Using Virtual Reality to Systematically Examine Impacts of Noise and Visual Clutter on Message Elaboration and Cognitive Capacity.

This study used virtual reality to examine how environmental attributes interact with health communication to influence psychiatric help-seeking behavior, using the example of a subway station. We used a 2 × 2 factorial design crossing two noise conditions (high noise [75 dB] or low noise [30 dB]) and two visual clutter conditions (low clutter [a tidy trash can and orderly construction materials] or high clutter [scattered trash and construction materials]). We found that participants in the high (vs. low) visual clutter condition reported lower cognitive capacity levels, and there was a significant correlation between cognitive capacity and message elaboration. However, we found no effects of noise conditions. Serving as a proof-of-concept study to investigate the contexts in which environmental stressors may influence information processing, this study contributes to the field of health communication environmental design research. Clinical Trial Registration: https://osf.io/rsa48.