Virtual Reality Games for Elderly Socialization

February 6, 2018 updated by: Thaiany Pedrozo Campos Antunes, Faculdade de Medicina do ABC
A minimum of 23 people aged 60 years and older, of both sexes, from an informatics course for beginners will participate in the study. The evaluation will consist mainly in answering two validated questionnaires on socialization, the short Social and Emotional Loneliness Scale for Adults (SELSA-S) and short-form UCLA Loneliness Scale (ULS-6). Reaction time and performance will also be measured by three virtual reality games, namely Reaction Time, Random and Moviletrando. All this evaluation will be repeated in three moments: T0 - at baseline; T1 - after 8 conventional informatics classes and; T2 - after 8 informatics classes which includes 15 minutes for practicing virtual reality games.

Study Overview

Status

Completed

Conditions

Intervention / Treatment

Detailed Description

Background: The use of new Technologies, such as the resources of augmentative and alternative communication (AAC), appears as a valuable tool to promote socialization in many groups of people. Serious games with virtual reality are an example of these resources and might bring benefits also to the elderly population, allowing an enjoyable and safe interaction that uses various sensorial stimuli. The purpose of this study protocol is to evaluate the effects of practicing virtual reality games on elderly socialization.

Method/Design: It will be an experimental, prospective longitudinal study which will use serious games with virtual reality to improve the socialization of elderly people. A minimum of 23 people aged 60 years and older, of both sexes, from an informatics course for beginners will participate in the study. The evaluation will consist mainly in answering two validated questionnaires on socialization, the short Social and Emotional Loneliness Scale for Adults (SELSA-S) and short-form UCLA Loneliness Scale (ULS-6). Reaction time and performance will also be measured by three virtual reality games, namely Reaction Time, Random and Moviletrando. All this evaluation will be repeated in three moments: T0 - at baseline; T1 - after 8 conventional informatics classes and; T2 - after 8 informatics classes which includes 15 minutes for practicing virtual reality games.

Discussion: This study will determine whether the practice of virtual reality games in addition to the usual informatics classes contributes to elderly socialization. The evolution in socialization, the evolution of reaction time and performance in virtual reality games and the correlation of motor learning to socialization will also be investigated.

Study Type

Interventional

Enrollment (Actual)

52

Phase

  • Not Applicable

Contacts and Locations

This section provides the contact details for those conducting the study, and information on where this study is being conducted.

Study Locations

    • Sao Paulo
      • Santo André, Sao Paulo, Brazil, 09060-650
        • Faculdade de Medicina do ABC

Participation Criteria

Researchers look for people who fit a certain description, called eligibility criteria. Some examples of these criteria are a person's general health condition or prior treatments.

Eligibility Criteria

Ages Eligible for Study

58 years and older (Adult, Older Adult)

Accepts Healthy Volunteers

No

Genders Eligible for Study

All

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

  • people aged over 60 years;
  • both sexes
  • spontaneously enrolled in the informatics beginner class for seniors of the Center of Reference for Elderly (CRI) in Ribeirão Pires

Exclusion Criteria:

  • Less than 75% of frequency in the classes between the assessments;
  • do not completion of the three moments of assessment;
  • having motor impairment of the upper limbs or cognition impairment,which prevents them to practice the games.

Study Plan

This section provides details of the study plan, including how the study is designed and what the study is measuring.

How is the study designed?

Design Details

  • Primary Purpose: Prevention
  • Allocation: N/A
  • Interventional Model: Single Group Assignment
  • Masking: None (Open Label)

Arms and Interventions

Participant Group / Arm
Intervention / Treatment
Experimental: Single arm study
A minimum of 46 elderly, students of a informatics course, will participate in the study. Initially, the students will have 8 usual informatics classes in the institution where they were enrolled spontaneously. Then, during the next 8 classes (from class 9 to class 16) they will practice 10 minutes of virtual reality games, as part of the class.
In Step 1 the elderly will participate of eight conventional computer classes which they were spontaneously enrolled. In Step 2, 10 minutes of the next eight classes will be used to practice serious games using virtual reality, using physical interface (keyboard or mouse).
Other Names:
  • practicing virtual reality games

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure
Measure Description
Time Frame
Socialization assessed by SELSA-S
Time Frame: up to 10 weeks

Improvement on self-perceived loneliness, representing the socialization level of the elderly, comparing baseline to the first 8 usual computer classes and after the 8 classes with virtual reality games. This will be verified through a decrease in the score of SELSA-S.

SELSA-S has 15 items, scoring up to 7 in each, 105 in total.

up to 10 weeks

Secondary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure
Measure Description
Time Frame
time of response during the practise of virtual reality games as assessed by TRT, Random and Moviletrando
Time Frame: up to 10 weeks
It's expected to have a decrease in time of response during the practise of virtual reality games. It will be recorded by the softwares of the games: Time response (TRT), Random and Moviletrando
up to 10 weeks

Collaborators and Investigators

This is where you will find people and organizations involved with this study.

Investigators

  • Principal Investigator: Thaiany Antunes, Master, Faculdade de Medicina do ABC

Publications and helpful links

The person responsible for entering information about the study voluntarily provides these publications. These may be about anything related to the study.

Study record dates

These dates track the progress of study record and summary results submissions to ClinicalTrials.gov. Study records and reported results are reviewed by the National Library of Medicine (NLM) to make sure they meet specific quality control standards before being posted on the public website.

Study Major Dates

Study Start (Actual)

August 1, 2016

Primary Completion (Actual)

July 1, 2017

Study Completion (Actual)

December 1, 2017

Study Registration Dates

First Submitted

May 31, 2016

First Submitted That Met QC Criteria

June 8, 2016

First Posted (Estimate)

June 14, 2016

Study Record Updates

Last Update Posted (Actual)

February 8, 2018

Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria

February 6, 2018

Last Verified

February 1, 2018

More Information

Terms related to this study

Plan for Individual participant data (IPD)

Plan to Share Individual Participant Data (IPD)?

No

This information was retrieved directly from the website clinicaltrials.gov without any changes. If you have any requests to change, remove or update your study details, please contact register@clinicaltrials.gov. As soon as a change is implemented on clinicaltrials.gov, this will be updated automatically on our website as well.

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