14 DAY TRIAL // Yesterday I've run into a very interesting article, written by an editor from Business Week, regarding a new type of treatment for the acute post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) caused by participation to the war in Iraq that makes use of drugs and violent war-based video games.
It is a rather strange approach, as in the same time, several trials are proceeding concerning the violence content in the games and the possibility that these games might dramatically influence human behavior. "Looking at the video-game industry in general as a source of help and innovation is at least one of my big goals," stated Commander Russell Shilling, program manager at the Office of Naval Research, cited by Business Week.
Moreover, some recent studies also show that 'the games consumerism' leads to inevitable immunity to real violence because the gamers, after a while, stop making the difference between what is real and what is virtual, fiction.
The treatment is part of a large project which is subsidized with no less than $4 million by the Office of Naval Research (ONR), a state department, and it has begun in April, 2005, being aimed at finding the most efficient way to diminish the PTSD effect present on more than 18% of the soldiers who fought in Iraq.
The developers of this new type of treatment, the researchers from Virtual Reality Medical Center, San Diego, said that they made use of several computer game technologies such as audio and visual effects taken from the training video game - 'Full Spectrum Warrior' - and they added an enhanced graphics and more advanced sound effect in order to simulate the war field. "The concept here is that by doing this in a very modestly paced manner, the person feels little bits of anxiety as they go through this, but not at a level that overwhelms them," says Albert "Skip" Rizzo, a research scientist at the Institute for Creative Technologies, cited by Business Week. "Eventually they're actually in the Humvee, driving down the road, and children are by the side of the road, and an IED (improvised explosive device) goes off and there are body parts everywhere."
But this approach appears to be not quite so novel, as the researchers developed a similar war veterans' recovery program in 1997 which featured the same simulation of violence from the battle field, as it was shown in a study, conducted in 1990, that 30.9% males and 26.9% females suffered from PTSD determined by the participation in the Vietnam war. On the other hand, the researchers expect worse this time, as there are many more soldiers in Iraq and violence if far more horrific.
We have all seen dozens of movies inspired by the dreadful Vietnam War. Just remember "Born on the 4th of July" featuring Tom Cruise in not such a good mood and looks as he usually is. It's horrible just to think that human beings can do all these things and to remember them seems to be terrible. So, I wonder? what are the consequences of this experiment? Is it meant to diminish the impact of the reality on veterans by creating a similar virtual one? And what is the effect on the soldiers? I have searched for some results of this treatment but I found none. I also wonder why.
But the veterans also take drugs, one to be more specific - the D-cycloserine, which was tested by Emory researchers and proved to have positive effects if it is introduced in treatments for acrophobia, or fear of heights. This drug is currently used to enhance the immersion in this violent virtual reality. "After treatment, and then again three months later, the people who got the D-cycloserine reported less fear," stated Rothbaum for Business Week. "After two pills and two sessions, they were doing better than the people who got the placebo."
The fact that this treatment could turn out to be at least risky business is shown by a recently conducted study which shows that the contact with violence generates certain psychological and physiological reactions, such as fear or anxiety or sweat and increasing heart rate. These are a set of normal reflex reactions to violence. But the persons who chose to expose themselves to such violent games usually loose all these reactions. "The outcomes of these procedures are decreased perception of injury severity, decreased attention to violent events, decreased sympathy for violence victims, increased belief that violence is normative, and decreased negative attitudes towards violence. This in turn leads to a decreased helping behavior (lower likelihood of intervening or delays intervention) and to an increased aggressive behavior (a higher likelihood of initiating aggression, more severe level of aggression, more persistence in aggressing)", it is written in the study, cited by Softpedia.
I am wondering what the risks of this treatment are. Could these researchers create non-humans?
