Immersive virtual reality (VR) has been increasingly adopted in educational contexts due to its potential to enhance learners’ sense of presence and engagement. However, the extent to which increased presence translates into improved learning outcomes remains unclear. This thesis investigated the role of presence in foreign language vocabulary acquisition by comparing a fully immersive VR learning environment with a desktop learning environment. The study aimed to understand the differences between conditions in presence, agency, engagement, learning outcomes and retention and explored the relationship between these variables.
A between-subject experimental design was employed, with participants assigned to either the VR or desktop condition. Participants completed a pre-test, an immediate post-test and a delayed post-test to assess vocabulary acquisition and retention, while presence, agency and engagement were measured following the learning intervention.
The results demonstrated that participants in the VR condition expectedly experienced a stronger sense of presence than those in the desktop condition. The sense of agency, however, did not differ in either condition, and no direct relationship with presence was found. Even though engagement levels were similar in both conditions, presence was positively associated with engagement in the VR condition and no such relationship was established in the desktop condition. Both instructional modalities were effective in supporting vocabulary acquisition, as observed by the significantly improved performance from pre-test to post-test and stable performance at the delayed test. Surprisingly, desktop participants outperformed participants in the VR condition at the immediate post-test. However, retention scores did not differ between the conditions. Presence was not meaningfully related to learning outcomes or retention in either condition.
These findings suggest that while VR enhances learners’ sense of presence and may increase engagement, it does not translate into exceptional learning outcomes. Presence alone isn’t sufficient to ensure effective learning outcomes; effective instructional design and management of cognitive load are more critical for learning than just immersiveness alone.