Stephan Streuber talks HRV and Physiological Synchrony in Virtual Reality

In this episode, Stephan Streuber joins Matt Bennett to discuss the role heart rate variability played in his recent research and article Remote collaboration in virtual reality induces physiological synchrony comparable to face-to-face interaction.

Dr. Stephan Streuber holds a Diploma in Media Informatics from Harz University of Applied Sciences and a PhD in Neural and Behavioral Sciences from the Max Planck Institute for Biological Cybernetics in Tübingen, Germany (2013), supported by a Research Fellowship from the Max Planck Society. He later held research positions at the Max Planck Institute for Intelligent Systems and the Brain Mind Institute at EPFL in Lausanne, Switzerland.

In 2018, he joined the University of Konstanz as an Assistant Professor for Virtual Reality and Collective Behavior, a role he held until 2021. Since then, he has been a Full Professor of Usability Engineering and Interaction Design in Visual Computing at Coburg University of Applied Sciences and Arts, where he leads the Virtual Environments and Social Interaction Lab (socialVRlab.com).

His main research aim is to understand the mechanisms behind social interactions. To do this, he creates immersive multi-user virtual environments with realistic avatars and AI-powered agents, facilitating the study of group coordination, synchronization, and emotion contagion. His work also investigates body perception and representation, with clinical applications in eating disorders, stroke rehabilitation, and XR-based mental health research and treatment.