Virtual reality to combat addictions?

Can virtual reality be effective in combating addictions? A team of scientists has shown that yes and has verified using this modern technology how stressful situations can precipitate the desire and search for substances such as alcohol or cannabis among young people who already have problematic consumption.

Researchers from the Autonomous University of Madrid and the Francisco de Vitoria University have experimented with virtual reality as a tool to prevent alcohol and cannabis consumption among young people and, through a virtual elevated maze, they recreated a very stressful environment to analyze the different responses. of young people according to their consumption levels.

Based on the premise that stressful events become risk situations that can precipitate drug or alcohol consumption, the researchers recreated very stressful, but highly controlled, contexts through immersive virtual reality to evaluate anxiety.

The response of the people who participated in the trials allowed the researchers to analyze the behavioral, psychological, physiological (such as heart rate) and hormonal (such as cortisol in saliva) response of the young people before, during and after experiencing that distressing situation. and overwhelming.

They also divided the people who participated in the trial into three groups: those who have problematic alcohol consumption, those who consume alcohol and cannabis in a combined way; and a third “control” group that does not consume these substances.

A conclusion and a why

Their conclusion: that the behavioral and physiological differences that were detected could be used to detect young individuals at risk of future serious addictions or other stress-related morbidities, and that similar experiments could serve to develop prevention strategies focused on emotional aspects, cognitive, psychological and physiological.

Because the stages of youth and early adulthood are crucial since they carry potential risks of developing behaviors that end up becoming addictive, with important repercussions on physical and mental health and important social and economic consequences.

Among the researchers who participated in the study, Professor Patricia Sampedro, from the Department of Biological and Health Psychology of the Autonomous University of Madrid, has stressed that stressful events can precipitate drug consumption, and has assessed that Virtual reality offers a unique way to simulate those events in a controlled and safe environment.

The study focused on trying to identify when consumption stops being a search for pleasure and becomes a permanent escape from discomfort and stress, which is typical of maintaining this type of actions.

Different responses depending on consumption levels

Román Moreno, co-author of the study and professor at the Faculty of Education and Psychology of the Francisco de Vitoria University, explained that they placed the young people on an elevated platform in the shape of a cross with two ends on a skyscraper, and that due to the innate fear caused by heights, the young people were allowed to explore freely for five minutes.

The researchers had already hypothesized what the responses would be, but Román Moreno assured EFE that the experiment allowed them to verify the different responses of the seventy young people who participated and verify the differences between the group that had problematic alcohol consumption, those who consumed alcohol and cannabis and the control group.

They thus verified how a stressful situation precipitates the search for substances among young people who already present a type of consumption that can be considered problematic, although they do not yet meet the criteria of “addiction”, and how this modern technology can allow identifying alterations in the response to the stress early in a controlled environment.

Román Moreno has also confirmed the different responses that were detected among the three groups of young people who participated in the experiment and the special importance that this may have, “because it allows us to investigate what type of alterations can be identified before a disorder develops.” addiction”.

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