Key TakeawaysVirtual reality is being explored as a means for treating different mental and physical conditions.VR allows healthcare professionals to manipulate virtual worlds as means of helping and treating patients.This type of therapy is not yet ready for at-home, unsupervised use.
Key Takeaways
Virtual reality is being explored as a means for treating different mental and physical conditions.VR allows healthcare professionals to manipulate virtual worlds as means of helping and treating patients.This type of therapy is not yet ready for at-home, unsupervised use.
Seeing yourself through a critical eye can be beneficial. But what happens when you see yourselftoocritically? While fleeting negative thoughts are normal, prolonged negative feelings about yourself can lead to conditions likebody dysmorphia.
Scientists have begun exploring virtual reality (VR) as a potential solution since it grants users the ability to change how they perceive the world and themselves in unexpected ways.
What Is Body Dysmorphia?
The review analyzes studies that have explored the ability of an avatar (a body in the virtual reality world) to alter behavior, feelings, and thoughts. The January paper was published in theJournal of Clinical Medicine.
What This Means For YouThe research is still in its early stages but appears promising. There may be some VR therapies available to you now and the use of VR may become more common in clinical practice in the future.
What This Means For You
The research is still in its early stages but appears promising. There may be some VR therapies available to you now and the use of VR may become more common in clinical practice in the future.
The Paper
“Even though there are many studies showing and investigating the use of immersive VR environments in the field of mental health, fewer studies have focused on investigating or reviewing immersive VR clinical studies that have explored the manipulation of embodied virtual bodies in VR for improving mental health,” co-author Marta Matamala Gómez, PhD, a postdoctoral researcher in Italy, tells Verywell.
The authors looked at not only the use of VR environments, but also at the use of avatars, to improve:
Why VR?
In the past few years, researchers have investigated the role of VR in helping patients. A June 2020 study found VR can help people recovering from orthopedic surgery. Another study in August found VR therapy can help those living with anxiety or depression.
Virtual Reality Therapy May Help Improve Your Own Self Image
According to Gómez, this can involve changing the size or color of the painful part of the body, changing the weight of the body in patients with anorexia nervosa, or changing the size or appearance of the virtual objects in the virtual environment.
Virtual Reality in Physical Therapy
“The most exciting thing is that there is still a lot of work to do in using virtual body ownership illusions (virtual embodiment) in the field of mental health,” Gómez says. “We found that there are fewer studies using full virtual body ownership illusions in the field of motor rehabilitation, compared to the pain or psychological rehabilitation fields. This indicates that there are still there a lot of studies to perform.”
Can You Use VR at Home To Support Mental Health?
Using VR to help support your mental health at home isn’t quite possible yet. “There is still a lot of work to do in introducing the use of virtual reality in clinical populations, and ethical and security protocols should still be developed before allowing the patients to use VR headsets on their own,” Gómez says.
According to Gómez, three important next steps need to be taken before at-home use is even considered:
4 SourcesVerywell Health uses only high-quality sources, including peer-reviewed studies, to support the facts within our articles. Read oureditorial processto learn more about how we fact-check and keep our content accurate, reliable, and trustworthy.Anxiety and Depression Associate of America.Body dysmorphic disorder.Matamala-Gomez M, Maselli A, Malighetti C, Realdon O, Mantovani F, Riva G.Virtual body ownership illusions for mental health: a narrative review.Journal of Clinical Medicine. 2021;10(1):139.Berton A, Longo U, Candela V et al.Virtual reality, augmented reality, gamification, and telerehabilitation: psychological impact on orthopedic patients’ rehabilitation.J Clin Med. 2020;9(8):2567. doi:10.3390/jcm9082567Ioannou A, Papastavrou E, Avraamides MN, Charalambous A.Virtual reality and symptoms management of anxiety, depression, fatigue, and pain: a systematic review.SAGE Open Nursing. 2020;6:2377960820936163. doi:10.1177/2377960820936163
4 Sources
Verywell Health uses only high-quality sources, including peer-reviewed studies, to support the facts within our articles. Read oureditorial processto learn more about how we fact-check and keep our content accurate, reliable, and trustworthy.Anxiety and Depression Associate of America.Body dysmorphic disorder.Matamala-Gomez M, Maselli A, Malighetti C, Realdon O, Mantovani F, Riva G.Virtual body ownership illusions for mental health: a narrative review.Journal of Clinical Medicine. 2021;10(1):139.Berton A, Longo U, Candela V et al.Virtual reality, augmented reality, gamification, and telerehabilitation: psychological impact on orthopedic patients’ rehabilitation.J Clin Med. 2020;9(8):2567. doi:10.3390/jcm9082567Ioannou A, Papastavrou E, Avraamides MN, Charalambous A.Virtual reality and symptoms management of anxiety, depression, fatigue, and pain: a systematic review.SAGE Open Nursing. 2020;6:2377960820936163. doi:10.1177/2377960820936163
Verywell Health uses only high-quality sources, including peer-reviewed studies, to support the facts within our articles. Read oureditorial processto learn more about how we fact-check and keep our content accurate, reliable, and trustworthy.
Anxiety and Depression Associate of America.Body dysmorphic disorder.Matamala-Gomez M, Maselli A, Malighetti C, Realdon O, Mantovani F, Riva G.Virtual body ownership illusions for mental health: a narrative review.Journal of Clinical Medicine. 2021;10(1):139.Berton A, Longo U, Candela V et al.Virtual reality, augmented reality, gamification, and telerehabilitation: psychological impact on orthopedic patients’ rehabilitation.J Clin Med. 2020;9(8):2567. doi:10.3390/jcm9082567Ioannou A, Papastavrou E, Avraamides MN, Charalambous A.Virtual reality and symptoms management of anxiety, depression, fatigue, and pain: a systematic review.SAGE Open Nursing. 2020;6:2377960820936163. doi:10.1177/2377960820936163
Anxiety and Depression Associate of America.Body dysmorphic disorder.
Matamala-Gomez M, Maselli A, Malighetti C, Realdon O, Mantovani F, Riva G.Virtual body ownership illusions for mental health: a narrative review.Journal of Clinical Medicine. 2021;10(1):139.
Berton A, Longo U, Candela V et al.Virtual reality, augmented reality, gamification, and telerehabilitation: psychological impact on orthopedic patients’ rehabilitation.J Clin Med. 2020;9(8):2567. doi:10.3390/jcm9082567
Ioannou A, Papastavrou E, Avraamides MN, Charalambous A.Virtual reality and symptoms management of anxiety, depression, fatigue, and pain: a systematic review.SAGE Open Nursing. 2020;6:2377960820936163. doi:10.1177/2377960820936163
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