Assessment of the usefulness and appeal of stigma-stop by psychology students: a serious game designed to reduce the stigma of mental illness

Abstract

The present work describes the first serious game designed to reduce the stigma among students towards mental health problems. The game is called Stigma-Stop, and

Effectiveness of Augmented and Virtual Reality-Based Interventions in Improving Knowledge, Attitudes, Empathy and Stigma Regarding People with Mental Illnesses—A Scoping Review

“…After utilizing Stigma-Stop, more than 85% of the high school students in Spain could identify panic disorder, depression and schizophrenia, although only slightly more than half could identify bipolar disorder [ 36 ]. This was largely congruent with the findings amongst psychology undergraduates in Spain [ 49 ]. Second Life (SL) simulation, involving players in a virtual reality environment, as a teaching modality, was deemed moderately effective as a psycho-educational modality [ 44 ].…”

“…Only one study examined AR-based intervention [ 46 ] while the remaining 15 studies examined the use of VR, with two utilizing a Virtual Dementia Tour intervention [ 47 , 48 ]. AR/VR interventions ranged from virtual interactions with characters (4 of 16 studies, 25%) [ 36 , 44 , 49 , 50 ], environments (4 of 16 studies, 25%) [ 34 , 41 , 51 , 52 ] and assuming a specific character within the study (2 of 16 studies, 13%) [ 43 , 53 ]. Some interventions (4 of 16 studies, 25%) also allowed the participants to experience perceptual or sensory disturbances such as auditory hallucinations [ 35 , 46 , 47 , 48 ].…”

“…Nine studies examined the effects of VR interventions on knowledge and awareness of mental illness with the majority (six of nine studies) showing increased knowledge about these conditions [ 34 , 44 , 45 , 47 , 48 , 51 ]. In terms of nature of mental conditions, three studies examined knowledge about a range of mental illnesses [ 36 , 45 , 49 ]. Five studies examined knowledge about specific disorders, namely, psychotic conditions [ 34 , 52 ], dementia [ 47 , 48 ] and one study evaluated knowledge about both depression and schizophrenia [ 44 ].…”

“…Eight studies examined the effects of AR/VR based intervention on attitudes towards people with mental illness and more than half (five of eight studies) showed improvement of attitudes following the intervention [ 34 , 35 , 41 , 46 , 47 ]. In terms of the nature of mental illness, three studies examined attitudes towards a range of mental illnesses [ 36 , 45 , 49 ], three related to psychotic disorders [ 34 , 41 , 46 ] and two studies examined attitudes towards people with dementia [ 35 , 47 ].…”

“…For qualitative findings that were conducted in two studies in Spain, at least half of the participants felt that they were able to help the character with schizophrenia or bipolar and more than 80% of them felt being able to help the character with depression or panic disorder after following Stigma-Stop intervention [ 36 , 49 ]. In a separate study by Liu et al (2020), participants from both VR and control groups acknowledged the need for external help beyond self, thus suggesting no difference in attitudes between the two groups.…”