Living life on screen has started to become a more and more frequent addiction. From video and computer games to simple apps on Facebook, people are living through a created character (avatar) on screen. And technologies like computer games, console video games, and virtual reality are always improving making these experiences more realistic. This realism is blurring the line between the real world and virtual world even though I feel there is no way the virtual world can ever replace real world experiences. This addiction to the virtual world may be used to improve the lives of individuals that can not handle the real world, but also alter the thinking of those not seeking treatment.
According to The Expression of Personality in Virtual Worlds, personalities of people are reflected in their avatars. And then in turn the virtual world has the ability to change how people handle the real world (Dretzin, 2010). Soldiers are getting treatment for post traumatic stress syndrome through the use of virtual reality. It is a fairly new idea and still being tested, but it appears to be working. This proves a very positive advancement in the treatment of mental health. It just needs to be more publicized and advertised as better than using drugs to treat a problem. Of course, not all mental illness can be treated with computers, but agoraphobia and other anxiety disorders are showing a very good possibility for improvement with virtual medicine.
Searching “treatment of agoraphobia virtual reality” on Google brings up about 12,100 results. I only looked at the first few pages of results. Not really trusting a lot of information published online, I looked at any result from medical studies. It seems most studies with virtual reality used for the treatment of anxiety disorders started around 2007 and still continue today. I really could not find full text copies to these studies, not that I'd want to read them, but results are always positive in every abstract I read. Technologies are always advancing according to Moore's Law, so the possibility for treatment should grow with it as well. Like drugs, virtual medicine or just the virtual world can alter the minds of those who do not need to be altered.
The virtual world can alter the human mind, but it does not mean it will. There are games based on violence. Most can make the obvious distinction between killing people on a screen and in real life. Do these games raise the question of “How does it feel to kill for real?” in the gamer's mind? For some, I bet the answer is “I wanna know.”, but giving them the benefit of doubt, I don't think they will. That concept was talked about by Friedman in Future Technology in reference to beating up people and stealing their possessions in real life because it is acceptable in World of Warcraft. Relating this to something more mellow and personal experience, I can say video games had affected me.
My love of cars goes back many many years. I was the kid playing racing games using the steering wheel for hours and hours non-stop. It was probably around age 13 I got my steering wheel. I got my permit and barely drove and still passed my license test on the first shot. I started racing my car at age 20 and did pretty well pretty quickly. I seriously believe video games helped become better driver. Talking to others that I have raced with, they said the same exact thing about their abilities behind a wheel and video games. They made us better drivers.
Living virtually has an obvious impact on living reality and visa versa. And being that everything is still pretty new, who knows where it is going to end up. The use for treatment of mental illness, entertainment, and educational values are clearly visible in the use of virtual living, but when will it all go too far? And will its use slow down? In some aspects, living through an avatar might have gotten out of hand for some and others like myself would rather live the experience through all fives senses, not two.
Its so very interesting that virtual reality has been creeping into our lives ever since our generation came into being. I mean think about it for a second, we've always had game systems and I remember when my family got our first computer and internet when I was six years old (or even younger). As child I welcomed this new experience because it was fun, cute, and colorful. I'm sure my parents were thinking, "How is this computer going to effect Timara and Angela?" I think in a way my whole family has evolved with a dependance on the computer, except of course my farmer grandfather.
ReplyDeleteI think the more personal the virtual reality world becomes like facebook, twitter, etc the more we become what we put out there. Maybe its a good thing if we want to be more outgoing or a bad thing with the ever present 'kissy face' that circulates on facebook.