Psychological effects of heavy usage of Virtual Reality Smith is a fourth grader who is all into video games; his goal is to have the latest video game. He lives in his video games. He goes to school every day physically and but mentally he is in his video game world, where he is the king of the racing cars and he is rich enough to buy the whole city. He always skips his homework because he cannot remember what he learned in school. While teachers are teaching, he is playing with his video games in his head and not paying attention in class. Teachers always contact smith’s parents and even parents seem to be helpless, because according to Smith’s parents, he gets very aggravated if they try to take his video games and Smith really gets violent with his siblings and friends. Smith wants to sit in locked room holding the remote controller in his hands where he can control several different cars in a second. He cannot remember anything what he does throughout the day because in his mind he is always in the second world. One day Smith was sitting in living room plying with his video games, suddenly his mom falls off from stairs and broke her arm. Instead of calling for help, Smith continues with his games and when his dad asks what happened he could not tell him exactly what happened. Smith told his dad, he does not remember if he sees mother falling down because all he could see that he is losing the game and he has to get more cars in the race. After that Smith’ dad contacts some of the specialists psychologists for help and they told Smith’s parents that he is almost into the second life and bringing him back to the life is the real challenge for them. This is just a one hypothetical example of how virtual world is affecting today’s generations, especially kids and teenagers. Because they are just starting their lives and as they are grow up they learn many new things and virtual reality happens to be one of those. People assume that virtual reality is a benign influence upon their lives and is not likely to cause any problems. However, this is a form of technology that is developing all the time and as a result, can produce problems, which have not been previously considered. In a media technology saturated world, people are jumping in and out of digital spaces. These virtual experiences can affect the world by psychological responses; virtual reality uses hearts have pumped intensively while crossing a virtual pit, and viewers exposed to negative images. Possible theoretical explanations of how presence may negatively influence cognition are presented. The purpose of this research is to investigate the effects of virtual reality on the development of cognitive memory and how people behave toward others in the real world. Virtual reality is a powerful technology with a potential for far-ranging social and psychological impact. The term “virtual reality” refers to an immersive simulation that involves relatively high verisimilitude. According to the definition, virtual reality is game changer; with virtual reality some people try to escape reality by focusing on the internet; some people try to replace their unhappy life with a better, virtual one. Sherry Turkle conveys her fear of technology’s effect on relationships exploring cases, both positive and negative, in which people become too immersed in their virtual lives, to the point when they are neglecting the real world. She first does a case study of Joel, who uses second life to explore his artistic side because his job as a programmer leaves little room for such pursuits. Joel spends most of his time building in SL as an artistic outlet. He has made many social connections and even progresses to the point of having his “real-world business cards include his avatar name is second life (217).” However, this is an example of an appropriate use of second life. He is content with his actual life, but uses second life to create in ways; he does not get to do offline. However, too much use of virtual reality can lead into the new world, where a person completely tries to escape real life, and wants to stay in a second, virtual life. In this new world, a person sees things how he or she wants to be and he or she tries to make his or her own fantasy, where everything is set up just the way he or she wants. Therefore, some people try to replace their unhappy life with a better, virtual one. Few studies have focused on the impact that presence within a virtual world has on memory tasks conducted in the physical world. However, some literature demonstrates that experiences in immersive virtual environments (IVEs) (technology that induces presence) can influence memory recall outside of the virtual environment. For example, one study by Segovia and Bailenson (2009) placed children into an immersive virtual reality simulation and then interviewed them after the experience. Children in the virtual reality condition reported more false memories, confusing the virtual experience as having happened in the real world earlier in their lives and one of the examples would be the Smith’s story. This effect lasted several days after treatment. This study illustrates that the power of highly immersive and presence evoking technology can affect memory about and in the physical world. Though this study showed the impact that virtual reality may have on memory, it failed to investigate what specific mechanism (such as level of presence) that affected memory, particularly when the information in the physical world was similar to the virtual world. The idea of a life lived online, or outside of regular society, is largely seen as dangerous and unhealthy. Virtual reality as entertainment has already started to surface, even without an experience that fully removes a person from his or her surrounding stimuli. One issue is social isolation, in which the user of virtual reality relies more on interactions that take place in a virtual world than on experiences in the real world. This lack of true, physical interaction has the potential to create incorrect associations that are not part of real social setting. The isolation could eventually cause depression, disassociation, and other condition, if it is severe enough. Moreover, the possible psychological and social effect of virtual reality is desensitization. If some users were to use virtual reality for entertainment extensively, then they could run the risk of failing to recognize the true consequences for actions in which they are viewing. When translate to the real world, in an extreme case, this could cause a lack of understanding of the effects of some actions when performed outside the virtual environment. Therefore, if virtual reality becomes a part of people’s day-to-day lives, more and more people may prefer to spend a majority of their time in virtual spaces. By the 2030s, virtual reality will be totally realistic and compelling and we will spend most of our time in virtual environments.

Reference
Turkle, Sherry. Alone together: Why we except more from Technology and Less from Each other. New York: Basic Books,2011. Print.

Segovia,K.Y> & Bailenson, J.N> (2009). Virtually true: Children’s acquisition of false memories in virtual reality. Media Psychology,1,371

Indalecio, Tina “Exploring Identity in the Virtual World.” Psychology Today. N.p., 30 Apr. 2010. Web. 22 Nov. 2015. <https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/curious-media/201004/exploring-identity-in-the-virtual-world-is-really-you>