Dr. David Obremski

Dr. David Obremski

Senior Researcher

Tel.: +49 931 31 88144

Psychologie Intelligenter Interaktiver Systeme
Julius-Maximilians-Universität Würzburg
Institut für Mensch-Computer-Medien
Universität Würzburg
Emil-Fischer-Straße 50
97074 Würzburg
Room 01.002

Mini-CV

David completed his Bachelor's degree in Human-Computer Systems and his Master's degree in Human-Computer Interaction in Würzburg. At the University of Music in Würzburg, David studied jazz piano in his Bachelor's degree. He wrote his PhD thesis in the field of mixed-cultural virtual agents and their possible applications for the reduction of implicit cultural bias at the work group for media informatics, supervised by Prof. Birgit Lugrin. Since April 2023, David has been working in the Psychology of Intelligent Interactive Systems group. His research focuses on the perception of (embodied) artificial intelligence with an emphasis on user trust, effectiveness of human-ai collaborative work settings and psychotherapy and AI.

Research Interests

Artificial Intelligence (AI)
Embodied AI
Extended Reality
AI in Psychotherapy
AI in Work Environments
Trust in AI

Publications

2025[ to top ]

Wienrich, Carolin, and David Obremski. “Immersion, Attention, and Collaboration in Spatial Computing: A Study on Work Performance With Apple Vision Pro”. IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics 31, no. 5 (2025): 2995-3002. https://doi.org/10.1109/TVCG.2025.3549145.
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Spatial computing is set to change the way we work. It will enable both focused work through a higher degree of immersion and collaborative work through enhanced integration of shared interaction spaces or interaction partners. With the Apple Vision Pro, the level of immersion can be adjusted seamlessly. So far, there have been no systematic studies on how this adjustability affects work performance when working alone or together. The present empirical study fills this research gap by varying the level of immersion across three stages (high, medium, low) while solving various tasks with the Apple Vision Pro. The results show that selective attention improves significantly with increasing immersion levels. In contrast, social presence decreases with increasing immersion. In general, participants performed better in the individual task than in the collaborative task. However, the degree of immersion did not influence the collaborative performance. In addition, we could not determine any adverse effects on depth perception or user experience after use. The present study provides initial contributions to the future of spatial computing in professional settings and highlights the importance of balancing immersion and social interaction in a world where digital and physical spaces seamlessly coexist

@article{10917012, abstract = {Spatial computing is set to change the way we work. It will enable both focused work through a higher degree of immersion and collaborative work through enhanced integration of shared interaction spaces or interaction partners. With the Apple Vision Pro, the level of immersion can be adjusted seamlessly. So far, there have been no systematic studies on how this adjustability affects work performance when working alone or together. The present empirical study fills this research gap by varying the level of immersion across three stages (high, medium, low) while solving various tasks with the Apple Vision Pro. The results show that selective attention improves significantly with increasing immersion levels. In contrast, social presence decreases with increasing immersion. In general, participants performed better in the individual task than in the collaborative task. However, the degree of immersion did not influence the collaborative performance. In addition, we could not determine any adverse effects on depth perception or user experience after use. The present study provides initial contributions to the future of spatial computing in professional settings and highlights the importance of balancing immersion and social interaction in a world where digital and physical spaces seamlessly coexist}, author = {Wienrich, Carolin and Obremski, David}, journal = {IEEE Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics}, keywords = {ieeevr25}, number = 5, pages = {2995-3002}, title = {Immersion, Attention, and Collaboration in Spatial Computing: a Study on Work Performance with Apple Vision Pro}, volume = 31, year = 2025 }

2024[ to top ]

Obremski, David, and Carolin Wienrich. “Autonomous VR Exposure Therapy for Anxiety Disorders Using Conversational AI—Ethical and Technical Implications and Preliminary Results”. Scientific Research Publishing 12, no. 4 (April 2024). https://doi.org/10.4236/jcc.2024.124010.
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The need for psychotherapy is very high and the lack of care causes a lot of suffering and high costs. This paper presents an interdisciplinary approach to creating an AI-guided exposure therapy for fear of heights in virtual reality (VR). First, ethical principles for the use of conversational AI in psychotherapy were translated into technical requirements and made measurable. Based on this, an autonomous virtual reality exposure therapy was iteratively developed with a therapist. The feasibility and implementation of the ethical principles were tested with a patient. The patient was very satisfied with the VR setup. The AI therapist was also rated positively, although there is still room for improvement regarding conversational skills. Overall, the paper shows how AI can contribute responsibly to improving the psycho-therapeutic supply. It also provides guidelines that make ethical principles tangible and measurable for developers.

@article{obremski2024autonomous, abstract = {The need for psychotherapy is very high and the lack of care causes a lot of suffering and high costs. This paper presents an interdisciplinary approach to creating an AI-guided exposure therapy for fear of heights in virtual reality (VR). First, ethical principles for the use of conversational AI in psychotherapy were translated into technical requirements and made measurable. Based on this, an autonomous virtual reality exposure therapy was iteratively developed with a therapist. The feasibility and implementation of the ethical principles were tested with a patient. The patient was very satisfied with the VR setup. The AI therapist was also rated positively, although there is still room for improvement regarding conversational skills. Overall, the paper shows how AI can contribute responsibly to improving the psycho-therapeutic supply. It also provides guidelines that make ethical principles tangible and measurable for developers.}, author = {Obremski, David and Wienrich, Carolin}, journal = {Scientific Research Publishing}, keywords = {obremski}, month = {04}, number = 4, title = {Autonomous VR Exposure Therapy for Anxiety Disorders Using Conversational AI—Ethical and Technical Implications and Preliminary Results}, volume = 12, year = 2024 }
Wienrich, Carolin, Marc Erich Latoschik, and David Obremski. “Gender Differences and Social Design in Human-AI Collaboration: Insights from Virtual Cobot Interactions Under Varying Task Loads”. In Extended Abstracts of the 2024 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems. CHI EA ’24. <conf-loc> <city>Honolulu</city> <state>HI</state> <country>USA</country> </conf-loc>: Association for Computing Machinery, 2024. https://doi.org/10.1145/3613905.3650827.
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This work explores the effects of users’ gender and social design features of AI under different task load conditions on human-like attributions, social impact, work performance and perceived workload, user experience, and various other measures in Human-AI Interaction (HAII). Users had to execute sorting and dispatch tasks in collaboration with a virtual cobot. The degree of social gestalt of the cobot was varied by the ability to make small talk (i.e., talkative vs. non-talkative cobot), and the task load was increased by adding a secondary task (i.e., high vs. low task load condition). Overall, the talkative cobot led to a more positive perception of the cobot and increased social qualities like sense of meaning and team membership compared to the non-talkative cobot. The following gender effect was particularly interesting. The talkative cobot had a buffering effect for women and a distraction conflict effect for men in high task load conditions. When interacting with the talkative robot, women find the high task condition less stressful. In contrast thereto, the talkative cobot was distracting for men in the high task load condition. Our results highlight that social design choices and interindividual differences influence a successful collaboration between humans and AI. The work also shows the added value of systematic XR-simulations for the investigation and design of human-centered HAIIs (eXtended AI approach).

@inproceedings{10.1145/3613905.3650827, abstract = {This work explores the effects of users’ gender and social design features of AI under different task load conditions on human-like attributions, social impact, work performance and perceived workload, user experience, and various other measures in Human-AI Interaction (HAII). Users had to execute sorting and dispatch tasks in collaboration with a virtual cobot. The degree of social gestalt of the cobot was varied by the ability to make small talk (i.e., talkative vs. non-talkative cobot), and the task load was increased by adding a secondary task (i.e., high vs. low task load condition). Overall, the talkative cobot led to a more positive perception of the cobot and increased social qualities like sense of meaning and team membership compared to the non-talkative cobot. The following gender effect was particularly interesting. The talkative cobot had a buffering effect for women and a distraction conflict effect for men in high task load conditions. When interacting with the talkative robot, women find the high task condition less stressful. In contrast thereto, the talkative cobot was distracting for men in the high task load condition. Our results highlight that social design choices and interindividual differences influence a successful collaboration between humans and AI. The work also shows the added value of systematic XR-simulations for the investigation and design of human-centered HAIIs (eXtended AI approach).}, address = {New York, NY, USA}, author = {Wienrich, Carolin and Latoschik, Marc Erich and Obremski, David}, booktitle = {Extended Abstracts of the 2024 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems}, keywords = {obremski}, publisher = {Association for Computing Machinery}, series = {CHI EA '24}, title = {Gender Differences and Social Design in Human-AI Collaboration: Insights from Virtual Cobot Interactions Under Varying Task Loads}, year = 2024 }

2022[ to top ]

Obremski, David, and Birgit Lugrin. “Mixed-Cultural Speech for Mixed-Cultural Users - Natural Vs. Synthetic Speech for Virtual Agents”. In HAI ’22: International Conference on Human-Agent Interaction, 290-92. ACM, 2022. https://doi.org/10.1145/3527188.3563910.
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@inproceedings{Obremski_HAI_Poster_2022, author = {Obremski, David and Lugrin, Birgit}, booktitle = {HAI '22: International Conference on Human-Agent Interaction}, keywords = {accent}, month = 12, pages = {290-292}, publisher = {ACM}, title = {Mixed-Cultural Speech for Mixed-Cultural Users - Natural vs. Synthetic Speech for Virtual Agents}, year = 2022 }
Obremski, David, Helena Babette Hering, Paula Friedrich, and Birgit Lugrin. “Mixed-Cultural Speech for Intelligent Virtual Agents - the Impact of Different Non-Native Accents Using Natural or Synthetic Speech in the English Language”. In HAI ’22: International Conference on Human-Agent Interaction, 67-75. ACM, 2022. https://doi.org/10.1145/3527188.3561921.
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@inproceedings{Obremski_HAI_Paper_2022, author = {Obremski, David and Hering, Helena Babette and Friedrich, Paula and Lugrin, Birgit}, booktitle = {HAI '22: International Conference on Human-Agent Interaction}, keywords = {accent}, month = 12, pages = {67-75}, publisher = {ACM}, title = {Mixed-Cultural Speech for Intelligent Virtual Agents - the Impact of Different Non-Native Accents Using Natural or Synthetic Speech in the English Language}, year = 2022 }
Obremski, David, Helena Babette Hering, Paula Friedrich, and Birgit Lugrin. “Exploratory Study on the Perception of Intelligent Virtual Agents With Non-Native Accents Using Synthetic and Natural Speech in German”. In INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON MULTIMODAL INTERACTION. ACM, 2022. https://doi.org/10.1145/3536221.3556608.
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@inproceedings{Obremski_2022, author = {Obremski, David and Hering, Helena Babette and Friedrich, Paula and Lugrin, Birgit}, booktitle = {INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON MULTIMODAL INTERACTION}, keywords = {accent}, month = 11, publisher = {ACM}, title = {Exploratory Study on the Perception of Intelligent Virtual Agents With Non-Native Accents Using Synthetic and Natural Speech in German}, year = 2022 }
Obremski, David, Paula Friedrich, Nora Haak, Philipp Schaper, and Birgit Lugrin. “The Impact of Mixed-Cultural Speech on the Stereotypical Perception of a Virtual Robot”. Frontiers in Robotics and AI 9 (November 2022). https://doi.org/10.3389/frobt.2022.983955.
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@article{Obremski_2022, author = {Obremski, David and Friedrich, Paula and Haak, Nora and Schaper, Philipp and Lugrin, Birgit}, journal = {Frontiers in Robotics and AI}, keywords = {accent}, month = 11, publisher = {Frontiers Media SA}, title = {The impact of mixed-cultural speech on the stereotypical perception of a virtual robot}, volume = 9, year = 2022 }
Wienrich, Carolin, David Obremski, and Johann Habakuk Israel. “Repeated Experience or a Virtual Nose to Reduce Simulator Sickness? Investigating Prediction of the Sensorial Conflict Theory and the Rest-Frame Hypothesis in Two Virtual Games”. Entertainment Computing 43 (August 2022): 100514. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.entcom.2022.100514.
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@article{Wienrich_2022, author = {Wienrich, Carolin and Obremski, David and Israel, Johann Habakuk}, journal = {Entertainment Computing}, keywords = {MI}, month = {08}, pages = 100514, publisher = {Elsevier {BV}}, title = {Repeated experience or a virtual nose to reduce simulator sickness? Investigating prediction of the sensorial conflict theory and the rest-frame hypothesis in two virtual games}, volume = 43, year = 2022 }

2021[ to top ]

Obremski, David, Alicia L. Schäfer, Benjamin P. Lange, Birgit Lugrin, Elisabeth Ganal, Laura Witt, Tania R. Nuñez, Sascha Schwarz, and Frank Schwab. “Put That Away and Talk to Me - the Effects of Smartphone Induced Ostracism While Interacting With an Intelligent Virtual Agent”. In Proceedings of the 9th International Conference on Human-Agent Interaction 2021. ACM, 2021. https://doi.org/10.1145/3472307.3484669.
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@inproceedings{Obremski_2021, author = {Obremski, David and Schäfer, Alicia L. and Lange, Benjamin P. and Lugrin, Birgit and Ganal, Elisabeth and Witt, Laura and Nuñez, Tania R. and Schwarz, Sascha and Schwab, Frank}, booktitle = {Proceedings of the 9th International Conference on Human-Agent Interaction 2021}, keywords = {mi}, publisher = {ACM}, title = {Put that Away and Talk to Me - the Effects of Smartphone induced Ostracism while Interacting with an Intelligent Virtual Agent}, year = 2021 }
Obremski, David, Jean-Luc Lugrin, Philipp Schaper, and Birgit Lugrin. “Non-Native Speaker Perception of Intelligent Virtual Agents in Two Languages: The Impact of Amount and Type of Grammatical Mistakes”. Journal on Multimodal User Interfaces, 2021. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12193-021-00369-9.
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Having a mixed-cultural membership becomes increasingly common in our modern society. It is thus beneficial in several ways to create Intelligent Virtual Agents (IVAs) that reflect a mixed-cultural background as well, e.g., for educational settings. For research with such IVAs, it is essential that they are classified as non-native by members of a target culture. In this paper, we focus on variations of IVAs' speech to create the impression of non-native speakers that are identified as such by speakers of two different mother tongues. In particular, we investigate grammatical mistakes and identify thresholds beyond which the agents is clearly categorised as a non-native speaker. Therefore, we conducted two experiments: one for native speakers of German, and one for native speakers of English. Results of the German study indicate that beyond 10{\%} of word order mistakes and 25{\%} of infinitive mistakes German-speaking IVAs are perceived as non-native speakers. Results of the English study indicate that beyond 50{\%} of omission mistakes and 50{\%} of infinitive mistakes English-speaking IVAs are perceived as non-native speakers. We believe these thresholds constitute helpful guidelines for computational approaches of non-native speaker generation, simplifying research with IVAs in mixed-cultural settings.

@article{Obremski2021, abstract = {Having a mixed-cultural membership becomes increasingly common in our modern society. It is thus beneficial in several ways to create Intelligent Virtual Agents (IVAs) that reflect a mixed-cultural background as well, e.g., for educational settings. For research with such IVAs, it is essential that they are classified as non-native by members of a target culture. In this paper, we focus on variations of IVAs' speech to create the impression of non-native speakers that are identified as such by speakers of two different mother tongues. In particular, we investigate grammatical mistakes and identify thresholds beyond which the agents is clearly categorised as a non-native speaker. Therefore, we conducted two experiments: one for native speakers of German, and one for native speakers of English. Results of the German study indicate that beyond 10{\%} of word order mistakes and 25{\%} of infinitive mistakes German-speaking IVAs are perceived as non-native speakers. Results of the English study indicate that beyond 50{\%} of omission mistakes and 50{\%} of infinitive mistakes English-speaking IVAs are perceived as non-native speakers. We believe these thresholds constitute helpful guidelines for computational approaches of non-native speaker generation, simplifying research with IVAs in mixed-cultural settings.}, author = {Obremski, David and Lugrin, Jean-Luc and Schaper, Philipp and Lugrin, Birgit}, journal = {Journal on Multimodal User Interfaces}, keywords = {mi}, title = {Non-native speaker perception of Intelligent Virtual Agents in two languages: the impact of amount and type of grammatical mistakes}, year = 2021 }

2020[ to top ]

Lugrin, B., E. Ströle, D. Obremski, F. Schwab, and B. Lange. “What If It Speaks Like It Was from the Village? Effects of a Robot Speaking in Regional Language Variations on Users’ Evaluations”. In 29th IEEE International Conference on Robot and Human Interactive Communication (RO-MAN 2020), 1315-20. https://doi.org/10.1109/RO-MAN47096.2020.9223432.
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The present contribution investigates the effects of spoken language varieties, in particular non-standard / regional language compared to standard language (in our study: High German), in social robotics. Based on (media) psychological and sociolinguistic research, we assumed that a robot speaking in regional language (i.e., dialect and regional accent) would be considered less competent compared to the same robot speaking in standard language (H1). Contrarily, we assumed that regional language might enhance perceived social skills and likability of a robot, at least so when taking into account whether and how much the human observers making the evaluations talk in regional language themselves. More precisely, it was assumed that the more the study participants spoke in regional language, the better their ratings of the dialect-speaking robot on social skills and likeability would be (H2). We also investigated whether the robot’s gender (male vs. female voice) would have an effect on the ratings (RQ). H1 received full, H2 limited empirical support by the data, while the robot’s gender (RQ) turned out to be a mostly negligible factor. Based on our results, practical implications for robots speaking in regional language varieties are suggested.

@inproceedings{9223432, abstract = {The present contribution investigates the effects of spoken language varieties, in particular non-standard / regional language compared to standard language (in our study: High German), in social robotics. Based on (media) psychological and sociolinguistic research, we assumed that a robot speaking in regional language (i.e., dialect and regional accent) would be considered less competent compared to the same robot speaking in standard language (H1). Contrarily, we assumed that regional language might enhance perceived social skills and likability of a robot, at least so when taking into account whether and how much the human observers making the evaluations talk in regional language themselves. More precisely, it was assumed that the more the study participants spoke in regional language, the better their ratings of the dialect-speaking robot on social skills and likeability would be (H2). We also investigated whether the robot’s gender (male vs. female voice) would have an effect on the ratings (RQ). H1 received full, H2 limited empirical support by the data, while the robot’s gender (RQ) turned out to be a mostly negligible factor. Based on our results, practical implications for robots speaking in regional language varieties are suggested.}, author = {Lugrin, B. and Ströle, E. and Obremski, D. and Schwab, F. and Lange, B.}, booktitle = {29th IEEE International Conference on Robot and Human Interactive Communication (RO-MAN 2020)}, keywords = {reflectedreality}, pages = {1315-1320}, title = {What if it speaks like it was from the village? Effects of a Robot speaking in Regional Language Variations on Users’ Evaluations}, year = 2020 }
Obremski, David, Carolin Wienrich, and Astrid Carolus. “What the user’s Voice Tells Us about UX - Analysing Parameters of the Voice As Indicators of the User Experience of the Usage of Intelligent Voice Assistants”. In. Gesellschaft für Informatik e.V, 2020. https://doi.org/10.18420/MUC2020-WS105-377.
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@inproceedings{https://doi.org/10.18420/muc2020-ws105-377, author = {Obremski, David and Wienrich, Carolin and Carolus, Astrid}, keywords = {obremski}, publisher = {Gesellschaft für Informatik e.V.}, title = {What the user’s voice tells us about UX - Analysing parameters of the voice as indicators of the User Experience of the usage of intelligent voice assistants}, year = 2020 }

2019[ to top ]

Obremski, David, Jean-Luc Lugrin, Philipp Schaper, and Birgit Lugrin. “Non-Native Speaker Generation and Perception for Mixed-Cultural Settings”. ACM International Conference on Intelligent Virtual Agents 2019, 2019. https://doi.org/https://doi.org/10.1145/3308532.3329427.
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This paper presents an experiment evaluating the effects of virtual agents' language proficiency on whether they are perceived as a native speakers or not. Our first results indicate that beyond 10% word order mistakes and 25% infinitive mistakes, virtual agents are perceived as non-native speakers, even though their appearance and non-verbal behaviour were not altered. We believe these thresholds constitute interesting guidelines possibly simplifying the design of non-native speaker simulations.

@article{obremski2019nonnative, abstract = {This paper presents an experiment evaluating the effects of virtual agents' language proficiency on whether they are perceived as a native speakers or not. Our first results indicate that beyond 10% word order mistakes and 25% infinitive mistakes, virtual agents are perceived as non-native speakers, even though their appearance and non-verbal behaviour were not altered. We believe these thresholds constitute interesting guidelines possibly simplifying the design of non-native speaker simulations.}, author = {Obremski, David and Lugrin, Jean-Luc and Schaper, Philipp and Lugrin, Birgit}, journal = {ACM International Conference on Intelligent Virtual Agents 2019}, keywords = {mi}, publisher = {ACM}, title = {Non-Native Speaker Generation and Perception for Mixed-Cultural Settings}, year = 2019 }

2018[ to top ]

Wienrich, C., C. K. Weidner, C. Schatto, D. Obremski, and J. H. Israel. “A Virtual Nose As a Rest-Frame - The Impact on Simulator Sickness and Game Experience”. In 2018 10th International Conference on Virtual Worlds and Games for Serious Applications (VS-Games), 1-8. https://doi.org/10.1109/VS-Games.2018.8493408.
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This paper presents an experiment measuring the impact of a virtual nose on simulator sickness and game experience in a virtual reality game presented on an Oculus Rift DK 2. Furthermore, the presented study investigated in the significance of the rest-frame\u0027s salience, for it to reduce simulator sickness. The results of our study indicated that the usage of a virtual nose reduces simulator sickness while it does not affect the game experience. Further results showed no significant impact of the rest-frame\u0027s salience, neither on simulator sickness nor on the game experience. In sum, the outcome of the study supports the thesis that a rest-frame in form of a virtual nose can be used in virtual reality applications to reduce simulator sickness.

@inproceedings{8493408, abstract = {This paper presents an experiment measuring the impact of a virtual nose on simulator sickness and game experience in a virtual reality game presented on an Oculus Rift DK 2. Furthermore, the presented study investigated in the significance of the rest-frame\u0027s salience, for it to reduce simulator sickness. The results of our study indicated that the usage of a virtual nose reduces simulator sickness while it does not affect the game experience. Further results showed no significant impact of the rest-frame\u0027s salience, neither on simulator sickness nor on the game experience. In sum, the outcome of the study supports the thesis that a rest-frame in form of a virtual nose can be used in virtual reality applications to reduce simulator sickness.}, author = {Wienrich, C. and Weidner, C. K. and Schatto, C. and Obremski, D. and Israel, J. H.}, booktitle = {2018 10th International Conference on Virtual Worlds and Games for Serious Applications (VS-Games)}, keywords = {obremski}, month = {09}, pages = {1-8}, title = {A Virtual Nose as a Rest-Frame - The Impact on Simulator Sickness and Game Experience}, year = 2018 }

Senior Researcher

Mini-CV

Research Interests

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