[{"data":1,"prerenderedAt":-1},["ShallowReactive",2],{"doc-detail-83154-en":3,"doc-seo-83154-105":30,"detail-sidebar-cat-0-en-105":91},{"code":4,"msg":5,"data":6},0,"success",{"doc_id":7,"user_id":8,"nickname":9,"user_avatar":10,"doc_module":4,"category_id":11,"category_name":12,"doc_title":13,"doc_description":14,"doc_content":15,"file_id":16,"file_url":17,"file_type":18,"file_size":19,"view_count":20,"is_deleted":4,"is_public":21,"is_downloadable":21,"audit_status":21,"page_count":22,"language":23,"language_code":24,"site_id":25,"html_lang":24,"table_of_contents":26,"faqs":27,"seo_title":13,"seo_description":14,"update_tm":28,"read_time":29},83154,687197207057,"Sage","https://ap-avatar.wpscdn.com/davatar_29158cc5080c5b710cf443261637dec0",8,"Research & Report","New Cross-Sensory Approach to Designing Restorative Virtual Environments","Virtual reality nature immersion can help people who lack access to real nature, supporting stress reduction and attention restoration. Current restorative virtual environments often focus on visual design and treat multisensory input as additive, even though evidence suggests cross-sensory interactions may change outcomes. Sound can increase stress recovery, yet certain natural sounds may feel threatening when mismatched with the virtual scene. Cross-sensory mechanisms in VR nature environments remain underexplored, limiting optimal design for restorative effects.","arXiv :2607 .0690 1v 1 [ cs .HC] 8 Jul 2026  \nNew Cross-Sensory Approach to Designing Restorative Virtual Environments  \nRACHEL MASTERS, Colorado State University, USA FRANCISCO ORTEGA, Colorado State University, USA  \nVirtual reality (VR) nature immersion is an increasingly popular field of research due to its potential to help people who do not have access to real nature. There are many questions surrounding how virtual forests can be designed to effectively reduce stress and restore attention. Many of these questions relate solely to visual aspects, but more recent literature has started exploring multisensory experiences. In these experiences, senses are treated as additive; however, certain results from the current literature may indicate that there are more complex, cross-sensory interactions occurring. For example, adding sound to visuals can increase stress reduction potential, but certain natural sounds can feel threatening if they are out of place within the virtual nature scene. Overall, cross-sensory interactions in VR nature environments (VNEs) are underexplored and challenge our current understanding of multisensory VNEs, and future explorations of these interactions are essential for designing optimal VNEs for stress reduction.  \nCCS Concepts: • Human-centered computing → Empirical studies in HCI; Virtual reality.  \nAdditional Key Words and Phrases: Forest Bathing, Multisensory, Cross-sensory, Biophilia, Affect, Nature Immersion  \n1 Introduction  \nForest bathing is a term used to describe the practice of nature immersion for stress reduction and mental resource restoration. Stress Recovery Theory describes how nonthreatening natural environments reduce stress by decreasing negative affect and increasing positive affect [26] . Attention Restoration Theory describes how nature restores depleted cognitive resources through elements that naturally maintain our interest [12] . Researchers are actively working to understand what qualities of nature make it restorative, both for nature conservation purposes [25] and for the design of restorative parks [14] that can help people in high stress environments like cities and hospitals [27] .  \nVirtual reality (VR) is becoming a very useful tool for both of these cases. VR is excellent for studying the design of real world parks because it can simulate granular differences in nature environments that would be too cumbersome to control in a real nature environment [14], such as testing certain sounds or controlling the number of different plants. VR also has potential as a virtual nature supplement when access to real nature is lacking, promoting stress reduction in the types of high stress environments that have the least nature access, including nursing homes [9] and hospitals [5] among other confined environments.  \nWhile VR presents great opportunities for controlled nature simulations, it also presents many unknowns surrounding the optimal design of VR nature environments (VNEs) for stress reduction and mental resource restoration. The primary focus of current literature on VNE design is on visual aspects of the environment [13, 18, 19, 22, 23]; however, multisensory VNE design is of increasing interest to researchers for multiple reasons. The primary reason is that real nature is multisensory, so incorporation of multiple senses into VNEs increases presence which can increase stress reduction potential [11] . A secondary reason is that cross-sensory interactions may affect stress reduction in ways not  \nAuthors’ Contact Information: Rachel Masters, [ramast1@colostate.edu](ramast1@colostate.edu), Colorado State University, Fort Collins, Colorado, USA; Francisco Ortega, [f.ortega@colostate.edu](f.ortega@colostate.edu), Colorado State University, Fort Collins, Colorado, USA.  \nPermission to make digital or hard copies of all or part of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial ad","cbCaib7uaTpPXwiI","https://ap.wps.com/l/cbCaib7uaTpPXwiI","pdf",379507,2,1,5,"English","en",105,"# Introduction\n# Current Multisensory Research","[{\"question\":\"What is the document’s main goal in VR nature environment design?\",\"answer\":\"To address how cross-sensory interactions in restorative VR nature environments are underexplored and need further study for designing optimal environments that reduce stress and restore attention.\"},{\"question\":\"Why is multisensory VR design important beyond purely visual design?\",\"answer\":\"Real nature is multisensory, and adding multiple senses can increase presence, which may enhance stress reduction. Cross-sensory interactions may also influence outcomes in ways not captured by additive assumptions.\"},{\"question\":\"How do theoretical frameworks for restoration relate to the need for cross-sensory research?\",\"answer\":\"Forest bathing and theories such as Stress Recovery Theory and Attention Restoration Theory explain how nonthreatening nature reduces stress and replenishes attention, but existing work largely emphasizes visual elements, leaving uncertainty about how specific sounds and other senses map onto restorative effects.\"}]",1784185644,13,{"code":4,"msg":31,"data":32},"ok",{"site_id":25,"language":24,"slug":33,"title":13,"keywords":34,"description":14,"schema_data":35,"social_meta":86,"head_meta":88,"extra_data":90,"updated_unix":28},"new-cross-sensory-approach-to-designing-restorative-virtual-environments","",{"@graph":36,"@context":85},[37,53,68],{"@type":38,"itemListElement":39},"BreadcrumbList",[40,44,47,50],{"item":41,"name":42,"@type":43,"position":21},"https://docshare.wps.com","Home","ListItem",{"item":45,"name":46,"@type":43,"position":20},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/","Document",{"item":48,"name":12,"@type":43,"position":49},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/research-report/",3,{"item":51,"name":13,"@type":43,"position":52},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/new-cross-sensory-approach-to-designing-restorative-virtual-environments/83154/",4,{"url":51,"name":13,"@type":54,"author":55,"headline":13,"publisher":57,"fileFormat":60,"inLanguage":24,"description":14,"dateModified":61,"datePublished":62,"encodingFormat":60,"isAccessibleForFree":63,"interactionStatistic":64},"DigitalDocument",{"name":9,"@type":56},"Person",{"url":41,"name":58,"@type":59},"DocShare","Organization","application/pdf","2026-07-23","2026-07-16",true,{"@type":65,"interactionType":66,"userInteractionCount":20},"InteractionCounter",{"@type":67},"ViewAction",{"@type":69,"mainEntity":70},"FAQPage",[71,77,81],{"name":72,"@type":73,"acceptedAnswer":74},"What is the document’s main goal in VR nature environment design?","Question",{"text":75,"@type":76},"To address how cross-sensory interactions in restorative VR nature environments are underexplored and need further study for designing optimal environments that reduce stress and restore attention.","Answer",{"name":78,"@type":73,"acceptedAnswer":79},"Why is multisensory VR design important beyond purely visual design?",{"text":80,"@type":76},"Real nature is multisensory, and adding multiple senses can increase presence, which may enhance stress reduction. Cross-sensory interactions may also influence outcomes in ways not captured by additive assumptions.",{"name":82,"@type":73,"acceptedAnswer":83},"How do theoretical frameworks for restoration relate to the need for cross-sensory research?",{"text":84,"@type":76},"Forest bathing and theories such as Stress Recovery Theory and Attention Restoration Theory explain how nonthreatening nature reduces stress and replenishes attention, but existing work largely emphasizes visual elements, leaving uncertainty about how specific sounds and other senses map onto restorative effects.","https://schema.org",{"og:url":51,"og:type":87,"og:title":13,"og:site_name":58,"og:description":14},"article",{"robots":89,"canonical":51},"index,follow",{"doc_id":7,"site_id":25},{"code":4,"msg":5,"data":92},[93,97,101,105,109,114,119,122,127,130,134],{"id":21,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":46,"category_name":94,"show_sort_weight":95,"slug":96},"Story & Novel",90,"story-novel",{"id":20,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":46,"category_name":98,"show_sort_weight":99,"slug":100},"Literature",80,"literature",{"id":52,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":46,"category_name":102,"show_sort_weight":103,"slug":104},"Exam",70,"exam",{"id":22,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":46,"category_name":106,"show_sort_weight":107,"slug":108},"Comic",60,"comic",{"id":110,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":46,"category_name":111,"show_sort_weight":112,"slug":113},6,"Technology",50,"technology",{"id":115,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":46,"category_name":116,"show_sort_weight":117,"slug":118},7,"Healthcare",40,"healthcare",{"id":11,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":46,"category_name":12,"show_sort_weight":120,"slug":121},30,"research-report",{"id":123,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":46,"category_name":124,"show_sort_weight":125,"slug":126},9,"Religion & Spirituality",20,"religion-spirituality",{"id":125,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":46,"category_name":128,"show_sort_weight":125,"slug":129},"World Cup","world-cup",{"id":131,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":46,"category_name":132,"show_sort_weight":131,"slug":133},10,"Lifestyle","lifestyle",{"id":135,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":46,"category_name":136,"show_sort_weight":22,"slug":137},19,"General","general"]