In the present paper, we describe the measurement of brain activation response during lathe operation in a VR lathe environment and an actual lathe environment by near-infrared spectroscopy. In the frontal lobes and the motor cortex, oxyHb tended to increase during the operation in both the VR lathe environment and the actual lathe environment. The results show that the brain activation response during the performance of lathe operation in the VR lathe environment was very similar to that which occurs during lathe operation in the actual lathe environment.