Hair Salone Blueprints

Second Life Can therapy help with autism? Why

Second Life Can therapy help with autism? (By Dr. Marianna Liotino)



For people with Asperger syndrome, social interaction can lead to anxiety-inducing conditions. Indeed, this syndrome is a pervasive developmental disorder, which is implemented with autism characterized by social difficulties, but at the same time, the patient has a strong capability of learning. Dr. Sara Bond Chapman, director of the Center for Brain Health, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, has developed a project, together with other colleagues, such as Daniel Krawczyk, specializing in the study of Brain-immaging, and Charles Tamminga, Director of the University Department of Psychiatry, in Dallas. They recently created a virtual platform in Second Life, a place that allows you to explore the patients and their disease, in a safe environment, not open to the public, where people who have autism can virtually use the practice of communication, Game and negotiation, in a realistic setting. One of the main problems of autism, it is the ability to communicate with other people every day. But what is Second Life?
course means "Second Life". This, however, is built in a virtual reality, on-line, created by an American company, Linden Lab, which consists of a virtual community Alternatively, that exists on the server developer of online game in which everyone can connect via the Internet, create their own "avatar" (character), and lead a parallel existence, along with thousands of people. In fact, the population of Second Life has just passed the 300 000 inhabitants. And like any company, or rather, a virtual city that respects itself, began to host conferences, political debates and art exhibitions, as well as shops and services of all kinds. Even psychotherapists, where instead of dialogue in person, there is a chat box, and instead of a real bed there is a virtual bed. This has led to the development of a real psychological therapy, through a virtual world, which is called Avatar Therapy. It takes place more or less like a chat session therapeutic, but in this case, the virtual reality environment Second Life, provides additional information that would not be available in chat. In fact, the patient and the therapist indirectly provide a large amount of information on their personality, based on the design of their avatar, the chosen name and dress. Moreover, the use of gestures, and emoticons, introduces the possibility of receiving additional small non-verbal information during treatment. Dr. Sandra Chapman, supports the use of chat and emoticons, develop a symbolic language that can greatly help the autistic child feel more ease in communicating. Unlike other models of intervention, virtual world experiences provide a powerful tool for learning new ways to communicate in situations similar to those supplied by the every day life. It was discovered that, invest in creating their own "avatar", which may or may not correspond to the subject in real life, brings into play different aspects of building the personality of a particular patient. The real-time interaction with people in surprisingly realistic scenarios, where, with the presence and support of an expert in psychology and reality, multimedia, allowing the patient to learn and manage problems, such as communication. In fact, it helps to overcome the blocks, at first in a virtual world, through learning with virtual simulation techniques, and then be applied to the real world. This study has led us to define a Second Life virtual environment that has a strong interactive, and has proved an effective therapy for people suffering not only from Asperger syndrome, but also by people with debilitating disorders such as social phobia, agoraphobia, obsessive compulsive disorder, anxiety. Thanks to Second Life, researchers from the Dallas Center for Brain Health, has long used this environment with a strong interactive, to perform exercises such as simulations of job interviews, meetings with an offline psychotherapist. All this, in order to educate patients to overcome the usual rocks emotional, moving applications of the actions that must be real, the virtual world, to then face the same in the real world.

Taken from the article: "Can Second Life Therapy with autism?" - Published by the newspaper "Monitor on Psychology"