Written by Manuel Holzer and Janne Witjes
Why do we need to be in a
virtual world? In order to answer this question, we are going to discuss how
the 10 universal psychological needs by Sheldon et al. (2001) relate to the
experience of being in a virtual world. Which human needs are satisfied by
Virtual Reality (VR) and which human needs are possibly endangered by VR? We
will discuss the needs we think are most relevant with respect to being in a
virtual world. 
Pleasure and stimulation is one of
the most obvious and important human needs that is addressed by VR. Lots of
games have been created that are being played inside a virtual world. Basically
any environment full of interesting stimuli can be experienced inside VR. A
virtual world also offers opportunities that may not be (easily) possible in
the real world; if you want, you could be at the top of the highest mountain,
could jump of a building and start flying or could be swimming in the ocean without
anyone or anything restricting you. This way, being inside a virtual world
gives you the chance to act autonomously and
independent, possibly more than in
the real world! Having a lot of control of
what is happening around you and what you are experiencing also leads to
feeling secure. To give an example,
virtual reality is used in exposure therapy where you can face your fears in a
controlled, secure way. When facing your fear of heights, you can increase the
height step by step and at any time you can be back in the real world, safe on
the ground. 
You can also fight
against hordes of zombies or do any extreme sport you ever wanted to do - but
is that really you? No! It is just an avatar you are controlling while sitting
on a couch or moving around in a closed room. The needs of healthy and bodily - feeling strong and healthy are just an
illusion. The greatest danger while playing games in VR is that, because of the
realism, you might transfer your own needs to the avatar in the virtual reality
and forget about the needs you have in the real world. Only because you have a
lot of friends and a crowd loving you in VR, it does not mean that the friends
are there for you in the real world or that they even exist. So you satisfied
your needs for relatedness and
belongingness in the virtual reality but if you turn the VR glasses off -
you might still be alone and feel lonely.
There are a lot of
different perspectives of VR - some of them might be positive and some might be
negative. But in the end everyone needs to find out the best way of using VR
for him or herself. But one thing is true for everyone, whether you are using
VR or not - you live in the real world and need to satisfy the needs of
yourself and not of some avatar.
References
Aino Ahtinen - Lecture 5
(24.9.2018) from the course: Psychology of Pervasive Computing
Sheldon, Kennon M.;
Elliot, Andrew J.; Kim, Youngmee; Kasser, T. (2001). What Is Satisfying About
Satisfying events? Testing 10 Candidate Psychological Needs. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology,
80(2), 325–339.
https://doi.org/10.1037//O022-3514.80.2.325
Pictures taken from:
- https://salzburg.arbeitplus.at/veranstaltung/heikle-gespraeche-meistern/
- https://skewsme.com/blog/2014/07/virtual-reality/
- http://11thhourvr.com/
