Dr. Chris Macdonald from Cambridge University has created a free online platform designed to help individuals overcome public speaking anxiety. By utilizing Virtual Reality (VR) environments, users can practice their presentations before various sizes of audiences, ranging from empty rooms to stadiums filled with thousands. The platform incorporates exposure therapy, breathing exercises, and feedback mechanisms, aiming to ease the fear of public speaking. Macdonald points out that the goal is to provide accessible and effective treatment for the common issue of speech anxiety, backed by promising research results on its efficacy.
Most people have some form of speech anxiety [but] very, very few people are accessing the treatment. So what I was trying to do with this project is fix those barriers.
The Virtual Reality Public Speaking platform employs exposure therapy...combined with breathing exercises and eye movements that help slow the heart rate and suppress the fear response.
The idea behind it is that this will give them extra resilience and adaptability... think of it like the psychological equivalent of training with weights.
A recent study published by Macdonald in the journal Frontiers in Virtual Reality suggests the platform could be beneficial.
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