Social Work Futures: Beyond Virtual Reality
Virtual reality (VR) has garnered attention over the past several years within the social work field as a way of connecting students with experiences that they may not be able to have in the classroom; and to orient them with the communities that they are likely to serve both in field placement and eventual practice (Huttar & BrintzenhofeSzoc, 2020; Lanzieri et al., 2021; Trahan et al., 2019).
Virtual reality on the surface is an appealing choice of technology to prepare students in a culturally humble way to work with clients or patients on any number of issues, making use of simulations that can provide immediate feedback to learners within the safety of their home or classroom.
While virtual reality might be appealing, especially as a new piece of technology, it is not without its limitations. Virtual reality carries with it a cost – not only for the consumer to invest in the headset and associated software – but for those seeking to develop interventions as well, and the agencies who would like to utilize, adopt, and implement existing intervention or training software to meet their populations’ unique needs.
There also exists little data as to how effective virtual reality is when compared to traditional classroom instruction (Huttar & BrintzenhofeSzoc, 2020). In a systemic review, Huttar & BrintzenhofeSzoc (2020) were only able to find onestudy examining the comparison between virtual reality and in-classroom instruction. There is also a dearth of evidence to how virtual reality compares in the short, medium, and long term, to interventions provided as they currently are.
Beyond cost, are other concerns surrounding accessibility. These include overall accessibility under both Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act and the Americans with Disabilities Act, as well as accessibility for those who are unable to bear the weight of a VR headset due to the natural aging process, or skeletal, or neuromuscular disabilities (Schwartz, 2020). Additionally, finding ways to include those who are blind, or those with neurological diversity concerns that prohibit their use of virtual reality as it is presently implemented remains an open question that has not been addressed (Schwartz, 2020).
While we are years away from the concept of a holodeck, (Star Trek’s ‘magical’ experience room where one’s wildest fantasies can become a reality) progress is being made toward more inclusive VR experiences. There is hope on the horizon. Whether or not it is in the distance remains an open question.
Until these barriers of cost and accessibility are mitigated and resolved not to the satisfaction of the technocrats but rather to the most excluded user, it remains a choice at odds with Social Work’s stated values as espoused in the NASW Code of Ethics. However, we do not have to throw the baby out with the bathwater. There is a middle, accessible ground, and one likely far more beneficial, far more convenient, and with far more longevity than VR headsets: Augmented Reality (AR).
Augmented reality is, perhaps, a hidden gem overlooked in social work and the helping professions. While many may think of Pokemon Go, or using Amazon.com’s “see it in your room” feature when they hear the term, AR technology is waiting to be unlocked by social workers engaged in technology development. It is waiting to be harnessed as a more meaningful, more accessible (and likely more realistic way) to engage social workers and social work students with their patients and their communities.
Katz et al (2012) were utilizing augmented reality as early as 2012, along with GPS positioning, in order to create applications that assist those who are blind with navigating based upon geolocation and visual landmarks. There are cellphones for the blind, and a variety of options and adaptations across both iPhone and Android devices that reduce barriers for those who are disabled or neurodiverse, which also reduces the cost burden currently associated with VR as it currently stands.
As Katz et al (2012) assisted the blind community to navigate their world, this technology can be utilized to assist students in navigating their communities and populations in safe, meaningful ways where learning and engagement can occur. Not only this, but it can allow students to exist within virtual space and real space at the same time, allowing them to remain oriented to the real world and the lessons they are working to learn in order to make a difference in it.
Social work education has seen the value of providing training to students to brief them on the communities, populations, and agencies that they will be attending to beyond the typical interventions courses. In Israel, Even-Zohar (2020) studied students at the baccalaureate level of social work education. The students were trained on a specific intervention, and sent out into the community to provide the intervention; largely they reported feelings of self-efficacy, and success having seen their work in practice (Even-Zohar, 2020).
Imagine, now, if these students were provided an augmented reality platform similar to that created by Katz et al. (2012). Students could – without VR headsets – take their cellphones into the community, and through the use of augmented reality point their phone – whether they can see or not, regardless of ability or disability – at the bank and see, or hear, or feel an overlay not of floating heads and disembodied cartoon avatars so often associated with VR, but of actual people interacting in a simulated situation, right in front of their eyes, interacting and playing out before them, while they could be fully present in the moment: taking in the sounds, smells, sights, tactile sensations, and more (whatever senses their body affords them). Imagine being able to enter a hospital and be guided around with an augmented reality tour guide, who shows you around, and then lets you have a session, in an actual hospital room (empty) though filled with augmented reality characters portrayed by real actors who can respond and interact with the students based on artificial intelligence.
Augmented reality has much to offer social work, in combining our digital worlds with our physical ones, in connecting students to scenarios where they actually occur, and by widening the tent of social work education to those who have been largely excluded due to their disabilities, and schools of social works’ inability to be inclusive by design, far beyond ‘accommodations.’
Rather than invest in a technology that is unproven, non-inclusive, expensive, and difficult, we should instead turn our attention to what, on the surface, may seem lest robust, but in fact can increase and open our worlds, in a manner far more consistent with our values, than virtual reality can ever hope to achieve.
References
Even-Zohar, A. (2020). Social work students acquiring tools to help families manage their household finances. Journal of Financial Therapy, 11(1). https://doi.org/10.4148/1944-9771.1199
Huttar, C. M., & BrintzenhofeSzoc, K. (2020). Virtual reality and computer simulation in social work education: A systematic review. Journal of Social Work Education, 56(1), 131–141. https://doi.org/10.1080/10437797.2019.1648221
Katz, B. F. G., Dramas, F., Parseihian, G., Gutierrez, O., Kammoun, S., Brilhault, A., Brunet, L., Gallay, M., Oriola, B., Auvray, M., Truillet, P., Denis, M., Thorpe, S., & Jouffrais, C. (2012). NAVIG: Guidance system for the visually impaired using virtual augmented reality. Technology & Disability, 24(2), 163–178.
Schwartz, M.L. (2020). Inclusion and equity through universal design vs. ableism and inequality through accommodations. SocialWorkDesk. https://www.socialworkdesk.net/blog/2020/10/20/inclusion-and-equity-through-universal-design-vs-ableism-and-inequality-through-accommodations/
Trahan, M. H., Smith, K. S., Traylor, A. C., Washburn, M., Moore, N., & Mancillas, A. (2019). Three-dimensional virtual reality: Applications to the 12 grand challenges of social work. Journal of Technology in Human Services, 37(1), 13–31. https://doi.org/10.1080/15228835.2019.1599765