It’s usually the youth that is associated with cutting-edge technology. Virtual reality (VR) is a simulated experience that can be similar to or completely different from the real world and on the beginning it was used for the games, fun. The kinds of the games are very popular among young people. But the situation changes. It’s new target group and the group became bigger year by year.
Virtual Reality (VR) is being used to better the lives of senior citizens all over the world. The most popular aims are reducing loneliness, improving their mental health and transporting them to far-flung places without needing to leave the comfort of their home.
Fundacja Bądź Aktywny (Poland) realized the project “Virtual & Augmented Reality Toolkit to Engage Seniors Brain With InTerGenerational UndErstanding” 2020-2022 in Erasmus+ programme.
The aims of the project were: The main goal of the project was to empower adult trainers and trainees in Care Attendance and IT with skills that will help to improve seniors’ lives, using a peer cooperative approach. The work focused on creation joint solutions involving VAR (Virtual and Augmented Reality) that will enhance seniors’ life and memory by using an intergenerational approach.
The tools for VR are have very different prices. The simple VR headsets are showing up in senior living and memory care facilities in the United States and abroad, giving elderly people a chance to experience the sights and sounds of distant places, enjoy moments from their past and explore experiences that for reasons of age or poor health are physically inaccessible in real life. are cheap, more complicated (with sound, joysticks) are more expensive.
In the Erasmus+ project the team created special VR application dedicated for the seniors.
The user (senior) visit virtual house consists of 3 rooms: Childhood, Youth, Adulthood.
In the every “room” the senior could find characteristic music, film and photos of his life. There were the questions about the time of the part of life.
The idea was to remind the user not only his life but the most important thing in every part of his life. This kind of a game is protection of the problems with memory.
The partners were from Poland, Spain, Turkey, Romania and Malta. The project team prepared 3 application per partner in the national languages and tested the results with the target group. The seniors were very glad and very excited to use VR technology.
The project showed that VR technology can be very useful for the seniors. Early they thin that virtual reality is just for gamers.
The same technology that lets users battle monsters in mythical worlds has proven useful for many situations.
VR headsets give elderly people a chance to experience the sights and sounds of distant places, enjoy moments from their past and explore experiences that for reasons of age or poor health are physically inaccessible in real life.