Stanford professor Jeremy Bailenson and his fellow researchers at the school’s VHIL short for Virtual Human Interaction Lab have been researching on the effects of VR on the human behaviour since the late 1990s. They have already written countless research papers in which they document the experiences in a virtual and illusionistic world. In their initial stage they have used expensive and custom-built VR hardware for their research as Oculus Rift; HTC VIVE didn’t exist at that time.
The researchers now publicly released a potentially behaviour-changing Virtual Reality simulations which is now available for free download for your HTC VIVE. The Ocean Acidification Experience is created with the intention to teach users regarding the chemistry which is behind ocean acidification along with the problems being caused and the prevention methods. Bailenson along with Roy Pea who is a professor in the Stanford Graduate School of Education with two other marine biologists began the work on developing the simulation in 2013. According to them, there were whispers in the air that the consumer VR was coming and this is how the project started.
It is the First attempt being made by VHIL by Stanford so as to come up with something that will be making better lives for the human beings living on this earth. Next they are planning to make another empathy-building VR immersive experience that will show what it feels like to go on a journey from having a home to being complete homeless. Let us see what VHIL next stores for us.