The Potential Societal Impact of Virtual Reality Mark E. Koltko-Rivera, Ph.D. Professional Services Group, Inc. PO Box 4914, Winter Park, Florida, 32793-4914 USA E-mail: mark@professionalservicesgroup.net Abstract Virtual reality (VR) is a powerful technology with a potential for far-ranging social and psychological impact. Disciplinary psychology and other social sciences should take a proactive stance in relation to VR, and conduct research to help determine the outlines of this potential impact, with the hope of affecting its direction. This article describes some potential psychosocial effects of a “seamless VR” such as might exist in the year 2025, in relation to several societal domains: private experience, home and family, and religion and spirituality. Research questions are described, as are several approaches to research in this area. Engineering and social science professionals should cooperate in research regarding the potential societal effects of VR. 1 Introduction As a discipline of research and study, psychology typically has been reactive; that is, a phenomenon occurs (e.g., a social trend is noted), and then psychologists study this phenomenon. However, we live in a time of multiple powerful demographic, technological, and cultural changes—a psychosocial perfect storm, as it were. Under these conditions, it behooves all disciplines, psychology included, to be more proactive in considering the potential effects created by various present and foreseeable trends (Koltko-Rivera, 2005a; see L. F. Thompson, quoted in Michaels, 2003). So it is that we come to consider the potential societal impact of virtual reality. The term “virtual reality” (VR) refers to an immersive simulation that involves relatively high verisimilitude. “In general … the term virtual reality refers to an immersive, interactive experience based on real-time 3-D graphic images generated by a computer” (Pimental & Teixeira, 1995, p. 15, italics in original). “Our preferred definition is an immersive experience in which participants … view stereoscopic or biocular images, listen to 3-D sounds, and are free to explore and interact within a 3-D world” (Pimental & Teixeira, 1995, p. 91). Oddly, although much has been written about the potential social impact of other emerging technologies, such as genetic engineering and cyborgization, relatively little has been written about the societal impact of VR (an exception: Calvert, 2002). In passing, one wonders why this would be so. I would speculate that this is because people may think they already have experienced VR, through depictions of VR in television and movies; the worlds of genetic engineering and cyborgization are less familiar, and yet seem capable of transforming the very meaning of “human being.” If this is why future-oriented scholars have paid less attention to VR, this situation has resulted from misguided thinking. Virtual reality has the potential to profoundly alter human society, not by altering our physical bodies (as genetic engineering or cyborgization might), but by altering our perceptions and interactions. There is a great deal of attention being paid to the psychology of those who use the Internet (e.g., Wallace, 1999), and to the Internet’s larger social implications (e.g., Lévy, 1997). Certainly VR and its potential social and psychological consequences deserve this type of attention, and much more. What will VR do to society, and to individual psychological experience? I will consider conjectural answers to this question in relation to several societal domains. In addition, I will outline some specific research questions, and potential research approaches with which to address these questions. 2 Parameters of the Current Investigation In order to consider the potential societal impact of VR, we must first define the temporal, technological, and experiential contexts and parameters of VR as we will consider it here.