Virtual Reality and Serious Games for Stress Reduction with Application in Work Environments

Ladakis, Ioannis; Kilintzis, Vassilis; Xanthopoulou, Despoina; Chouvarda, Ioanna

doi:10.5220/0010300905410548

Cited by 6 publications

(16 citation statements)

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“…Of the 32 studies, 24 involved healthy individuals [ 6 , 8 , 10 , 24 , 26 , 28 - 38 , 40 , 41 , 43 - 48 ], 1 involved individuals at high risk of developing anxiety disorders [ 39 ], 1 involved patients with lung cancer [ 7 ], 1 involved patients with pneumonia [ 49 ], 2 involved patients with COPD [ 27 , 42 ], 2 involved patients with COVID-19 [ 49 , 50 ], and 1 involved patients with asthma [ 5 ]. The breathing exercises were mostly related to breathing therapy (9/32) [ 5 , 6 , 10 , 25 , 27 , 33 , 48 , 49 , 54 ] and anxiety management (13/32) [ 8 , 28 , 29 , 32 , 34 , 36 , 37 , 39 - 41 , 43 - 45 ]. Most of the reviewed papers based their research on pilot (16/32) or control studies (11/32), while some of the papers (4/32) only described the design and development processes of their systems.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Virtual Reality for Pulmonary Rehabilitation: Comprehensive Review

Pittara¹,

Matsangidou²,

Petkov³

et al. 2023

JMIR Rehabil Assist Technol

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Background Pulmonary rehabilitation is a vital component of comprehensive care for patients with respiratory conditions, such as lung cancer, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, and asthma, and those recovering from respiratory diseases like COVID-19. It aims to enhance patients’ functional ability and quality of life, and reduce symptoms, such as stress, anxiety, and chronic pain. Virtual reality is a novel technology that offers new opportunities for customized implementation and self-control of pulmonary rehabilitation through patient engagement. Objective This review focused on all types of virtual reality technologies (nonimmersive, semi-immersive, and fully immersive) that witnessed significant development and were released in the field of pulmonary rehabilitation, including breathing exercises, biofeedback systems, virtual environments for exercise, and educational models. Methods The review screened 7 electronic libraries from 2010 to 2023. The libraries were ACM Digital Library, Google Scholar, IEEE Xplore, MEDLINE, PubMed, Sage, and ScienceDirect. Thematic analysis was used as an additional methodology to classify our findings based on themes. The themes were virtual reality training, interaction, types of virtual environments, effectiveness, feasibility, design strategies, limitations, and future directions. Results A total of 2319 articles were identified, and after a detailed screening process, 32 studies were reviewed. Based on the findings of all the studies that were reviewed (29 with a positive label and 3 with a neutral label), virtual reality can be an effective solution for pulmonary rehabilitation in patients with lung cancer, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, and asthma, and in individuals and children who are dealing with mental health–related disorders, such as anxiety. The outcomes indicated that virtual reality is a reliable and feasible solution for pulmonary rehabilitation. Interventions can provide immersive experiences to patients and offer tailored and engaging rehabilitation that promotes improved functional outcomes of pulmonary rehabilitation, breathing body awareness, and relaxation breathing techniques. Conclusions The identified studies on virtual reality in pulmonary rehabilitation showed that virtual reality holds great promise for improving the outcomes and experiences of patients. The immersive and interactive nature of virtual reality interventions offers a new dimension to traditional rehabilitation approaches, providing personalized exercises and addressing psychological well-being. However, additional research is needed to establish standardized protocols, identify the most effective strategies, and evaluate long-term benefits. As virtual reality technology continues to advance, it has the potential to revolutionize pulmonary rehabilitation and significantly improve the lives of patients with chronic lung diseases.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Virtual Reality for Pulmonary Rehabilitation: Comprehensive Review

Pittara¹,

Matsangidou²,

Petkov³

et al. 2023

JMIR Rehabil Assist Technol

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“…The prevailing physiological signals employed to measure stress in the workplace exploit the electrical conductance of skin (SC, EDA and GSR) [ 29 , 32 , 38 , 41 , 42 , 49 , 52 , 55 , 56 , 58 , 61 , 62 ], Heart Rate Variability (HRV) [ 32 , 33 , 38 , 39 , 40 , 41 , 42 , 44 , 50 , 51 , 54 , 59 , 62 ], and Heart Rate (HR) [ 38 , 40 , 43 , 51 , 54 , 55 , 56 , 58 , 60 , 61 ]. These are in line with Sharma and Gedeon’s findings [ 12 ], as electrodermal activity and HRV are unobtrusive indicators of autonomic nervous system activity and can be used to predict mental disorders and relaxation states [ 59 ].…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…From the 38 studies that met the inclusion criteria, less than were 20% found to deliver stress-mitigating interventions, of which only 3 used tangible interfaces to help workers cope with stress, and with all of them employing head-mounted displays to deliver Virtual Reality (VR) interventions [ 34 , 55 , 56 ].…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…While the work of Thoonde and Oikonomou [ 34 ] focused on the design and evaluation of an intervention alone, Ladakis et al [ 55 ] employed a wrist-worn device and a Moodmetric smart ring to monitor users’ HR and EDA in order to assess the efficacy of their VR approach. They developed a serious game to help mitigate stress via deep breathing exercises which were delivered to the user using the Oculus Go, a more affordable alternative compared to the device used by [ 34 ].…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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From Monitoring to Assisting: A Systematic Review towards Healthier Workplaces

Lopes

Rodrigues

Cabral

et al. 2022

IJERPH

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Long-term stress is associated with a decline in global health, affecting social, intellectual, and economic development alike. Although comprehensive action plans have been implemented to provide people access to mental health services and promote mental well-being, employees’ mental health generally takes second place to productivity and profit in business settings. This review paper offers an overview of the current interactive approaches used for relieving work-related stress associated with mental health. Results from the 38 included studies show that affective computing is used mainly for monitoring purposes and is usually combined with tangible interfaces that collect workers’ physiological changes. Although the ability to sense and predict employees’ affective states can potentially improve mental health in the workplace, there is a substantial disparity between monitoring one’s health and the delivery of practical interventions to mitigate stress found in the surveyed studies. Designing systems that capitalize on embodied interaction principles is paramount, especially in the post-pandemic context, as the concepts of physical and mental safety take on new meanings that must be consciously and carefully addressed, particularly in workplace settings. Finally, this paper highlights the main design implications for the effective implementation of interfaces to help mitigate stress in the workplace.

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“…Other parameters, such as HR, HRV, and breathing rate, are associated with the stress level of the patient [48]. Monitoring these parameters allows for indirectly identifying the challenge the patient is facing and his ability to overcome it.…”

Section: Data Integration and Processingmentioning

confidence: 99%

Digital Technologies for Innovative Mental Health Rehabilitation

et al. 2021

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Schizophrenia is a chronic mental illness, characterized by the loss of the notion of reality, failing to distinguish it from the imaginary. It affects the patient in life’s major areas, such as work, interpersonal relationships, or self-care, and the usual treatment is performed with the help of anti-psychotic medication, which targets primarily the hallucinations, delirium, etc. Other symptoms, such as the decreased emotional expression or avolition, require a multidisciplinary approach, including psychopharmacology, cognitive training, and many forms of therapy. In this context, this paper addresses the use of digital technologies to design and develop innovative rehabilitation techniques, particularly focusing on mental health rehabilitation, and contributing for the promotion of well-being and health from a holistic perspective. In this context, serious games and virtual reality allows for creation of immersive environments that contribute to a more effective and lasting recovery, with improvements in terms of quality of life. The use of machine learning techniques will allow the real-time analysis of the data collected during the execution of the rehabilitation procedures, as well as enable their dynamic and automatic adaptation according to the profile and performance of the patients, by increasing or reducing the exercises’ difficulty. It relies on the acquisition of biometric and physiological signals, such as voice, heart rate, and game performance, to estimate the stress level, thus adapting the difficulty of the experience to the skills of the patient. The system described in this paper is currently in development, in collaboration with a health unit, and is an engineering effort that combines hardware and software to develop a rehabilitation tool for schizophrenic patients. A clinical trial is also planned for assessing the effectiveness of the system among negative symptoms in schizophrenia patients.

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Virtual Reality and Serious Games for Stress Reduction with Application in Work Environments

Cited by 6 publications

References 0 publications

Virtual Reality for Pulmonary Rehabilitation: Comprehensive Review

Virtual Reality for Pulmonary Rehabilitation: Comprehensive Review

From Monitoring to Assisting: A Systematic Review towards Healthier Workplaces

Digital Technologies for Innovative Mental Health Rehabilitation

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