The Role of the Social Sciences in Virtual Reality By Carter Allgeier 

What is Virtual Reality? - A virtual space, where through the use of senses simulate a reality, that the user can interact with. - Mostly used for video games, but more recently used in virtual social settings, such as VR Chat, and the meta universe - These devices range from using your phone, standalone or connect to a computer. Valve Index 

Virtual Reality. - Popular games such as Beatsaber and Blade and Sorcery - Social hubs, VR Chat and Metaverse - From personal experience, it’s scary how real and smooth the experience is. VR Chat (top) & Beatsaber (bottom) 

3 Social Sciences in Virtual Reality - Psychology - Sociology - Geography 

Psychology - If living the dual life way, could you lose grip on reality? - You can look like, sound like, and act like anything you can think of, as long as someone has created a model for it. What could this affect have on unattainable standards? - Cyberbullying, in VR it's pretty much just straight up bullying and harassment. 

Sociology - Virtual reality is all about interacting with people, but on a much larger scale. - Are you social or anti social if you only “socialize” on Virtual Reality - Multiple people from all over the world, with strong anonymity, it is essentially social media on steroids. 

Geography - Geography plays an important role and not at all when it comes to VR - Anywhere in the world can load into a lobby or server with another person from across the world - In world geography has no meaning, other than what servers are within reasonable ping limits. - Within virtual reality, there is no sense of geography, everything either looks the same or completely different. - Traveling from one place to another becomes sitting at a loading screen waiting for the world to load. - No countries or built in natural culture. 

Other Issues within VR - Long daily use can cause issues with dissociation. - What is the effect on social skills after using VR for an extended period of time? - Really unattainable standards could be propped up and effect esteem in younger users. - Post VR Sadness, a feeling of sadness and dullness after playing VR. 

Dissociation/Post VR Sadness - Long term repeated use, can cause feelings of dissociation - Shortly after a session, multiple users, including me, feel a weird sense of dullness and sadness. - Solutions to this is VR in moderation. 

Some Solutions - Solution to dissociation, frequent breaks in playing and avoid long sessions. - Separate sessions from one another, socialize outside between social sessions on vr. - Use in moderation! 

Citations. Bardi, J. (2022, December 13). Virtual reality defined & use cases. Marxent Labs. Retrieved February 12, 2023, from https://www.marxentlabs.com/what-is-virtual-reality/ Noone, G. (2022, February 24). Is virtual reality bad for our mental health? Tech Monitor. Retrieved February 12, 2023, from https://techmonitor.ai/technology/emerging-technology/is-virtual-reality-bad-for-mental-health Pennington, A. (2022, December 1). What's The Societal Impact of VR? NAB Amplify. Retrieved February 12, 2023, from https://amplify.nabshow.com/articles/whats-the-societal-impact-of-vr/ Searles, R. (2017, August 31). Virtual reality can leave you with an existential hangover. The Atlantic. Retrieved February 12, 2023, from https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2016/12/post-vr-sadness/511232/