Designing hand-held controller-based handshake interaction in social VR and Metaverse

This work presents four possible designs for the handshake interaction in a Social VR-like virtual environment in which the user operates using hand-held controllers: a first design based on a graphics user interface (GUI), a second design leveraging a physical button on hand-held controllers, and two designs based on recreating the handshaking gesture by grabbing the other party’s hand and shaking it. The four designs were evaluated and compared through a user study which involved 24 participants, analyzing factors pertaining to embodiment, presence and social presence, usability, and handshake quality of experience. Results indicated that the gesture-based design was preferred, overall.