Virtual Worlds, Volume 4, Issue 4 (December 2025) – 2 articles

Background: Young children have experienced increased emotional difficulties, including anxiety, emotion dysregulation, and tantrums. Limited access to mental health services has created an urgent need for accessible interventions to equip professionals with effective strategies for managing children’s strong emotions. This study piloted an innovative virtual reality (VR) simulation designed to teach professionals emotion management techniques. Methods: Participants included 107 early childhood professionals (e.g., educational, healthcare, and allied health) working with children aged 3–6 years from the southeastern United States. The multilingual VR simulation taught professionals emotion management strategies. Participants self-selected whether to complete a temper tantrum management simulation (n = 71) or a separation anxiety simulation (n = 36). Participants’ responses to children’s strong emotions were assessed at baseline, post-intervention, and at one-month follow-up, along with a satisfaction survey. Results: Participants reported a significant increase in intent to use effective emotion regulation strategies immediately following VR completion. However, actual use of effective strategies showed no significant change at one-month follow-up. Being a Spanish-speaking professional was associated with significantly greater improvements in both intent and actual use of effective strategies at follow-up. Participants reported high satisfaction ratings with the VR simulations. Conclusions: VR simulations show promise as an innovative tool for teaching emotion management strategies, particularly benefiting Spanish-speaking early childhood professionals. While effective for immediate motivation, additional support mechanisms (e.g., repeated practice, workplace supports) may be needed to sustain long-term behavior change in professional practice. Full article

Background: Virtual reality has been shown to reduce pain during labour. We aimed to determine whether virtual reality reduces analgesia use and shortens labour duration. Methods: A non-randomised pilot study was conducted, using a matched case–control design (1:2 ratio). Cases were women who voluntarily used virtual reality alongside standard intrapartum pain management, including non-pharmacological methods and/or epidural analgesia. Controls received standard intrapartum pain management. Results: A total of 108 women were included for analysis (36 cases vs. 72 controls). Perceived pain scores before and after virtual reality use did not differ significantly (p = 0.43, p = 0.73), suggesting a limited immediate analgesic effect under current conditions. Epidural analgesia rates and cervical dilation at initiation of analgesia did not show significant differences between cases and controls (p = 0.13, p = 0.42). After adjusting for induction of labour and cervical dilation at admission, there were no significant differences for duration of epidural analgesia (p = 0.86, p = 0.56), duration of labour (p = 0.64, p = 0.55), or vaginal birth (p = 0.23). Adjusted models indicated a non-significant trend toward shorter durations of labour, birth, and epidural exposure for cases. Conclusions: Our pilot study did not reveal a decrease in perceived pain or epidural analgesia use or an effect on duration of labour and vaginal birth. Full article