Validation of a Virtual Reality Environment for Research on Human-Drone Interaction in Construction

Drones have been increasingly adopted in the construction industry to address labor shortages, enhance productivity, and reduce inefficiencies. This growing adoption has made human-drone interaction inevitable on jobsites, raising concerns about potential safety impacts on human workers and underscoring the need for systematic investigation of relevant human factors. Human-centered experiments are essential for directly examining these factors, where virtual reality (VR) offers a controlled, repeatable, and risk-free environment for simulating high-risk construction scenarios and observing safety-critical behaviors. This study presents the development and validation of a VR environment designed to serve as a realistic and engaging platform for human-drone interaction research in construction. The workflow for VR development is outlined, followed by a pilot study to evaluate the feasibility of the developed VR environment. The evaluation quantitatively examined sense of presence, perceived workload, motion sickness, VR technical reliability, and scenario design relevance. The findings validated the feasibility of the developed VR environment as an experimental platform for advancing human-drone interaction research, which will ultimately support the development of safer and more productive construction practices.