JMIR Publications

ABSTRACT

Background:

Virtual reality can be used in higher education to create learning experiences and improve knowledge acquisition. Virtual reality can serve as a valuable didactic tool in higher education, where students are expected to learn how to behave professionally in challenging situations, such as complex interactions with vulnerable patients or clients. It is important to provide students with engaging, authentic learning tasks; this can motivate students and give them a sense of mastery. There is a need for in-depth qualitative explorations of educational virtual reality applications to assess their impacts on students’ knowledge and skills and to explore students’ learning experiences with virtual reality. To our knowledge, little empirical research has examined the use of virtual reality to facilitate learning in higher education in the fields of healthcare and social work.

Objective:

The aim of this study is to explore faculty and students’ experiences with watching a prototype of a 360° video using virtual reality headsets. We address the following research questions: - How does the virtual reality prototype stimulate participants’ emotions? - How can virtual reality be used in higher education for health- and social care?

Methods:

We used a qualitative design and collected data through focus group interviews with project participants. The data were analyzed using qualitative content analysis.

Results:

Our analysis identified two main themes in participants’ experiences with the virtual reality prototype. The first theme, authentic professional experience, highlights participants’ experiences of watching the 360° video through a virtual reality headset. The second theme, contextualization of virtual reality, highlights participants’ perceptions of how the virtual reality experience should be incorporated into the educational context

Conclusions:

Our findings suggest that 360° videos with human actors and eye contact can trigger emotions in the viewer and therefore serve as a pedagogic tool that can create authentic professional experiences for students. Virtual reality educational tools could be used to create a safe environment that can better prepare students for real-life practice in health- and social care. However, virtual reality experiences need to be contextualized in educational programs to create a safe environment for learning and to ensure follow-up on the emotions such experiences may trigger in students. Our findings highlight the perceived importance of allowing students to reflect on the virtual reality experience in a safe setting and of follow-up by faculty members. In-person follow-up with students can be resource-intensive for programs with large numbers of students and makes it challenging to offer repeated trainings with virtual reality, something that has been identified as one of the benefits of virtual reality. Clinical Trial: This project is registered with the Norwegian Center for Research Data (protocol code 423788).