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Simulated Schizophrenia

Melinda Wenner
crazy1.jpg

According to Vince Beiser in this month's issue of Wired, a new device called Virtual Hallucinations is training cops, paramedics and social workers what it feels like to be schizophrenic. Beiser writes,

"The system offers two scenarios. In one, you're riding a bus in which other riders appear and disappear, birds of prey claw at the windows, and voices hiss, 'He's taking you back to the FBI!' The other features a trip to the drugstore, where the pharmacist seems to be handing you poison instead of pills, and hostile customers stare at you in disgust.

"Developed with psychiatrists and endorsed by advocates for the mentally ill, Virtual Hallucinations is being used by law enforcement, corrections and health care professionals in at least half a dozen states."

The idea, according to an article in the De Moines Register, the purpose of this "a high-tech virtual reality mask" is to help people develop a more empathetic understanding of what people with hallucinations are experiencing.

Comments

trumped

Submitted by ST Frequency on Fri, 06/22/2007 - 02:01.

I was totally working on a blog piece about this...!

Here's an article I found from 2002, about a virtual reality program that mimics daunting hallucinations, to help schizophrenics themselves in distinguishing reality from frightening delirium...

 And this one is about a virtual facility built by UC Davis' Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences department that  operates within the parallel online universe of Second Life.   From the department website:

"At UC Davis we have built a demonstration of virtual hallucinations which occur in a psychiatric ward built on our own virtual real estate on the Internet ... The goal of the virtual hallucinations project is to use computer virtual reality techniques to build a simulation of the hallucinatory experience.  This simulation could then be used to train medical students, nursing students and hospital staff. It could be used as educational material for family members and caregivers of patients with mental illness.  Finally, the patients themselves could be immersed in the environment and its potential as a form of therapy could be assessed."

When Second Life users "visit" the haunted ward, they are thrust into an experience modeled on the actual hallucinations of schizophrenic patients. Moreover, the developers have amassed a growing "library" of hallucinations that can be customized to fit a specific patient or situation. Examples of these include:

  • - Voices give a running commentary, telling the patient that he is worthless, fat, and that he should kill himself.
  • - Bagpipe music that periodically starts and ends abruptly.
  • - The text of a poster in the entrance morphs to spell derogatory words.
  • - A gun appears on the table in the common room, and voices tell the patient to take the gun and kill himself.  When he approaches the gun, it starts to pulsate.
  • - The patient's reflection appears in the bathroom mirror, and voices whisper, "you're dead, you're dead."  The reflection slowly changes to appear gray and drawn, and bleeds from the eyes.
  • - The floor disappears leaving only "stepping stones" and a cloudy abyss below.

 ;)

st 

 

cool

Submitted by Adam Elenbaas on Sat, 06/30/2007 - 15:45.
This is really amazing Melinda. Thanks for posting! I often wonder if Schizophrenics are chemically crucified in our culture---but then that often seems far too general a statement to make. This seems like a helpful development. Adam Elenbaas