Promise of technology, metaverse can change the concept of empathy
The virtual environment had popularity increased by the higher use of technology during the pandemic
SÃO PAULO, BRAZIL — Global technology usage increased due to the Coronavirus pandemic. In Europe, a region where isolation was taken more seriously during the first wave of the pandemic, technological expansion increased by 40 per cent, according to research from the technological enterprise Nova DC. Countries such as Germany, France, Italy and the UK played a key role in this increase.
In Brazil, the number of homes with access to the internet increased from 71% in 2019 to 81% in 2020, which means an estimated amount of 61.8 million houses connected more through the virtual world. These figures were compiled by the Regional Center for Information Society Development Studies in its research on the use of communication and information technologies inside Brazilian homes. The study was published in November 2021.
This is where the metaverse became relevant. This latest technology is meant to replicate reality in the virtual form. Advertised by Mark Zuckerberg as he announced that Facebook would change its name and could look into this new technological environment, this innovation is already unknown to a few people.
“Metaverse is a parallel world that, for many people, is something strange and with a difficult understanding, but we cannot deny that, each day, this subject is no longer mystic and is becoming more popular”, Signa’s customer success analyst Daniel Martins says. “What is new is always more interesting, even more so for the new generation, the audience that Mark Zuckerberg most wants to reach”, highlights.
Proof of that is the increase in the search for Ozone-X services, a spin-off of the virtual reality enterprise Nexus VR. The company gained a 25 per cent increase in its number of clients and, from those, 85 per cent, despite starting its entrance in the interactivity virtual world through punctual actions with augmented reality, has interested to develop something related to metaverse in the future.
To understand this growing demand, the company is supported by a construction process that goes from digitalization of spaces to personalization of punctual experiences using immersion 360º, customized avatars and activation of augmented reality.
As far as the future is concerned, Ozone-X shares visions that the metaverse will be even more interactive. “In the future, we have the utilization of learning machines, deep learning and Natural Language Processing (NLP) together forming a new ecosystem that will be reached once we have an interoperability between platforms in which the same avatar could be used in different experiences”, observes the co-founder of Ozone-X, Felipe Coimbra.
In that aspect, the company provides a way that navigation is made on websites that will be immersive, shopping will no longer be made on slapped websites and, yes, in an interactive and immersive atmosphere. “That has applied to education, because in our platform there already exists a group of distance learning in which the student learns in a way totally interactive and immersive”, comments the co-founder of Ozone-X Patrícia Novo. “Because of that, we believe that metaverse has a lot to contribute, after all, using gamified immersion technology can bring great results in many areas”, he concludes.
His contribution is first noted in the social interaction camp. After all, seeing the avatars that move around and in some ways behave in a way that mimics their real counterpart creates more empathy and more willingness to bond.
For the professor of the Computation Institute from Fluminense Federal University (FFU) Esteban Clua, metaverse will influence the growth of empathy, an increase in the desire to and being able to talk with people behind the avatars. “That is what makes multiplayer games so interesting: the interaction with a lot of people”, highlights. “However, one big problem is that you don’t see the avatars as the real physiognomy of the people behind them, what happens even in social media profiles”, he opposes.
This alert relates to the counterpart from the psychoanalyst Edson De Paula, writer and speaker. For him, the construction of empathy is more challenging in the virtual environment because she believes it takes a conscientious effort to comprehend another’s world. “What I’ve seen in virtual relations is that people tend to be more authentic and, with that in turn, to be more forceful in their opinions”, she adds. “This does not approximate and, if it does not approximate, it does not conduct to empathy”, she states.
In what touches the obstacles to be confronted by metaverse there is also the data protection. After all, just 20 minutes of using augmented reality glasses is enough to collect more than 20 million personal information, such as reactions, biometry and its behaviour. Because of that, the General Data Protection Law (LGPD in Brazil) and (GDPR in Europe) exist and are applicable in any area inside the internet, including the metaverse.
To ensure its proper functioning, it has a basic guideline that is up to each country to use and adapt according to their beliefs and understanding of data use. An example of this is what happened in Holland. In July, the country announced that it will limit almost totally the use of Chrome extension and the operational system Chrome OS in schools for not understanding how Google uses the collected data from kids. “Thus, it is up to each country to decide how to implement LGPD either by creating more security understanding items or not”, explains Martins.
Either by data collection or not, the use of metaverse ends up highlighting some social weaknesses thanks to the accelerated use of technology stimulated by pandemics. And it was fairly thanks to this movement that led to the discovery that some people had already expressed regard to insecurity in relation to technology use, such as video calls.
This insecurity is influenced and highlighted by technology use because, in psychology João Carlos Maciel’s notes, people are insecure with their images and are shy. For him, this is the reason that metaverse turned into an invitation to a virtual immersion to practice interpersonal relations.
Despite that, it is important to highlight that social relations occur between people in the real world. “If it can be seen, emotionally what we practice in social interaction does not happen in the virtual scenario because, there, people sell themselves in a way that is convenient and not by loyalty with reality”, Maciel observes.
Although an increase in social interaction in the virtual environment can be observed, this immersive experience of people getting along with the digital world with augmented reality using a personalized avatar brings the possibility of generating a false consciousness. “In there, people can feel each time more secure and protected participating in events that, in the real world, they wouldn’t even participate in,’’ explains De Paula.
However, despite the LGPD act in relation to data security and the screens of smartphones and notebooks seeming to be like protection against adverse actions in the real world, it is important to remember that these environments are created by humans and full of algorithmics that end up absorbing a series of social preconceptions.
That’s why, while preconceptions and racism exist in the real world, the same will occur in the virtual scenario. “While human beings are creating and producing thoughts of hate, it is almost inevitable that it also happens in those virtual worlds”, laments the professor of the Computation Institute from Fluminense Federal University (FFU).
In that aspect, it will be necessary that strict monitoring would be made in the virtual world to prevent situations not just of bias, but also of injury and defamation, occur in this ecosystem. “I like to think in an ideal world in which we have regularization of this type of media”, psychologist Juliana Yume notes. “How nice it would be if we use our knowledge of psychology, sociology and biology to create virtual universes more secure and healthy”, she idealizes.
Until this scenario concretizes itself, it will still be a hostage to the same conflicts from the real world. Proving that, Microsoft’s operation director Regis Soares even informed that the first case of sexual abuse on metaverse had just happened, but none knows who’s the author yet.
Not by chance, computation scientist Louis Rosenberg, responsible for improving the first augmented reality functional system, informed in an article published on Big Think website that society is not prepared to spend a lot of time in an environment digitized because this practice can disturb the notion of reality.
That reinforces the mote that excessive use of any substances and objects can prejudice health. And with metaverse there’s no difference. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), there are eight diseases already catalogued that occur by the digital environment.
One of them is named Nomofoby, which is when people can’t stay away from smartphones without bringing a battery along, having, therefore, many psychological reactions. “In that case, physic and mental health can suffer a lot in that new environment, and it’s possible that people, especially those from new generations, have to relearn how to live in the real world since a big part of human experiences will be conditioned to the virtual ecosystem”, projects the specialist in human behaviour Tânia Zambon.
That illustration highlights that, like what happened with petroleum and tobacco, nowadays there is informational negligence surrounding the metaverse, which only is giving attention to its benefits. That’s because also talking about its negative points is important, after all, digital reality is related to the stimulation of eyes and mobility diseases, sleep disorders and depression, anxiety and hallucination cases. The increase of cardiac diseases occurred by a sedentary lifestyle stimulated by the hours in front of technological screens can also be observed.
In the attempt to guarantee health in the digital world of interactivity, the possibility of disconnection is an important artifice. And it is especially in the virtual world disconnection practice that lives one of the most important differentials between metaverse and social media.
Different from social media, in which there is the possibility of disconnection, metaverse, with its augmented reality glasses, can throw the return to reality off. “However, if you can be in a universe where it’s possible to travel the world, wear everything, be with everybody, how and where is desired, why to stay with the annoying real life?”, questioned Tânia. “This is another question that will need to be answered while people are using metaverse, after all, not even all of them will want to return to reality”, reflects.
