USING VIRTUAL REALITY THERAPY FOR AUTISM SPECTRUM DISORDERS
- Developmental disorder characterized by social, communicative, cognitive, and behavioral impairments.
- In an experiment by Strickland, autistic children were being taught to cross the street by themselves. The researchers used virtual reality therapy to construct an artificial world with a sidewalk, street, and buildings. Everything else was eliminated, but cars were added as the experiment progressed. Only these items were placed in the virtual world to help children recognize objects. The results of this experiment demonstrated that autistic children were able to turn, find objects, and walk towards them. Therefore, they could cross the street by themselves because they now can recognize all the relevant objects. Using VRT in this setting helped autistic children better react to events that they experience in the real world (Strickland).
Overall, employing virtual reality therapy for helping people with autistic spectrum disorders is very beneficial because researchers can modify the environment according to the individual’s condition. The virtual world also provides a safer learning environment for autistic children to acquire the skills they are lacking. Additionally, autistic people indicate that their thought patterns are mostly visual so learning these skills in a visual world is very beneficial for them. Finally, autistic people also noted that they prefer computer interactions so virtual reality therapy works with the type of learning they prefer (Strickland).