360 Video: A prototyping process for developing virtual reality interventions

Abstract

Virtual reality (VR) has emerged as a promising technological intervention for anxiety disorders. However, there are no existing standards and best practices to evaluate the effectiveness of environments to achieve their intervention goals. The purpose of this study was to develop a VR intervention for student veterans with social anxiety disorder and test feasibility utilizing a three-stage development model. The development of a therapeutic VR environment may benefit from an interdisciplinary collaboration of researchers from various fields of study. Utilizing three stages of prototyping with two virtual reality platforms, fully immersive video (n?=?6) and three-dimensional (3-D) immersive virtual reality (n?=?8), the research team designed an intervention for student veterans with social anxiety disorder, testing bio-reactivity of participants. Results of prototyping include user feedback validating increased stress levels and increased bio-reactivity specifically in galvanic skin response and heart rate elevation. Implications include the use of 360° video for prototyping 3-D virtual reality interventions.     

Three-dimensional virtual reality: Applications to the 12 grand challenges of social work

Abstract

The American Academy of Social Work and Social Welfare (AASWSW) identified 12 Grand Challenges of Social Work to unify the profession with focused research, practice and policy applications for the most pressing social issues. Virtual Reality (VR), specifically three-dimensional immersive computer-generated environments, has a history of research and applications to address social and behavioral problems. VR is becoming more readily available, as the technology is becoming more common in mainstream platforms such as mobile technology. While social work interventions are often tailored for vulnerable populations that may not have access to VR computing, it appears that virtual reality is gaining accessibility with these advances. Within the framework of the 12 Grand Challenges of Social Work, researchers from three social work virtual reality laboratories in the United States, Texas State University, the University of Houston, and the University of Alabama, review applications previously tested and currently in development to focus future research and intervention in social work practice.     

(Im)materiality, virtual reality and interaction: grounding the 'virtual' in studies of technology in action

This paper explores the organisation of social interaction amongst participants ‘in’ Virtual Reality. Despite the wide‐ranging sociological interest in ‘virtual’ technologies, there is rather little detailed sociological investigation of user experiences of the virtual technology par excellence, namely multi‐user Virtual Reality. Interestingly the discourses that underpin discussions of more mundane virtual technologies (eg email, the Web, mobile phones, etc.) tend to draw on design visions for Virtual Reality, such as the opportunities for social life freed from the constraints of the physical body. This paper contributes to a growing number of empirical studies that provide a critique of this view, but maybe more importantly, provides a detailed analysis of action and interaction in virtual worlds. It considers the organisation of interaction within VR with particular emphasis on the ways in which visual features of the digital domain are seen and shared by participants. The paper describes the ways in which the abilities to share views on the virtual world requires participants to overcome problems associated with the very material character of the VR interfaces. The study is based on the analysis of recordings of a Virtual Reality system that enables participants to talk to one another and see one another's actions within a virtual environment.     

Past,Present, and Future: Editorial on Virtual Reality Applications to Human Services

Abstract

“Virtual Reality” interventions in human services may include 360° video, augmented reality, mixed reality, and fully immersive 3-dimensional virtual reality simulations. A variety of applications have been evaluated in various fields of study, including medicine, social work, psychology, and human performance training. Currently, the state of research of VR interventions in human services has primarily focused on efficacy and effectiveness research, with few studies evaluating “scaling up” or implementation of VR interventions in larger populations. Unfortunately, the state of efficacy and effectiveness studies of VR interventions still remains weak with some applications due to smaller sample sizes, lack of randomized control trials, and a gap in reporting key intervention qualities, dosage, and outcomes. With new developments in combining artificial intelligence with VR, realism and the potential for human interaction with computer generated simulations may boost presence and immersion within these applications. This editorial provides an overview of the state of virtual reality applications in human service provision, potential gaps to be addressed by research in the future, and the development of AI based interactive sequences that may boost use presence.     

Micro-entrepreneurship,new media technologies,and the reproduction and reconfiguration of gender in rural China

This article explores the connections between micro-entrepreneurship, new media technologies, and gender in rural China. Based on fieldwork among diverse individuals engaged in agricultural and non-agricultural micro-entrepreneurship, I examine how uses of technology in economic production become the site for the reproduction and/or reconfiguration of gender hierarchies. Grounding my analysis in feminist and critical theories of technology, I investigate the gendered uses and discourses of new media technologies that emerge from three types of entrepreneurial spaces: physical places where micro-entrepreneurship is based on new media technologies, such as internet cafés and mobile phone shops; virtual realms where new media technologies potentially facilitate entrepreneurship, including text messaging and various websites; and virtual spaces where informal learning and sharing take place via mediated networks formed around common occupations. I argue that in the context of entrepreneurship, even among women and men who are young and have migration experience, deeply entrenched gendered power differentials produce unequal access to capital and social networks, and hence uses and understandings of technology. Although engagement with technology has opened up new spaces for economic enhancement and the rearrangement of conventional gender norms, such engagement does not overcome – indeed, in many cases reproduces – gendered power relations.     

Anchors,Habitus, and Practices Besieged by War: Women and Gender in the Blockade of Leningrad

As war challenges survival and social relations, how do actors alter and adapt dispositions and practices? To explore this question, I investigate women's perceptions of normal relations, practices, status, and gendered self in an intense situation of wartime survival, the Blockade of Leningrad (1941–1944), an 872‐day ordeal that demographically feminized the city. Using Blockade diaries for data on everyday life, perceptions, and practices, I show how women's gendered skills and habits of breadseeking and caregiving (finding scarce resources and providing aid) were key to survival and helped elevate their sense of status. Yet this did not entice rethinking “gender.” To explore status elevation and gender entrenchment, I build on Bourdieu's theory of habitus and fields to develop anchors: field entities with valence around which actors orient identities and practices. Anchors provide support for preexisting habitus and practices, and filter perceptions from new positions vis‐à‐vis fields and concrete relations. Essentialist identities and practices were reinforced through two processes involving anchors. New status was linked to “women's work” that aided survival of anchors (close others, but also factories and the city), reinforcing acceptance of gender positions. Women perceived that challenging gender relations and statuses could risk well‐being of anchors, reconstructing gender essentialism.     

Skill training in multimodal virtual environments

Multimodal, immersive, virtual reality (VR) techniques open new perspectives for perceptual-motor skill trainers. They also introduce new risks and dangers. This paper describes the benefits and pitfalls of multimodal training and the cognitive building blocks of a multimodal, VR training simulators.     

Placing Gender in Social Work: The Local and National Dimensions of Gender Relations

This paper argues that as well as being sensitive to wider discourses of gender relations, social workers need to consider the ways in which gender is localised. It is argued that to some extent gender practices vary according to local culture, that gendered identities are often localised and that social workers tend to construct their clients according to images of local men and women. These images tend to be stereotypical but some do also reflect dominant local gendered practices. The paper draws on data from qualitative interviews with social workers and probation officers, as well as the experience of teaching social work students, to illustrate these arguments. Whilst it is argued that the localising of gender is of general relevance, the data come from Wales alone. The author's conclusion is that (amongst other things) anti‐oppressive practice involves recognising the important influence of local stereotypes and challenging them, whilst also acknowledging that gendered practices do vary from place to place.     

The contested spatialities of transnational activism: gendered gatekeeping and gender struggles in an African association of informal workers

In this article I explore the geographies of emerging transnational networks of organized informal workers, with empirical reference to a local association based in Mozambique and a transnational network of which it is part. I uncover the gendered spatialities of this transnational activism to demonstrate how participation is unequal and heavily mediated rather than direct. In particular, I show how influential actors have engaged in practices of gendered gatekeeping that tend to keep women in place. I also explore the tensions that emerged because of these practices and the negotiation of divergent gender ideologies and strategies within the network. In the article, I relate to recent theoretical work that problematizes the unequal and contested geographies of transnational activism, and introduce insights from feminist scholarship to reflect on gender inequalities and gender visions in transnational networks.     

Gender discourses in academic mobility

Despite increasing geographic mobility among academic staff, gendered patterns of involvement in academic mobility have largely escaped scrutiny. Positioned within literatures on internationalization, physical proximity, gender and parenthood in academic mobility and understandings of gender as a process enacted through both discursive and embodied practices, we use discourse analysis based on interviews with academics in New Zealand to examine differences in language that create differing realities with regards to gender and obligations of care in academic mobility decisions. The findings reveal how academic mobility is discursively formulated as ‘essential’ to successful academic careers, with the need for frequent travel justified despite advances in virtual communication technologies. Heteronormative discourses are shown to disrupt and fragment the opportunities female academics have to engage in academic mobility. However, we also uncover ways in which these discourses are resisted, wherein fathers articulate emotional strain associated with academic mobility. The article shows how discourse works to constitute the essentialization of academic mobility, and the uneven gendered practices associated with it, whilst also giving voice to gender inequities in academic mobility from the southern hemisphere.     

Corporeal Interactions in VRChat: Situational Intensity and Body Synchronization

Erving Goffman's work on interaction in everyday life focuses on joint spatio-temporal and face-to-face situations and denies the constitution of social situations via mediatized interaction. In contrast, we argue that shared immersive media such as Social Virtual Reality enable intense, delocalized forms of co-present interactions that constitute closeness and intimacy. By discussing Goffman in the context of current works that open up his perspective for mediatization, we present an understanding of social situations that focuses on intensity and synchronized embodiment—physical, digital, and corporeal. On the Social VR platform VRChat, synchronized bodies allow for intimate corporeal practices, such as cuddling, dancing, or cybersex. Virtual Reality technology facilitates delocalized forms of affective-bodily interaction, thereby contributing to the social negotiation of mediatized closeness and intimacy—despite physical distance. Our findings are based on a digital ethnographic analysis of lifeworlds and practices of enthusiast VRChat-users, combined with qualitative semi-structured interviews.     

Feminism and Military Gender Practices: Israeli Women Soldiers in "Masculine" Roles

Women's military service is the focus of an ongoing controversy because of its implications for the gendered nature of citizenship. While liberal feminists endorse equal service as a venue for equal citizenship, radical feminists see women's service as a rei•cation of martial citizenship and cooperation with a hierarchical and sexist institution. These debates, however, tend to ignore the perspective of the women soldiers themselves.
This paper seeks to add to the contemporary debate on women's military service the subjective dimension of gender and national identities of women soldiers serving in "masculine" roles. I use a theory of identity practices in order to analyze the interaction between state institutions and identity construction. Based on in-depth interviews, I argue that Israeli women soldiers in "masculine" roles shape their gender identities according to the hegemonic masculinity of the combat soldier through three interrelated practices: (1) mimicry of combat soldiers' bodily and discursive practices; (2) distancing from "traditional femininity"; and (3) trivialization of sexual harassment.
These practices signify both resistance and compliance with the military dichotomized gender order. While these transgender performances subvert the hegemonic norms of masculinity and femininity, they also collaborate with the military androcentric norms. Thus, although these women soldiers individually transgress gender boundaries, they internalize the military's masculine ideology and values and learn to identify with the patriarchal order of the army and the state. This accounts for a pattern of "limited inclusion" that reaf•rms their marginalization, thus prohibiting them from developing a collective consciousness that would challenge the gendered structure of citizenship.     

Mobile Selves: Gender, ethnicity and mobile phones in the everyday lives of young Pakistani-British women and men

This paper focuses on mobile phone use by a young minority ethnic group as a medium through which to explore diversity and technology use in everyday life. Recent research with young people has shown that mobile phones are instrumentally, socially and emotionally important but few have problematized the homogeneous concept of 'youth'. This paper argues for increased recognition of the intersections of social categories such as youth, gender and ethnicity with technologies, specifically mobile phones, in order to understand complexity of use. Drawing on new empirical, qualitative data from an urban area in the North East of England we explore the focus group narratives of young Pakistani-British Muslim women and men focusing on the notion of 'shifting' gendered and cultural identities and social practices, developed and reworked in relation to the use of mobile phones. We look at the gendered dynamics of mobile use, including gender talk and text, and ask whether the young women and men experience mobiles differently in everyday life. We also explore the ways in which mobiles are used to create 'space of one's own' and the gendered dynamics of remaining connected, especially to key peer groups. The paper concludes with the assertion that in order to fully explore the mutability of youth cultures across space and time, we need to develop a more dynamic concept of 'mobile selves' by exploring the place and meaning of technologies such as mobile phones in the rich tapestries of young people's lives.     

THE POLITICAL ECONOMY OF TIME IN THE INTERNET ERA: FEMINIST PERSPECTIVES AND CHALLENGES

This paper examines the gender matrix of time, arguing for cross-disciplinary consideration of political economy, globalization and technology to achieve a detailed understanding of gendered hierarchies of time and the ways in which public/private identifications of social space and time have variously constructed and maintained them. It is argued that women are alienated from their own time, which is identified as most legitimately allocated to the service of others both in the home and at work. The inter-relationship of technologies and gendered identities is explored in relation to public/private divisions and the political-economic and scientific-technological knowledge processes that contribute to upholding them. ICTs reflect these historically established gendered patterns, but international projects such as 'Women on the Net' also demonstrate the capacities of these technologies for disrupting the gender matrix of time through their use by women for women.     

Intersectional Approach to Top Executive White‐Collar Offenders’ Discourses: A Case Study of the Martha Stewart and Sam Waksal Insider Trading Scandal

Employing a feminist intersectional approach, the current study analyzes how the intersected social identities of homemaker extraordinaire Martha Stewart and Sam Waksal, the former CEO of ImClone, manifest in their gendered discursive strategies during the insider trading scandal. Findings indicate gendered performance could be better understood from a social learning process perspective, which dictates that individuals learn from public reactions to their past acts and adjust their presentations of self to achieve their career goals. Our findings also highlight gender transgression includes not only the demeanors associated with acts but also the role individuals take against the socially constructed gendered expectations.     

Avatarculture: Narrative, power and identity in virtual world environments

Drawing on the work of Raymond Williams, this paper examines avatar culture through the interplay of emergent and residual forces. A dual process is at work in the formation of cultural identities in which the enabling conditions of virtual worlds are understood alongside and in relation to pre-existing off-line phenomenon. Avatar culture confirms structure for participants, especially in relation to gender and sexuality, whilst at the same time providing a reflexive space to break with pre-existing features of social identity. Virtual environments are thus microcosms of a grounded cultural materiality that is simultaneously improvised on and transformed. With regard to the distinctive aspects of avatar culture the paper focuses on issues of narrative, representation, censorship and power relations and their formation within virtual worlds. It discusses how virtual worlds incrementally acquire a peculiar power and meaning in the lives of participants. The paper discusses the flows of social interaction in virtual environments and how intermittence best describes how users participate and withdraw from different encounters. Avatar culture binds people together temporarily and loosely and then frees them up to relocate themselves elsewhere. In this context, virtual environments might be regarded as putting structure and power into movement. The ethnographic approach adopted helps peel back the residue of social structure to reveal a virtual agency with its emerging shells of avatar-derived affiliations, tensions and conflicts.     

Digital identities – overcoming visual bias through virtual embodiment

ABSTRACT

This study sheds new light on the role of identity in virtual environments when virtual representation of self is in support of disabled individuals and the potential impact of their virtual identity on work opportunities. It is widely understood that individuals who live with disability often experience a lifetime of bullying, exclusion, marginalization and rejection. They often experience workplace bias and discrimination. Yet, when they can create an identity and experience embodiment in virtual environments, the results can be extraordinarily powerful – even life-changing. This research builds on nearly a decade of ethnographic research in 3D online immersive social virtual worlds; seven of those years working with disability communities to answer the following: RQ1: In a virtual world where one can choose any avatar form, how does that visual sense of self-representation influence one’s ability to gain access to a social network, to be a leader in that network, and to find work? RQ2: How does realism in representation influence work experiences in these digital worlds? The results reveal the importance of choice in online representation of avatars in creating work and online social engagement. Implications contribute to our understanding of visual bias in the workplace and how emerging virtual reality technologies may open new avenues for meaningful work and social interactions for people with disabilities.     

Wedded to work: Class struggles and gendered identities in the restructuring of the Ecuadorian Banana industry

From 1934 to 1962, the United Fruit Company owned and operated Hacienda Tenguel, an immense banana plantation in Ecuador's southern coast. In an effort to control the working‐class of Tenguel, United Fruit implemented a system of plantation management that was rooted in the support and manipulation of gendered institutions and practices. In the end, the system backfired and the workers invaded the entire property, using the same sets of gendered relationships, rights, and identities that the company had developed in order to produce a docile labor force. In contrast, the current system of contract farming, backed by the state, has made it impossible to adopt the identity of “worker” in a more subjective and political sense. Plantations, now severed from the daily life of the family and community, are no longer sites where a politically meaningful sense of class identity is forged. In examining this process of restructuring, this essay explores the complex and changing relationships between political struggle, the formation of class and gender identities, and processes of capitalist transformation.     

‘Heroes and Matriarchs’: Working‐Class Femininities,Violence and Door Supervision Work

Door supervision work is traditionally seen as a working‐class, male‐dominated trade. In addition, it is deemed to be one that is physically risky, where violence is seen as a ‘tool of the trade’ and where ‘bodily capital’ and ‘fighting ability’ are paramount to the competent performance of the job. This paper is a timely analysis on the manner in which the increasing numbers of women who work in door supervision negotiate their occupational identity and construct their work practices. The analysis focused on the way in which discursive constructions of both violence and workplace identities are variably taken up, reworked and resisted through the intersection of gender and class. This resulted in the identification of two main discourses; ‘playing the hero’ and the ‘hard matriarch’. These findings allow us to theorize that multiple, gendered and classed occupational identities exist beyond normative expectations and can be seen to be both emancipatory for working women, while simultaneously bolstering exploitation, workplace harassment and violent practices.     

CONSTRUCTING IDENTITIES AT THE MARGINS: Masculinities and Citizenship in the Israeli Army

This article examines the construction of multiple gendered and national identities in the Israeli army. In Israel, hegemonic masculinity is identified with the masculinity of the Jewish combat soldier and is perceived as the emblem of good citizenship. This identity. I argue, assumes a central role in shaping a hierarchal order of gendered and civic identities that reflects and reproduces social stratification and reconstructs differential modes of participation in, and belonging to, the Israeli state.
In-depth interviews with two marginalized groups in the Israeli army—women in "masculine" roles and male soldiers in blue-collar jobs—suggest two discernible practices of identity. While women in "masculine" roles structure their gender and national identities according to the masculinity of the combat soldier, the identity practices of male soldiers in blue-collar jobs challenge this hegemonic masculinity and its close link with citizenship in Israel. However, while both identity practices are empowering for the groups in question, neither undermines the hegemonic order, for the military's practice of "limited inclusion" prohibits the development of a collective consciousness that would challenge the differentiated structure of citizenship.