Why Virtual Reality Could Be A Mental Health Game Changer
Using VR to improve mental health.
Mental health includes our emotional, psychological, and social well-being. It affects how we think, feel, and act. It helps determine how we handle stress, relate to others, and make healthy choices. Just like we each have a state of physical health, we also each have our mental health to look after. It’s not just about surviving, it’s about thriving. It’s enjoying life, having a sense of purpose, and being able to manage life’s highs and lows.
Mental illnesses are among the most common health conditions around the world. This is no longer something we can just sweep under the rug. No this is serious. Let’s take a look at just how real this is:
More than 50% will be diagnosed with a mental illness or disorder at some point in their lifetime!
1 in 5 people will experience a mental illness in a given year.
1 in 5 children, either currently or at some point during their life, have had a seriously debilitating mental illness.
1 in 25 Americans live with a serious mental illness, such as schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, or major depression.
Okay so we have a bunch of bad news and now what? Thankfully, there is a solution… you guessed it — Virtual Reality!
What Even Is Virtual Reality (VR)?
In technical terms, VR is a 100% computer-generated simulation of a three-dimensional image or environment that can be interacted with in a seemingly real or physical way by a person using special electronic equipment, such as a helmet with a screen inside or gloves fitted with sensors.
Think of it as being wholly immersed in a fictional world with none of the real world in your view. If I were to magically drop you into VR Hogwarts, you’d see the blue Flying Ford Anglia car stuck in the Whomping Willow, Snape strutting down the halls with his cloak barely catching up, and perhaps the Weasley twins crashing the OWLs on their broomsticks — fireworks all around…okay I might be a bit of a potterhead.
Nevertheless, it’s a head mounted device that takes you to some other reality involving your ears and eyes, its a complete cut off from the real world.
Surpassing Obstacles
Previous methods of dealing with mental health-related concerns are insufficient to keep up with this rise. When thinking of mental health treatments, we often think talk therapies and medication. What we aren’t focusing on enough is VR and just how large of a difference it can make. More specifically, therapeutic VR and exposure therapy VR.
VR isn’t just capable of helping us with what seems like more straightforward phobias and anxiety disorders. It can also help with depression, schizophrenia, paranoia.
— Daniel Freeman, professor of clinical psychology at the Department of Psychiatry, Oxford University.
Virtual Reality Exposure Therapy (VRET)
Studies claim that the use of VR includes aspects that are very limited by the human element — virtual reality exposure therapy (VRET) being one of them.
When people experience a traumatic event, they may have a natural response that creates an intense fear reaction to sights, sounds, or other elements that remind them of the trauma. This can cause them to avoid situations that include those triggers, like the sound and sight of fireworks for someone with PTSD due to military combat.
As you expose yourself to triggers through virtual reality, you have the chance to confront your fear in a safe environment. As with traditional exposure treatment, this allows you to learn how to cope with your anxiety and re-frame your thinking about the traumatic event. Over time, this can result in slowly getting used to the triggers and your stress responses will become less and less intense.
How It Works
When starting off, you’ll spend time getting to know your therapist and discussing what caused your trauma. Then your therapist will create the environment for your VRET. Using a virtual reality headset that creates an immersive environment mimicking what your trauma was like.
There can be sights, sounds, smells, and vibrations involved to further recreate and enhance the experience. The setup is designed to help you confront the situations that cause you fear and anxiety, but in a safe and controlled environment. You’ll discuss these immersive experiences with your therapist.
VR therapy researchers claim that using this method to help PTSD patients, especially veterans leads to fewer panic attacks, relapses and overall better sleep quality — often without the need for medication.
The layers … they just peel back and they just get you to your core. At first you don’t want to, but you break down and do it, and it’s absolutely amazing.
— Kevin Tergliafera, Veteran, Army National Guard
Immersing a patient in a recreation of traumatic events and incidents with senses like visuals and smell is difficult to recreate when done by psychiatrists. With VR, patients no longer have to revisit the memories that cause them trauma — VR helps create it for them. Therapists can now ask their patients to “jump off a cliff” — using VR of course, a previously impossible therapy element.
VR therapy is now increasingly used to treat anxiety and specific phobias. In fact, many companies are developing apps that offer “therapeutic VR” They use specially programmed computers, visual immersion devices and artificially created environments to give the patient a simulated experience that can be used to diagnose and treat psychological conditions that cause difficulties for patients. It’s a far safer, quicker and less expensive option.
Companies like Mimerse, are currently developing therapeutic VR to overcome phobias such as public speaking and flying on airplanes. HOW LIFE CHANGING IS THAT?!
Experts estimate that as much as 77% of the population has some level of anxiety regarding public speaking and about 40% of the general population reports some fear of flying. Those are some pretty big numbers — With VR, you can give speeches and build muscle memory that carries over when you step up in front of a real audience. Awesome? Hell yeah.
A Promising Future
It’s early days for VR and mental health but what we’ve already seen is that the potential is huge, not only for therapy but also for assessment: rather than relying on what people can remember of their thoughts and feelings, VR will allow clinicians to run powerful situational tests.
However, getting to the point will require significant strategic leadership and investment. When it comes to hardware, VR could turn out to be more important in mental health than brain scanners. In order to reach that, not only do the psychological component of virtual therapies need to be appropriate, the VR experience must be up to scratch.
When VR is done properly it’s a breath-taking experience. Virtual therapies will need to be just as exciting as the very best computer games if they are to keep us coming back for more. And of course, VR treatments must be tested in clinical trials. A lot of hard work is required, but the benefits could be extraordinary.
Conclusion (TL;DR)
Is virtual reality the NEXT BIG THING?
- Virtual Reality is the use of computer technology to create a simulated environment by simulating as many senses as possible, such as vision, hearing, touch, even smell through headsets and other gear.
- VR headsets are essentially machines designed to replace our surroundings with something created in software. There are sensors, accelerators, and magnetometers in headsets to determine how you move and track your interactions with a virtual space.
- Mental health includes our emotional, psychological, and social well-being. It affects how we think, feel, and act. Mental illness has become a serious problem (1 in 5 people will be diagnosed within their lifetime)
- VR is capable of accommodating this rise through treatments like Virtual Reality Exposure Therapies (VRET)
- There can be sights, sounds, smells to further recreate and enhance the experience. The setup is designed to help you confront the situations that cause you fear and anxiety, but in a safe and controlled environment.
- It’s a far safer, quicker and less expensive option compared to traditional exposure therapy.
It’s not a matter of if, but when.
Hi, name is Victoria! A 15 year old Science and Technology enthusiast! Follow along on my path to becoming a unicorn person [someone that impacts billions🦄] Don’t hesitate to give feedback, suggestions and comments. If you enjoyed this article, clap it and feel free to connect with me on LinkedIn. Thank you so much for reading, until next time!!
