Virtual Reality And The Training Of Military Personnel To Cope With Acute Stressors

Virtual reality is used in psychotherapeutic applications, but also as a training tool to practice stress management techniques and, hopefully, in the long term reduce the likelihood of developing posttraumatic stress disorder. This chapter begins with an overview of posttraumatic stress disorder and virtual reality technologies used in clinical research. The core of the chapter is dedicated to review studies using virtual reality to learn and practice stress coping skills or preparing military personnel to deal with stressful situations. Our analyses revealed that virtual reality is a promising training tool but more studies are clearly needed. Issues such as realism and the sense of presence are discussed and their role appears more complicated than initially thought.