VR Serious Game for Treatment of Trypophobia

School of Science and Technology 科技學院
Computing Programmes 電腦學系

VR Serious Game for Treatment of Trypophobia

WU Tsz Chung Kimble, CHEUNG Hoi Man, YAN Ho Yin


Programme	Bachelor of Computing with Honours in Internet Technology
Supervisor	Dr. Andrew Lui
Areas	Virtual Reality Applications
Year of Completion	2017

Objectives

The aim of this project is to develop a serious game with VR technology on Android platform to help people with Trypophobia to reduce fear. The idea of serious game is applied in this project as we are aiming to use gaming as a treatment of Trypophobia. One of the treatments for phobias is exposure therapy.

To achieve the aim, the main objective of the project is to develop a VR game on Android platform that can be played as a treatment of Trypophobia.

The project has also defined a number of sub-objectives as follows:

Design a treatment procedure based on exposure therapy.
- This treatment procedure will be the core of our application.
Design a questionnaire for player to determine which level of trypophobia they have.
- The trypophobia questionnaire (TQ) shows 3 types of images, Trypophobic images, Non-trypophobic images and Images of unpleasant objects/scenes. Responses to the images will be recorded and converted into a score. According to Le, Cole & Wilkins (2015), people with higher TQ score experience less discomfort than people with lower TQ score [7]. TQ score help the users to determine game level.
Design and create mazes with relatively high contrast material at midrange spatial frequencies (Cole, G. G., & Wilkins, A. J.,2013) [1] for exposure-based treatment.
- Mazes will be designed on several levels. The initial game level will be adjusted according to the user's TQ score. Users enter the level which depends on how serious their trypophobia are. More serious they are, the lower level they enter. Low-level mazes are smaller in size compared to high-level mazes. Trypophobic images will be inserted in the maze as part of the exposure therapy.
Design relaxing treatment to help player to overcome shock after gaming.
- Provide relaxation exercise for user to recover from anxiety and stress after each game session. Breathing exercise will be given to user for relaxation purpose. Relaxing music will be played in the background.
Evaluation of the effectiveness of the game in treating Trypophobia.

Compare the TQ score of the same user of different time, before playing the game and after playing the game.

Video Demonstration

Background and Methodology

This project aims to develop a VR serious game to treat Trypophobia.

To treat a phobia, the usual treatment is graded exposure of the patient to anxiety-producing stimuli (systematic desensitization). Patient creates a fear hierarchy starting at imagining the fear and building up in stages to the most fear-provoking images or even real things. There are some research reviews, however, showed that most of the patients have difficulty in applying imaginative techniques . In recent years, a new therapeutical approach called Virtual Reality Therapy (VRT) has arisen to change the status quo. VRT can create and generate stimuli for patient who have problem in imagining the fear or can't bear to experience real situation.

Main approach/idea:

Technology to be used:
- Unity
- VR
- Android
Expected advantages of our solution
- VR provides an immersive experience to users as if they are experiencing the game in real life. Users can experience events that they are unable or hard to do in real life.
- Using Android platform with cardboard instead of using other VR devices because it is portable and much cheaper than other VR devices.

There are 3 main functions in the app. The first function of the app included a pre-game questionnaire, the user needs to complete it for the system to determine his level of fear towards trypophobia. The second function is the maze game, the user has exposed trypophobia objects during exploration of the maze. The third function is a post-game questionnaire, the user needs to complete it again for the system to decide if he has finished the treatment or not.

Fig.1 Use case diagram of Maze of Holes

Fig.2 Activity diagram of Maze of Holes

Conclusion and Future Development

“To develop a serious game with VR technology on Android platform to help people with Trypophobia to overcome the fear”. This is our main target and original intention. The goal is already achieved with the support of different parts in the treatment: Questionnaire to determine which level of trypophobia player has, develop a magnificent maze with realistic textures for exposure-based treatment, relaxing treatment design between each level of the game and a methodology to evaluate success or failure. We combined these parts together to make a great serious game – Maze of Holes.

According to the face-to-face interview. All interviewees have the improvement when facing trypophobic. In other words, they have all reduced the fear and treat trypophobia in some ways. It is an encouraged result to evaluate the whole game design is work very well as a treatment of trypophobia.