Physical and Physiological Impact of Custom-Made Virtual Reality Exergames for Older Adults

Cíntia França, Cíntia França, Hildegardo Noronha, Eva Freitas, Pedro Campos, Pedro Campos, Rui T. Ornelas, Rui T. Ornelas, Élvio Gouveia, Élvio Gouveia, Élvio Gouveia, Élvio Gouveia

2025

Abstract

Aging is associated with decreased physical fitness components, such as strength, power, cardiorespiratory fitness, and balance, resulting in physical limitations on functional activities of daily living. The increasing population of older adults calls for innovative strategies to support functional health, particularly through exercise. This study has two main objectives: (1) to introduce a custom-designed virtual reality (VR) exergame prototype, FitFest, developed to deliver physical activity (PA) sessions for older adults, and (2) to present the results of a pilot study assessing physical and physiological responses during gameplay. Seven older adults (mean age 67.0±3.8 years) participated in 18 user testing sessions involving two VR exergames—Wine Fest and Flower Fest. Each session was monitored for PA intensity and heart rate (HR). The participants spent most of their time in sedentary behavior (56.5±20.4%), followed by light PA (42.1±19.3%), averaging 436.7 steps and a heart rate of 92.1 bpm per session. Although the differences were not statistically significant, Wine Fest led to lower sedentary behavior, higher light PA levels, and more total steps than Flower Fest. The findings suggest that the system can potentially promote light PA among older adults, emerging as a complementary tool to traditional PA sessions.

Paper Citation

in Harvard Style

França C., Noronha H., Freitas E., Campos P., Ornelas R. and Gouveia É. (2025). Physical and Physiological Impact of Custom-Made Virtual Reality Exergames for Older Adults. In Proceedings of the 13th International Conference on Sport Sciences Research and Technology Support - Volume 1: icSPORTS; ISBN 978-989-758-771-9, SciTePress, pages 155-162. DOI: 10.5220/0013681600003988

in Bibtex Style

@conference{icsports25,
author={Cíntia França and Hildegardo Noronha and Eva Freitas and Pedro Campos and Rui Ornelas and Élvio Gouveia},
title={Physical and Physiological Impact of Custom-Made Virtual Reality Exergames for Older Adults},
booktitle={Proceedings of the 13th International Conference on Sport Sciences Research and Technology Support - Volume 1: icSPORTS},
year={2025},
pages={155-162},
publisher={SciTePress},
organization={INSTICC},
doi={10.5220/0013681600003988},
isbn={978-989-758-771-9},
}

in EndNote Style

TY - CONF

JO - Proceedings of the 13th International Conference on Sport Sciences Research and Technology Support - Volume 1: icSPORTS
TI - Physical and Physiological Impact of Custom-Made Virtual Reality Exergames for Older Adults
SN - 978-989-758-771-9
AU - França C.
AU - Noronha H.
AU - Freitas E.
AU - Campos P.
AU - Ornelas R.
AU - Gouveia É.
PY - 2025
SP - 155
EP - 162
DO - 10.5220/0013681600003988
PB - SciTePress