluation of Sustainable Plant-Based Homopolymers as an Alternative to Traditional Emollients in Topical Emulsions.

Meneguello T, Palma N, Santos Y, Carvalho A, Ladeira A, Bonsanto F Pharmaceutics. 2025; 17(2).

PMID: 40006631 PMC: 11859265. DOI: 10.3390/pharmaceutics17020265.

Comparative Analysis of Physiological Vergence Angle Calculations from Objective Measurements of Gaze Position.

Krauze L, Panke K, Krumina G, Pladere T Sensors (Basel). 2025; 24(24.

PMID: 39771937 PMC: 11678997. DOI: 10.3390/s24248198.

Weathering words: a virtual reality study of environmental influence on reading dynamics.

Rocabado F, Muntini L, Gonzalez Alonso J, Dunabeitia J Front Psychol. 2024; 15:1433781.

PMID: 39469248 PMC: 11514275. DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2024.1433781.

Virtual Reality-Assisted Informed Consent for Anesthesia: A Prospective and Randomized Proof-of-Concept Study.

Simon S, Opfermann P, Hofstaetter J, Marhofer P J Clin Med. 2024; 13(20).

PMID: 39458046 PMC: 11509058. DOI: 10.3390/jcm13206096.

Toward Physiological Detection of a "Just-Right" Challenge Level for Motor Learning in Immersive Virtual Reality: Protocol for a Cross-Sectional Study.

Lemay M, Levac D JMIR Res Protoc. 2024; 13:e55730.

PMID: 39312763 PMC: 11459106. DOI: 10.2196/55730.

References

Kothari R, Yang Z, Kanan C, Bailey R, Pelz J, Diaz G . Gaze-in-wild: A dataset for studying eye and head coordination in everyday activities. Sci Rep. 2020; 10(1):2539. PMC: 7018838. DOI: 10.1038/s41598-020-59251-5. View

John B, Jorg S, Koppal S, Jain E . The Security-Utility Trade-off for Iris Authentication and Eye Animation for Social Virtual Avatars. IEEE Trans Vis Comput Graph. 2020; 26(5):1880-1890. DOI: 10.1109/TVCG.2020.2973052. View

Adhanom I, Lee S, Folmer E, MacNeilage P . GazeMetrics: An Open-Source Tool for Measuring the Data Quality of HMD-based Eye Trackers. Proc Eye Track Res Appl Symp. 2021; 2020. PMC: 8006601. DOI: 10.1145/3379156.3391374. View

Pulay M . Eye-tracking and EMG supported 3D Virtual Reality - an integrated tool for perceptual and motor development of children with severe physical disabilities: a research concept. Stud Health Technol Inform. 2015; 217:840-6. View

Boyer E, Portron A, Bevilacqua F, Lorenceau J . Continuous Auditory Feedback of Eye Movements: An Exploratory Study toward Improving Oculomotor Control. Front Neurosci. 2017; 11:197. PMC: 5403913. DOI: 10.3389/fnins.2017.00197. View

Kramida G . Resolving the Vergence-Accommodation Conflict in Head-Mounted Displays. IEEE Trans Vis Comput Graph. 2015; 22(7):1912-31. DOI: 10.1109/TVCG.2015.2473855. View

Waltemate T, Gall D, Roth D, Botsch M, Latoschik M . The Impact of Avatar Personalization and Immersion on Virtual Body Ownership, Presence, and Emotional Response. IEEE Trans Vis Comput Graph. 2018; 24(4):1643-1652. DOI: 10.1109/TVCG.2018.2794629. View

Duchowski A . A breadth-first survey of eye-tracking applications. Behav Res Methods Instrum Comput. 2003; 34(4):455-70. DOI: 10.3758/bf03195475. View

Harris D, Wilson M, Vine S . A critical analysis of the functional parameters of the quiet eye using immersive virtual reality. J Exp Psychol Hum Percept Perform. 2020; 47(2):308-321. DOI: 10.1037/xhp0000800. View

10.

Kourkoumelis N, Tzaphlidou M . Eye safety related to near infrared radiation exposure to biometric devices. ScientificWorldJournal. 2011; 11:520-8. PMC: 5720004. DOI: 10.1100/tsw.2011.52. View

11.

Al Zayer M, MacNeilage P, Folmer E . Virtual Locomotion: A Survey. IEEE Trans Vis Comput Graph. 2018; 26(6):2315-2334. DOI: 10.1109/TVCG.2018.2887379. View

12.

Trillenberg P, Lencer R, Heide W . Eye movements and psychiatric disease. Curr Opin Neurol. 2004; 17(1):43-7. DOI: 10.1097/00019052-200402000-00008. View

13.

Mann D, Williams A, Ward P, Janelle C . Perceptual-cognitive expertise in sport: a meta-analysis. J Sport Exerc Psychol. 2007; 29(4):457-78. DOI: 10.1123/jsep.29.4.457. View

14.

Yiu Y, Aboulatta M, Raiser T, Ophey L, Flanagin V, Eulenburg P . DeepVOG: Open-source pupil segmentation and gaze estimation in neuroscience using deep learning. J Neurosci Methods. 2019; 324:108307. DOI: 10.1016/j.jneumeth.2019.05.016. View

15.

Stein N, Niehorster D, Watson T, Steinicke F, Rifai K, Wahl S . A Comparison of Eye Tracking Latencies Among Several Commercial Head-Mounted Displays. Iperception. 2021; 12(1):2041669520983338. PMC: 7883159. DOI: 10.1177/2041669520983338. View

16.

Zhe Z, Siebert F, Venjakob A, Roetting M . Calibration-Free Gaze Interfaces Based on Linear Smooth Pursuit. J Eye Mov Res. 2021; 13(1). PMC: 7881880. DOI: 10.16910/jemr.13.1.3. View

17.

Tao L, Wang Q, Liu D, Wang J, Zhu Z, Feng L . Eye tracking metrics to screen and assess cognitive impairment in patients with neurological disorders. Neurol Sci. 2020; 41(7):1697-1704. DOI: 10.1007/s10072-020-04310-y. View

18.

Cowey A, Rolls E . Human cortical magnification factor and its relation to visual acuity. Exp Brain Res. 1974; 21(5):447-454. DOI: 10.1007/BF00237163. View

19.

Otero-Millan J, Macknik S, Martinez-Conde S . Fixational eye movements and binocular vision. Front Integr Neurosci. 2014; 8:52. PMC: 4083562. DOI: 10.3389/fnint.2014.00052. View

20.

Shibata T, Kim J, Hoffman D, Banks M . The zone of comfort: Predicting visual discomfort with stereo displays. J Vis. 2011; 11(8):11. PMC: 3369815. DOI: 10.1167/11.8.11. View