Emotions and the Emotional Valence Afforded by the Virtual Environment

Abstract

For decades, researchers have been concerned about the effectiveness of traditional toolsused by clinicians to treat mental disorders and have been trying to develop more and moreinnovative techniques. The emergence of virtual reality presents new clinical andexperimental opportunities in psychology. Virtual reality, as defined as “an applicationallowing a user to navigate and interact in real time with a computer-generated threedimensionalenvironment” (Pratt et al., 1995, p.17), can be distinguished from other mediaby the real-time interaction with synthetic stimuli. The potential of virtual reality hasencouraged more scientific research exploring the mechanisms involved in the efficacy ofusing virtual environments.Various applications to mental health problems have been the subject of virtual realityexperiments. Virtual reality’s usefulness in inducing anxiety for curative purposes has beenreiterated many times (Robillard et al., 2003; Moore, Wierderhold et al., 2002), and theeffectiveness of this tool for psychological treatment of certain anxiety disorders isdocumented by numerous studies (Bouchard et al., 2006; Côté & Bouchard, 2008; Gerardi etal., 2010; Weiderhold & Weiderhold, 2005).It may seem astonishing that virtual reality would put an end to phobic avoidance eventhough virtual scenarios are not totally realistic. The feeling of presence gives users thesubjective impression that the virtual environment in which they are immersed really exists.Seven dimensions may modulate presence: the realism of pictograms and images, socialinteractions in the environment, the ease of interactions, the user’s power or perception ofcontrol, the duration of exposure, social factors such as relationships with others and,finally, characteristics related to the virtual reality system (Stanney & Sadowski, 2002). Inaddition, some variables such as the participant’s propensity to be absorbed in an activity,the tendency to concentrate and to dispose of distractions (Witmer & Singer, 1998) and,certain data even suggests, the ability to be hypnotized could be involved in an increasedfeeling of presence (Wiederhold & Wiederhold, 2000). Ijsselsteijn and Riva (2003) assertedthat the effectiveness of virtual immersion is partly attributable to the degree of presence feltby the immersed user. Similarly, Wiederhold and Wiederhold (1999) suggested that thedegree of presence could be related to the success of the treatment.