虚拟现实技术不只是游戏

    随着索尼（Sony）和Facebook 新收购的Oculus VR等厂商推出不那么昂贵的头戴式商品，虚拟现实技术已经蓄势待发，将在家庭娱乐和游戏领域大展拳脚。

    不过与此同时，虚拟现实技术的计算机模拟环境还有望以富有创造力的全新手段改造一些重要产业，比如健康科学、金融服务和制造业。专家表示，这些将会改善我们的生活，让我们做出更好的选择。

    斯坦福大学（Stanford University）虚拟人机交互实验室（Virtual Human Interaction Lab）主任杰里米•拜伦森说：“虚拟现实技术可以让那些抽象深奥的关系感官化。我们研究发现，让这种因果关系能够被人感知，而不只是停留在理论层面的话，它对顾客行为和其他行为的影响力将远超其他任何发明。”

    即便在因果关系并不明显的情况下，虚拟现实技术也可以成为一种有效的工具。拜伦森与斯坦福大学的麻醉学系（Department of Anesthesia）合作，利用技术将患有慢性区域性疼痛综合征（chronic regional pain syndrome, CRPS，一种由剧烈疼痛、出汗和皮肤病变为特征的疾病）的儿童置入虚拟仿真环境中，让他们的大脑摆脱不愉快的理疗和治愈方法。儿童使用电脑生成的替身“阿凡达”，即虚拟现实环境中的元素，来完成一些简单的活动，比如戳气球，以此转移他们对身体痛苦信号的注意力。

    华盛顿大学（University of Washington）的研究人员发明了一种类似的疗法，叫做“雪世界”（Snowworld）。伴随着歌手保罗•西蒙的音乐，病人可以在其中专注地向企鹅和乳齿象扔雪球，而不用想着疼痛的伤口和灼热的疗法。研究人员表示，这项技术非常有效，减少了强力麻醉药和其他易于使人上瘾的止痛药的需求。

    高德纳研究公司（Gartner）消费者技术部门的研究总监布莱恩•布劳表示：“在虚拟世界中全神贯注的体会与众不同。人的脑海就像被搬到了我们现实里的电影屏幕中一样，虚拟世界变成了真实的世界。”

    虚拟人机交互实验室的研究人员正在研究虚拟现实技术给许多行业带来的影响。其中之一是金融服务业，他们已经研发了浸入式的体验环境，利用一系列金融情境，让人们看到未来的自己。

    拜伦森说：“人们很难直接感受到由于年轻时候不注意储蓄，等到老了后可能遭遇的贫困。”他指出，通过模拟环境，可以让这种关系变得更加直观。至少在实验室的条件下，存款者的比例更高了。

    拜伦森说，投资银行美林证券（Merrill Lynch）非常喜欢这项研究。银行以该技术为基础，设计了自己的在线应用“直面退休”（Face Retirement），让任何拥有笔记本摄像头的人都能创造未来的自己，还能与他们互动。

    拜伦森也在关注其他行业。他与位于洛杉矶的市场研究公司利伯曼全球研究（Lieberman Research Worldwide）建立了合伙企业AppliedVR，旨在推动虚拟现实仿真技术的商业化，最大限度地发掘它的商业潜力。

    利伯曼的董事长戴夫•萨科曼说：“员工安全和减肥将是首先进入市场的两个领域。”他补充道，AppliedVR也对偏头痛的治疗、饮食失调、戒酒和戒毒领域很感兴趣。

    这家公司目前正与保险公司旅行者集团（Travelers）合作，开发使用虚拟现实技术的手机应用，意在减少制造工厂和仓库的意外事故。AppliedVR通过创造一个虚拟环境，让人们在仓库中像超人一样飞行，从而实现了这点。它减少了工友们被铲车撞上，或者从没有安全护杆的平台上掉下来的危险。

    萨科曼说：“我们发现这是一种十分有趣的体验，它立刻培养出了人们对于安全的敏感度。”他补充道，这种类似游戏的体验不仅有娱乐作用，还在感情层面影响到了人们的潜意识，从而让人们更容易做出改变。

    高德纳的布劳说：“培训就是一个能从虚拟现实技术中受益的很好的例子，我认为虚拟现实技术对商界会变得十分重要，它的影响力将会在接下来五年中开始显现。”

    如果到最后，虚拟现实技术并没有比传统的训练和行为矫正方式更加有效呢？好吧，至少它会更加有意思。(财富中文网)

    译者：严匡正

    Virtual reality technology is poised to take off for home entertainment and gaming as inexpensive headsets become commercially available from companies like Sony (SNE) and Facebook's (FB) newly acquired Oculus VR.

    But at the same time, VR's computer-simulated environments are expected to transform key industries such as health sciences, financial services, and manufacturing in new and imaginative ways that experts say will improve our lives and the choices we make.

    "Virtual reality transforms relationships that tend to be abstract to become visceral," says Jeremy Bailenson, director of Stanford University's Virtual Human Interaction Lab. "Our research has shown that making this cause and effect relationship perceptual, as opposed to theoretical, changes consumer and other behaviors more than other interventions."

    VR can be an effective tool even where cause and effect are not obvious. In a collaboration with Stanford's Department of Anesthesia, Bailenson used the technology to place children with chronic regional pain syndrome (CRPS) -- a disease characterized by severe pain, swelling, and changes in the skin -- in virtual simulations that divert their brains from unpleasant physical therapy and treatment. The children use computer-generated doubles known as avatars, a fixture in VR environments, to perform a simple exercise like popping balloons, distracting them from processing pain signals.

    University of Washington researchers have developed a similar form of therapy known as SnowWorld, in which patients concentrate on throwing snowballs at penguins and mastodons to the music of Paul Simon, rather than focusing on painful wound and burn treatments. The technique is so effective, the researchers say, that it has reduced the need for strong narcotics and other addictive painkillers.

    "The experience of being fully immersed in a well-made virtual world is like none other," says Brian Blau, research director for consumer technology at the research firm Gartner. "Your mind is transported in the same way that movies suspend our reality, and that virtual world becomes real."

    Researchers in Stanford's Virtual Human Interaction Lab are studying the impact of VR across a number of industries. One of those is financial services, for which they have developed an immersive experience that introduces people to avatars of their future selves under a variety of financial scenarios.

    "People have a hard time tangibly understanding the possible poverty one might have as a senior citizen resulting from not saving money during one's youth," says Bailenson, noting that a simulated environment makes this relationship much more tangible, resulting in higher rates of savings, at least under laboratory conditions.

    The investment bank Merrill Lynch liked the research so much, he says, that it used the technology as the basis for designing its own online app known as Face Retirement, which allows anyone with a laptop camera to create and interact with their future self.

    Bailenson has his eye on other industries. Through AppliedVR, a new partnership between Bailenson and the Los Angeles-based market research firm Lieberman Research Worldwide, his aim is to commercialize VR simulations with the biggest business potential.

    "Worker safety or weight loss would be first to market," LRW chief executive Dave Sackman says. He added that AppliedVR is also interested in migraine treatment, eating disorders, and drug and alcohol recovery.

    The company is currently working with Travelers (TRV), the insurance company, on a virtual reality mobile application intended to reduce accidents in manufacturing plants and warehouses. AppliedVR does this by creating a virtual world where people fly through a warehouse like Superman, saving co-workers from hazards such getting hit by a forklift or falling off a platform without a safety railing.

    "We're finding this to be a fun experience that generates some immediate safety sensitivity," Sackman says. In addition to being entertaining, the game-like experiences make it easier for people to change by engaging their subconscious brains on an emotional level, he adds.

    "Training is a great example of a business process that could benefit from VR," Gartner's Blau says. "I think VR will be important to businesses, and its impact will start to be seen over the next five years."

    And in the case that VR does not prove to be more effective than traditional approaches to training and behavior modification? Well, at least it will be more fun.