promotes the sensation of immersion by responding to user intentions with actions on the screen. This response allows users to visually interact with objects and to manipulate graphic objects on the screen (i.e., touching and feeling the objects using auditory, haptic, and tactile inputs; Jafari, Adams, & Tavakoli, 2016).
Technologies have intrinsic properties and activate cognitive systems that help children to engage in meaningful learning and to solve problems (Lamb, Annetta, Hoston, Shapiro, & Matthews, 2017). Therefore, a VR environment triggers the human brain’s capacity to process environmental inputs in the same way as the real world (Lamb, Firestone, & Adasheva, 2016). In short, VR technology is well-suited interactivity, and immersion ability of the environment (Stephens, Lamb, Riman, & Pearson, 2017).
The infusion of digital content information into virtual environments is now possible, making them nearly indistinguishable from reality. Most recent VR work makes use of video from the real world in both 4K digital resolution and 8K digital resolution: 4K resolution is a horizontal resolution of 4,000 pixels and 8K digital resolution is a horizontal resolution of 8,000 pixels. These resolutions are several orders of magnitude greater than what the human eye can resolve, making the images incredibly realistic and detailed at scale. The perceived immersion of VR allows clinicians to begin to address the immersive experiences afforded by VR, which we saw with Autumn.
Case Example: Autumn Autumn (pseudonym) is a 12-year-old client, and some details have been changed to protect her identity. As with other child-centered approaches, virtual reality was a key component in Autumn’s success. Autumn was referred for anxiety and a high need to control the environment in her everyday functioning. Initial diagnostic visits provided evidence of intact perceptual systems and understanding conceptual ideas, but also the presence of a parent who provided rigid, prescribed scheduling and control for as long as Autumn could
Autumn was initially “trained” in the use of the VR controls via a small virtual robot avatar contained inside of the VR environment. The robot taught skills, such as how to grasp objects, how to interact with the environment, and how to walk and move in the environment. Notably, the VR system allows full ambulatory movement with visual cues demarcating the boundaries.
Many of her sessions were spent immersed in a simulation of a Jurassic-era tropical forest with a wide area to explore, including rivers, large forests, caves, and cliffs. The open and interactive nature of these environments allowed Autumn to interact and maneuver through the available activities at her pacing and planning. During her initial immersive experiences in the forest environments, Autumn exhibited timid exploratory behaviors and severe inhibition in exploring the cave and river components of the environment. Anxiety caused Autumn to approach exploration with a sense of rigidness and the
24 | PLAYTHERAPY | March 2018 |
www.a4pt.org
repetition of mistakes. During VR sessions, she would often freeze the VR environment; she discussed how being afraid of new things may lead to less enjoyment of the world and an inability to try new things. The discussions often focused on how she felt in an environment that contained potentially threatening outcomes, and that disrupted her initial plans of how to explore the environment. Her concerns created anxiety as she attempted to cope with these environments.
Within the virtual environment, the client must continually reason, plan, and engage with unknowns. After several sessions over a period of months, Autumn came to understand the virtual reality environment, to generalize the thoughts of how she felt to thoughts of how another might feel, and to how others may respond to her actions. Ultimately, assessing the impact of her activities in a wider community. Over time Autumn’s fears and rigid need to control the environment slowly diminished, and she began to function more easily in the VR environment and in the real world.
Conclusions and Future Perspectives VR technology engages children in an immersive context and provides them with authentic experiences and a large degree of environmental control. These experiences allow children to engage in social scripting, environmental control, and exploration in a safe, soft-failure environment. This safe context coupled with the ability to collect data outside classroom and home, to interact with an avatar, or to communicate face-to-face with peers make VR functions critical to the therapeutic process.
VR is thought to have considerable potential for
applications, and several researchers have probed its therapeutic effects on cognitive retraining, feedback, interest, emotion regulation, and other abilities.
In his work, Lamb has even begun to make use of functional near-infrared spectroscopy, a neuroimaging device, to examine the effects of cognitive retraining related to executive function using VR. Therefore, it is prudent to suggest that therapists understand how VR technology could further assist within practice. For example, through directive psychodynamic therapies in the play context, VR can be used as a diagnostic tool to determine the cause of maladaptive behaviors and to engage self-help mechanisms. This can be accomplished through clinician inquiries and
VR is thought to have considerable potential for applications, and several researchers have probed its therapeutic effects on cognitive
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36
