New VR Program Gives Domestic Abusers a Taste of Their Own Medicine

The researchers have developed a virtual reality program that puts the local aggressors in the position of their victims – and they say it seems to be working to rehabilitate them.

In reports to London Times newspaperCrime Correspondent Rachel Silveter said that she ended up with the removal of VR glasses because she “fears that males’ Avatar will reach the female character she has become.”

With experimental programs in six prisons around the Catalonia region of Spain, the Vrespeetme program aims to help men who are home to abuse learn how to experience their partners.

“We want to improve the sympathy of the men who were violent towards their partners,” explained Nicholas Barnes, a government psychologist in Catalonia that developed technology, in an interview with Times. “Early results are positive, we can see a tendency to improve sympathy.”

Like Sylvester, many men participating in the Barnes program had brutal reactions to the virtual abuse they suffered from.

“What do you do?” The aggressor, who is waving on the horizon, said in simulating Sylvester as he approaches the symbolism. “Did you see yourself in the mirror? … There is no single woman who looks miserable as you are doing now, you are disgusting.”

“Don’t you say anything?” Continue the abusive Avatar. “You are typical, I have to go home every day and look at your abundant face, who feared the face of the little puppy dog.”

According to TimesMore than 1,000 men have participated in the program since Barnes presented it to prisons. Some of them were moved to cry during the experiment – and others, like the reporter, had to take off headphones before the simulation ended.

Along with the scenario of summoning the names that the reporter tested, and includes others by Barnes, along with the Ministry of Justice in Spain and Barcelona University, watching the interaction of sexual harassment in a bar, and it appears to be a conversation with a victim before it turns into an experiment from its perspective.

The man who participated in the recent VR scenario told the English newspaper that he changed the way he thought about what he did.

He told the prisoner, who was not named, his partner – then himself – told the default: “I allowed myself to get away by anger.” “I am aware of the damage that caused you. I left my anger improvement from me and I could not control myself. Now that I knew that I made a lot of mistakes, I am very sorry.”

It is clear that the discomfort of these reactions is part of the program. It remains to see, as with other prison VR programs, how really is to rehabilitate these tools.

More about VR prison: What are the ethics of linking VR headphones on guests in solitary confinement?