Virtual Reality (VR) has the potential to enrich education but little is known about how unique affordances of immersive technology might influence leaning and cognition. This study investigates one particular affordance of VR, namely environmental embeddedness, which enables learners to be situated in simulated or imagined settings that contextualize their learning. A sample of 51 university students were administered written learning material in a between-subjects design study, wherein one group read text about sarcoma cancer on a physical pamphlet in the real world, and the other group read identical text on a virtual pamphlet embedded in an immersive VR environment which resembled a hospital room. The study combined advanced EEG measurement techniques, learning tests, and cognitive load measures to compare conditions. Results show that the VR group performed significantly better on a knowledge transfer post-test. However, reading in VR was found to be more cognitively effortful and less time-efficient. Findings suggest the significance of environmental embeddedness for learning, and provide important considerations for the design of educational VR environments, as we remediate learning content from non-immersive to immersive media.

虚拟现实（VR）具有丰富教育的潜力，但对于沉浸式技术的独特承受能力如何影响学习和认知知之甚少。这项研究调查了VR的一种特殊功能，即环境嵌入性，它使学习者能够处于模拟或想象中的环境中，从而使学习成为现实。在对象之间的设计研究中，对51名大学生的样本进行了书面学习材料的管理，其中一组阅读现实世界中物理小册子上有关肉瘤的文本，另一组阅读嵌入在虚拟现实手册中的虚拟小册子中的相同文本。身临其境的VR环境，类似于医院的病房。这项研究结合了先进的脑电图测量技术，学习测试和认知负荷量度来比较情况。结果表明，VR小组在知识转移后测中表现明显更好。但是，发现在VR中阅读在认知上更省力，而且时间效率更低。研究结果表明，在我们将学习内容从非沉浸式媒体转换为沉浸式媒体的过程中，环境嵌入对于学习的重要性，并为教育性VR环境的设计提供了重要的考虑因素。