Mind Mansion: Exploring Metaphorical Interactions to Engage with Negative Thoughts in Virtual Reality

TL;DR

Mind Mansion is a VR experience designed to help users confront negative thoughts through metaphorical interactions, promoting emotional awareness and coping strategies in a playful virtual environment.

Contribution

This work introduces a novel VR-based metaphorical interaction method for engaging with negative thoughts, combining traditional therapy concepts with immersive technology.

Findings

Reduces negative affect in users

Enhances emotional awareness and acceptance

Encourages exploration of alternative perspectives

Abstract

Recurrent negative thoughts can significantly disrupt daily life and contribute to negative emotional states. Facing, confronting, and noticing such thoughts without support can be challenging. To provide a playful setting and leverage the technical maturation of Virtual Reality (VR), our VR experience, Mind Mansion, places the user in an initially cluttered virtual apartment. Here we utilize established concepts from traditional therapy and metaphors identified in prior works to let users engage metaphorically with representations of thoughts, gradually sorting the space, fostering awareness of thoughts, and supporting mental self-care. The results of our user study (n = 30) reveal that Mind Mansion encourages the exploration of alternative perspectives, fosters acceptance, and potentially offers new coping mechanisms. Our findings suggest that this VR intervention can reduce negative affect and improve overall emotional awareness.