UC Davis, Virtual Hallucinations Project; Sedig 26, 41, 22

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

      

"A facial reflection that becomes blood-spattered               "A poster that reads “partnerships for recovery” turns into “shit recovery.” "

as you move closer towards it"

 

    "A floor that falls away into the sky as you walk"

 

 

 

 

Kim Hornburg (Oona Brandenburg) - Auditory Hallucinations:

 

Description

 

We all hear voices in our heads, voices that tell us that we should have worked harder on that project, that we shouldn’t have eaten that second chocolate bar, or that we should really get started on that exercise regime. But most of us know that these voices aren’t real, but are the internalized voices perhaps of an authoritarian parent who chastised us for being lazy, perhaps of a media-saturated universe that tells us we should all be skinny and fit. People with schizophrenia are not always able to make this distinction. They may hear voices, scary voices that tell them that they are not fit for human society, voices that tell them to commit unthinkable acts, and they may believe that these voices come from some source outside themselves. They cannot control these voices. They cannot say “Stop”.

 

The Virtual Hallucinations Psychiatric Evaluation and Treatment Clinic of UC Davis attempts to replicate this experience of auditory hallucinations, “based on the hallucinations of two specific people with schizophrenia” (according to a greeting note card). As you enter, you don a "hallucinations badge", and the experience begins, with a disorienting chorus:

 

Devious laughter . . . 

  female voice: You're just pathetic. You're mean, you've been really awful to everyone. You shouldn't be out there with people. You're just a scumbag.

You're going to ruin everything. You're just a load on their lives.

  male voice: You're evil. You're so evil. You're the most evil person in the world. You ... are ... evil.

Devious laughter . . .

  male voice: I can hear you. I can see your thoughts . . . You have no secrets from me, from anyone. we can all see everything.

  female voice: She thinks that you've got a big nose, and you know that you really look horrible. She thinks you're ugly. She thinks you're a scumbag. Don't listen to what she says because she wants to undermine you all the time.

Devious laughter . . .  

 

As visitors we have the option to turn the voices off at the entrance; imagine not having this option, being compelled to listen to this chorus in an unending loop as you make your way through the clinic. Before a patient's bathroom mirror reflecting a corpse-head with bleeding eyes, a new voice mixes in with this repeating chorus:

 

You're dead. You're dead. Dead.

 

 

 

You may even hear bagpipes. (Apparently, one of the people whose hallucinations inspired the project heard bagpipes as he saw himself dying in the bathroom mirror.)

 

The other voices become louder, more insistent. You make your way down the hallway, and find yourself in a media room, where a beam of light illuminates a gun laying on a table. Immediately, a male Cockney-accented voice enters the fray:

 

You've got 5 seconds to get the bloody gun. Get the gun out of the holster and shoot yourself. Shoot that bloody copper too . . . Do it now."  

 

 

You turn away, towards a television that turns itself on as you approach. An announcer begins:

 

Coming up next, we continue our discussion of the political, moral, and ethical factors that shape a modern society.

 

And then his voice speaks to you directly:

 

My society. You are contaminating my society. Kill yourself now . . . You are the most worthless person in the world. And I won't have you contaminating my society.

 

You turn your back, you try to block the voices out, but you cannot. You must listen.

(Of course, you can turn off the voices at the entrance, but, confused, you've forgotten.)

 

 

As you might imagine, the experience is more than a little disorienting.

 

Educational Potential of the Auditory Hallucinations

 

 

But what of its educational potential? The virtual psychiatric clinic, created by Nash Baldwin (the avatar name of Dr. James Cook), was based on research by a team headed by Dr. Peter Yellowlees, professor of psychiatry at the University of California, Davis, “to help medical students understand what it is like to have schizophrenia” (Fell, 2007). Dr. Yellowlees has said that "Quite a few people [with schizophrenia] say it's like something they've experienced" (Fell, 2007). The clinic also has the potential to sensitize others, including family and friends of people with schizophrenia, to schizophrenic experiences of hallucinations through a simulated first-hand experience.  According to a pilot study, "73% of the visitors said afterwards that it 'improved [their] understanding of schizophrenia'" (Schmoller, 2006). One visitor reported that it "kept me up at night like two days afterward" (Au, 2007) -- perhaps an overstatement, but you get the idea of how profound the educational experience can be.

 

A greeting notecard announces that "You should get a sense of just how intrusive the voices of schizophrenia really are." Indeed, a journey through the clinic makes clear just how hard it is to concentrate with all these voices that just won't shut up, as expressed by Nash Baldwin: "I can't actually work in this environment; it's so annoying and intrusive, I can't get anything done" (Au, 2004).  In fact, upon entering the clinic you are warned that "some people find the virtual hallucinations disturbing, particularly the voices", and that those with a history of mental illness should not tour the facility. For this reason -- and because of some graphic language -- I would not use this site with secondary students (and certainly not with elementary students).

 

I, too, found the experience somewhat unsettling -- see my description of my tour above -- but not to any extreme. I felt that I got a window -- albeit a small one -- into the world of schizophrenia. The auditory component of the site is essential; I toured once without the looping chorus, and the overall effect of the virtual hallucinations clinic was weak. As for the auditory hallucinations, I felt that the creators could have gone farther: we have the option of turning the voices off, but what if there was some effort involved? What if we had to perform a series of tests to try to control the voices, to turn them off, but were ultimately unable to do so (without knowing that this inability had been programmed into the experience)? I think in this way we might have a better idea of what it’s like for people with schizophrenia who cannot control the voices.

 

Opinion of Second Life 

 

Overall, I’ve found Second Life a bit of a letdown, especially in terms of interaction with other avatars. For the most part, I’ve been alone in my travels, and have found myself wondering, “Where the heck is everybody?” Nevertheless, I believe that it has great educational potential when educators organize experiences for their students. For example, I am currently studying social skills training strategies for students with learning and behavioural difficulties, and see potential in Teen Second Life for teaching adolescents socialization skills. They could use their avatars to practise social interactions in a safe environment, to try out various approaches to, for example, conflict resolution. Indeed, Second Life has already been used to teach such skills to adults with Asperger’s syndrome, a mild form of autism (Mangan, 2008). I also read about an Eye4You Alliance created in Teen Second Life to offer adolescents a wide range of educational experiences, from “classes on how to run an SL business” to “author ‘appearances’ and other book-related events” organized by Random House (Czarnecki & Gullett, 2007). It will be up to us as educators to imagine new ways to use this technology in our classrooms.

 

 

References

 

Au, W. J. (2004, September 9) A lever to move the mind. New World Notes. Retrieved on March 15, 2008, from http://nwn.blogs.com/nwn/2004/09/a_lever_to_move.html

 

Czarnecki, K., & Gullet, M. (2007). Meet the new you: In Teen Second Life, librarians can leap tall buildings in a single bound and save kids from boring assignments – all before lunch. School Library Journal, 53, 36-39. 

 

Fell, A. (2007, October 12) Psychiatrist uses virtual world to make hallucinations seem authentic. Dateline UC Davis. Retrieved on March 15, 2008, from     http://www.dateline.ucdavis.edu/printable_dl_detail.lasso?id=9787&preview=no

 

Mangan, K. (2008). Virtual worlds turn therapeutic for autistic disorders. Chronicle of Higher Education, 54, A26.

 

Schmoller, Seb. (2006). Economist feature about Second Life, a "virtual online world". Retrieved on March 15, 2008, from http://fm.schmoller.net/2006/10/economist_featu.html