Virtual reality therapy helps cure people’s fear of heights

FEAR of heights can be overcome using virtual reality (VR), a study by psychiatrists has found.

Prof Daniel Freeman, from Oxford University’s department of psychiatry, tested the therapy on 100 volunteers with a serious height phobia.

They were split into two groups, one of which underwent six 30-minute VR sessions over a period of two weeks.

They wore VR headsets that immersed them in a virtual world where, guided by an avatar “coach”, they were encouraged to face their fears.

Within the simulation, each participant was taken to a 10-storey office block with a yawning atrium. There, they engaged in activities designed to be both entertaining and to defy their terrified reaction. Examples included crossing a rickety walkway, stepping out on a platform with no safety barriers, rescuing a cat from a tree and playing a xylophone on the edge of a balcony. Finally, they rode a virtual whale around the atrium space.

Prof Freeman said: “The results are extraordinarily good. Over three quarters of the participants showed at least a halving of their fear of heights. Our study demonstrates that VR can be an extremely powerful means to deliver psychological therapy.

“We know that the most effective treatments are active: patients go into the situations they find difficult and practise more helpful ways of thinking and behaving.” The results of the study are in the latest edition of The Lancet Psychiatry journal.