Virtual Reality

Virtual Reality Technology

Delivers sensory stimuli to generate a perceptual and interactive experience of a realistic and immersive environment.

• Constructs the illusion of an interactive, three dimensional world

What separates VR from other technologies?

Feelings of ‘immersion’ and ‘presence’

• The illusion that you are ACTUALLY in that environment, not just seeing/hearing it from the outside

Think: Watching a movie VS being a character in the movie

What can VR technology look like?

• CAVE rooms

• Head mounted displays (HMDs)

CAVE Environments

When you go into a room or cube and you are surrounded by screens

Think: That excursion angel was talking about

How do head mounted VR displays work?

• They are fitted with two screens and they give slightly different visual information to each eye, which gives the illusion of depth

• Fitted with tracking devices to change the field of vision as participant moves

• Separate headphones for each ear

  • Creates stereophonic sound and gives illusion of movement, distance, location or speed

Why has the use of VR proliferated in recent years?

• Higher affordability as technologies range from about $13 to $1000

• Improvements in software and processing

• Virtual environments are more easily modifiable

• Some of the VR programs are free (e.g. VEPSY)

VRET

Virtual reality exposure therapy

• Used in place of in-vivo exposures because although exposure therapy is one of the most effective treatments in psychology, there is a HUGE gap in therapists actually implementing it

  • Only used in 19-33% of cases

• This is because exposure therapy can be time consuming, costly, impractical, not feasible and anxiety provoking for the client AND clinician

• VRET addresses this as it can be cheaper, easier to organise and replicate feared situations and easier to disseminate

Think: The reason why there might be phobia subtype differences in treatment response; it is super easy and accessible to set up an in vivo exposure with dogs, but how fo you do it for a storm?

What advantages does VRET offer that in vivo exposure does not?

• Affordability

• Feasibility of obtaining the resources/fear stimuli for exposures

• Easier to manipulate fear stimuli to proceed through the exposure hierarchy (i.e. changing the colour or size of a spider)

• It is preferred by patients

• May leverage the dose-response effect (greater accessibility means they could theoretically do exposures at home, multiple times a day, but you can’t buy a ticket to the wildlife sanctuary every day to see spiders)

True or False: Most individuals would prefer to use VR instead of in vivo exposure

True - 76%

Evaluate the efficacy of VRET

Demonstrates very strong effect sizes when compared to WLC conditions

• Several meta-analyses have found these results

• A meta-analysis by Carl et al (2019) found it is equally effective as in vivo exposure for treating SP, SAD, PTSD and PD

• It’s efficacy for GAD and OCD is less known as these studies did not meet inclusion criteria for meta-analyses

• No differences in drop out rates between VRET and in vivo exposure (but this actually may further support the realism)

What type of SP is most studied in VRET research?

Fear of flying

• Because it is the most difficult to organise exposures for in vivo

• Are you going to buy a plane ticket every time you have a session? No

What techniques can VR be used for in therapy?

• Developing cognitive and behavioural skills

• Skills training (i.e. social skills, memory)

• Exposure

• Occupational therapy/rehabilitation

What is the average treatment effect size for all mental health related VR interventions?

d = .73 (moderate to large)