6 VR biographical rooms compose the VR UNIT
This unit is designed to meet the psychological and sociological specifications of the project. Moreover, it will meet all the latest trends in engineering getting all the benefits that technology may offer in our case.
Functional description
Each Virtual Reality (VR) Unit will provide a framework where each prisoner or ex-prisoner will be able to move to a virtual room through Virtual Reality devices and the appropriate installation. In this virtual room, users will see a number of items that are (somehow) related to his profile and story. Usually these items are related to the cause of his imprisonment. These items might be newspaper articles, photos, narrations or videos. The exact items that fit to the user’s profile are selected and uploaded to the framework by the Organizer of the session.
The users wear their VR glasses and headphones and starts interacting with the unit through handheld sensors and dedicated user interfaces. They can pick a certain item and hear, watch or read it. They can move inside the physical room (where the installation is hosted) and by their movement to interact with the Virtual Room and all the items that appear in the Virtual Room.
Throughout users’ VR experience, the VR Unit is tracking their behaviour and choices. This tracking information is directly uploaded to the statistics sub-unit of the platform and all these data are available to the Organizer and the scientific personnel for post processing.
The User will be able to move around in a set of ten different Virtual Rooms like rooms in prison, the place where the crime was committed, internal or external places etc .
The work environment is virtual reality (VR), which typically refers to computer technologies that use software to generate the realistic images, sounds and other sensations that replicate a real environment (or create an imaginary setting), and simulate a user’s physical presence in this environment.
Therefore, the main objective of this particular output, is to create a dynamic VR system, consisting of rooms inspired by the “situation rooms” of the Rimini Protokoll. It also consists narrative stories, videos, photographs and newspaper articles. The user, through this system, creates dynamically the environments within the user acts, either by reusing already registered materials, or by adding new ones.
This material, used by trained teachers or trainers, could contribute in supporting the reintegration of prisoners into society by using as a main mean the emotional intelligence and emotional literacy. With this, the primary objective is that the detainees will be freed from negative emotions, such as anger, aggression, rejection, disappointment, in order to develop the ability of taking good decisions.
The users have the impression of being in the virtual world while having the ability to navigate and manipulate their own elements, putting themselves and their senses at the center, to become witnesses and at the same time protagonists in stories perhaps similar to their own. The goal is to emotionally identify with another inmate’s mental state of mind, to understand his / her behavior and motivations and through this to understand their own behavior, motivations and ultimately their self-esteem.
Research has shown that the free exchange of stories of different individuals supports their psychological state, help them to reassess their actions, to redefine their priorities and values, to gain self-respect and can lead them to taking sound decisions which will ultimately lead to their reintegration into society.
Will be delivered:
• three-dimensional mapping of the rooms
• creation of the management system
• creation of Virtual Reality System
• mapping of statistics
• scenario finishing and recording
• digitization, entry in the photo database, articles, etc
• maintenance and debugging throughout the duration of the project
• training of partners’ involved staff
• manual
• six virtual reality systems consisting of VR headsets and computers