00:00Virtual reality. It's a technology many are familiar with in the gaming industry, but its potential reaches far beyond that.
00:07Increasingly, NGOs and doctors have been harnessing its potential for fostering empathy.
00:12But how exactly does that work and how successful is it? That's what we're talking about on SHIFT.
00:22VR headsets first hit the market back in the 90s and the hype was huge, but sales were low.
00:27For most people they were just too expensive. That was up until the mid 2010s.
00:33Lower prices and improved technology like 360 degree videos made VR interesting for non-gamers too.
00:40Worldwide more than 30 million VR headsets are now in use.
00:44And the media is now talking about VR as an empathy machine.
00:49So first off, what is empathy?
00:52Simply put, it's being sensitive to the feelings, thoughts and experiences of others.
00:56Like feeling moved when a cowboy has to leave his horse behind in a western.
01:02According to data from psychologists and neuroscientists, VR triggers much stronger emotions than TV.
01:09Aid and conservation organizations are increasingly making use of this technology, wanting to create closeness to a subject or spur
01:17people into action.
01:18Habitat XR for example.
01:22Imagine experiencing this, not in the wild, but through a headset.
01:27South African company Habitat XR works to reconnect people with nature through extended reality.
01:33Like VR and holograms.
01:35Many companies and art collectives have been using the technology to inspire us to protect the planet.
01:44So XR technologies allow people to empathize by allowing them to become an active participant inside the story.
01:52So by being physically present, a person's mind can't tell the difference between physically being there and virtually being there.
02:00Recent studies show that immersive experiences can indeed enhance empathy.
02:05More so than other media.
02:06But there are limits.
02:09It's critically important to understand that simply putting on a headset doesn't cause empathy.
02:13We've got to be very thoughtful about what we build, how people use it and what our expectations are.
02:19On the long term side, there's been very few studies that look at long term change.
02:25Conservation groups hire companies like Habitat XR to unlock empathy for fundraising campaigns or for encouraging political action.
02:37With very powerful storytelling, people will take their headsets off with a tear coming, you know, streaming down their face
02:43and they'll put their hand up to swipe their credit card.
02:44And we found that this empathy results in significantly higher donations being made.
02:50For example, this project follows a Mongolian starving to death due to climate change.
02:57Another one lets people get up close with mountain gorillas to understand why they need protection.
03:03What it does is it again democratizes access to gorillas, which is a very ecologically sensitive environment.
03:10It's a very expensive thing for people to be able to go and trip with mountain gorillas.
03:14It's a thousand five hundred US dollars per person for a single hour.
03:17In order to get people emotionally involved, the team at Habitat XR used 360 degree video, but also digital animations
03:26for augmented reality.
03:27That's where virtual elements are layered over reality.
03:31Users can see animals and habitats spring up around them in the comfort of their own home.
03:37Take the Future Zoo, a new immersive project in South Africa.
03:42At first you might think it's a museum like any other, but then you put on a VR headset.
03:47Before you know it, you're interacting with holograms, learning about the savannah.
03:52Great for kids and adults alike, anyone who wants a taste of unspoiled digital nature.
03:58They hope emotion will lead to action for the environment.
04:02I have to agree, it does look pretty amazing.
04:06But could the emotional impact of virtual reality just come from the novelty factor?
04:11What do the experts say?
04:12At the turn of the century, when you hear about the apocryphal stories of the dawn of cinema and the
04:17notion of people seeing a train coming into the station is one of the first films that was being circulated.
04:24People hid under their seats, right?
04:26They had a powerful, visceral experience when first confronted with cinema, two dimensional cinema.
04:31We now have gotten used to it.
04:33But VR, however, is something that many people are still experiencing for the first time.
04:38It is not widespread.
04:39And because of that, it can be a really powerful emotional experience just because it is amazing to be fully
04:47surrounded both by sound and visuals in an event.
04:51VR is engaging and political organizations know it.
04:55The UN, for example, used headsets to bring Security Council members directly to a peacekeeping mission in South Sudan.
05:04The council is about to vote on the mission's future and their VR experience may have played a key role.
05:10Follow a herder and his livestock in South Sudan.
05:14Watch peacekeepers treat his animals all in virtual reality.
05:19This VR experience was created by the UN to bring viewers up close.
05:23Its peacekeepers have been stationed here since the country gained independence from Sudan in 2011 after decades of civil war.
05:33In February 2025, Security Council members were the first to be transported from New York to South Sudan, seeing the
05:41work of the Blue Helmets up close.
05:44The goal? To evoke empathy and understanding for the mission and to show why it should continue.
05:51The journey takes the viewer across the country.
05:54To a severely flooded area where peacekeepers have built and maintain a dike.
06:00To a UN site sheltering over 40,000 displaced people.
06:06And to a school where peacekeepers work as teachers.
06:11For Nicolas Hasem, head of the mission, the VR experience is a success.
06:15It gives you a real tangible sense of what peacekeepers do, which is often lost in discussions and formulaic presentations,
06:28engaging with council members.
06:30There was a much greater degree of sympathy with the peacekeeping project than there had me in the city.
06:37Today, anyone visiting the UN headquarters in New York can take part.
06:43I really liked the storytelling of it all. I really liked being immersed in what the discussions looked like, what
06:51the conversations looked like.
06:52You could think better of, like, how is it to be there, right on location, to teleport to you in
06:58a totally different way than conventional TV or anything like that.
07:03A novel insight for the public.
07:09But for the Security Council, it's part of their critical decision-making process.
07:15In 2026, they decide, will the mission continue or is this the final chapter?
07:24But all this begs the question, is a VR experience really appropriate here?
07:30The UN is celebrating the success of its VR initiative, but should productions like these really guide high-level decision
07:37-making?
07:38Scientists like Lisa Musseri are skeptical.
07:41The very same labs that were showing positive pro-social outcomes for some of their early VR experiments also showed
07:49how it could enhance biases and stereotyping as well.
07:56Anytime a technology seems like it has a good outcome, we also know that it must have a less good
08:02outcome.
08:03But remember, VR films aren't neutral.
08:06Creators decide how to tell the story, where to hit those emotional notes.
08:11But how much can VR really influence our decisions?
08:15Professor Jeremy Bailenson and his team are running the tests to find out.
08:20At Stanford, they're tracking participant reactions to a powerful VR project on a complex social issue.
08:28Homelessness is on the rise.
08:30While leaders worldwide struggle to find solutions and public frustration grows,
08:34psychology professor Jeremy Bailenson is turning to virtual reality to create a deeper understanding of this complex issue.
08:42At Stanford's Virtual Human Interaction Lab in California, he developed the immersive experience Becoming Homeless.
08:49It traces the path that pushes people onto the street, putting viewers in their shoes, humanizing their stories and fostering
08:58empathy.
08:59When we look at VR and we compare VR to other tools, watching a video, reading about case studies, doing
09:07role playing in the real world,
09:09what we find, VR causes behavior change and attitudinal change more than other types of interventions designed to make you
09:19think about other people.
09:20Listen, I know you're having trouble making rent.
09:24In the experience, a narrator guides participants through interactive scenarios after a sudden job loss.
09:31Choosing personal objects to sell to make rent.
09:36Seeking shelter on a public bus.
09:42While research on the long-term effects of VR and empathy is still limited,
09:46early findings from Bailenson students like Fernanda Herrera show promise.
09:53Fernanda showed long-term lasting behavioral changes in measures such as how you discuss the homeless when you're writing about
10:01them,
10:01the types of verbs and adjectives you use to make them more human to other types of more behavioral measures
10:08around intentions to volunteer.
10:12Studies on VR around racism and age discrimination yielded similar results.
10:17They show that VR can indeed serve as a tool for rewiring how we relate to others.
10:25So let's say a VR experience really moves us.
10:29Does that mean we'll actually go out and advocate for the homeless or for nature conservation?
10:34There are examples of that happening, but usually dedicated action is still needed to bridge the gap.
10:41You're given a card about where you can volunteer your time or where you can donate money.
10:45And the hope then is that that heightened emotion might lead to overcoming some of the activation energy
10:52that often comes with really contributing to these complex problems.
10:55These are one step in a larger process of how do you get people involved in these complex social problems.
11:02Even if VR can boost our empathy, we shouldn't put all of our eggs in one basket, though.
11:09If we want to think about VR as an empathy machine, that's totally fine, but it can't be the silver
11:14bullet.
11:15It has to always be seen as one in an arsenal of tools, many of which are sociological and anthropological
11:23as opposed to technical, right?
11:25A technological solution will never be the right solution for a societal problem.
11:31You always need kind of a mix of technical and social engineering when it comes to fixing the big sticky
11:36problems of the world.
11:37What Lisa Messeri is saying is that we need awareness campaigns, conferences, sponsorships or community efforts like a school clean
11:45-up day.
11:46If we want to go from feeling something to actually doing something and making change, then we need more than
11:52just VR.
11:53Back in the real world, lasting societal change requires time, money and commitment.
11:59What do you think? Have you ever been moved by a VR experience? How powerful can it be in today's
12:06world?
12:06Let us know in the comments. See you next time on Shift.
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