Verify the Validity of Guidance Sign in Buildings: A New Method Based on Mixed Reality with Eye Tracking Device

Evacuation signs are one of the key factors which influence the building evacuation efficiency and evacuees' route choice behaviors. It is important to test the effectiveness of evacuation signs, and an eye movement test was verified to be a good way. In this paper, both reality and MR (Mixed-Reality) evacuation experiments were carried out to collect the eye movement data of participants, such as gaze position, fixation duration, and number of gazes. In the reality experiment, participants took part in an emergency evacuation at a T-junction corridor with the glass-type eye-tracking device. In order to collect eye movement data in the MR experiment, the eye tracking device was integrated into the Microsoft HoloLens device (MR-ET for short). In either reality or MR experiments, each participant took part in five sub-experiments with five different types of evacuation signs. It was found that (1) the evacuation signs with a black background, green foreground and flashing lights have a better effect in guidance; (2) the flashing lights can better attract the attention of the participants, and enhanced the participants' understanding of the signs. (3) An X-mark will hinder participants' understanding of the signs and increase their reaction time. According to the results of the experiments, it is also found that the eye-tracking test in an MR environment is also a good method to test the effectiveness of the evacuation signs, and such a method can also be used in building safety design without damaging a wall or changing the reality environment of a building.