How virtual reality is helping soldiers recover from war | Skip Rizzo | TEDxManhattanBeach

This talk was given at a local TEDx event, produced independently of the TED Conferences. Believing we need to do more to support our soldiers and veterans, many of whom suffer from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, Professor Skip Rizzo shares new applications for virtual reality, once thought to be a technology for the entertainment industry. Experience "BraveMind" and meet a "Sim Coach," two products that offer hope to soldiers and veterans as they come back from war.

Skip Rizzo’s goal is to find new ways that Virtual Reality (VR) and related interactive technologies can drag the field of psychology kickin’ and screamin’ into the 21st Century! He addresses clinical care challenges by leveraging simulation and interactive technology. The Virtual Iraq/Afghanistan project has focused on the creation of a VR exposure therapy application for treating combat-related PTSD with OIF/OEF service members and veterans. Now available at 55 clinics, this system is being retooled for a stress resilience/coping strategy-training for use by service members prior to a combat deployment.

He and his colleagues also use VR applications to test and train attention, memory, visuospatial abilities and executive function. They have developed full body interactive VR Game systems to improve physical rehabilitation following Stroke, Traumatic Brain Injury and for those aging with a disability. Skip expects the recent excitement generated around VR (Facebook purchasing a VR headset company for 2 Billion Dollars!) to be the harbinger of game-changing innovations in clinical research and care.

The “Game Changers” he most admires are Myron Krueger and Franklin D. Roosevelt. Myron was an early innovator of Virtual Reality with his Videoplace installation. He was an artist in the 60s and 70s who saw computing in the future as going beyond boosting productivity, and rather as tools that could foster human machine interaction in novel and inspiring ways. Franklin D. Roosevelt, because he inherited a mess and addressed the problems of the Great Depression and WW2 while maintaining compassion and building opportunities for those who suffered most from it.

About TEDx, x = independently organized event In the spirit of ideas worth spreading, TEDx is a program of local, self-organized events that bring people together to share a TED-like experience. At a TEDx event, TEDTalks video and live speakers combine to spark deep discussion and connection in a small group. These local, self-organized events are branded TEDx, where x = independently organized TED event. The TED Conference provides general guidance for the TEDx program, but individual TEDx events are self-organized.* (*Subject to certain rules and regulations)

[Zoza]

There is no excuse not to make these SimCoach look better..

As far as im concerned they could have a complete facial animation and realistic characteristics both in graphics and in character. 

[JoeSimon]

from where do i get the america vs iraq game? it looks nice

[DocHerbalist]

Is it just me or does this guy look like an older brother of Steven Segal. LoL

[yaosio]

N64 came out in 1996, how did this inspire him in 1995?

[zaidhakimi]

Am I the only one thinking about Sword Art Online?