Srimana Niyomkar's Online Journal: Research in Second life

Research in Second life

The other day I went to the medical simulation center to observe the research using Second life in part. The PI compared three different activities of students in a simulation clinic: (1) An interview between medical students and standardized patients. (2) An interview between medical students and a puppet standardized patient. (3) An interview between medical students and standardized patients’ avatars in Second life. For the second and third activities, the students did not see the real patients face to face. The puppet and avatars in second life are amazing! In my opinion, the puppet is better than avatars in second life since it can move its mouth and limbs including showing its emotions under the control of the patient actor who controls the tablet connected with a computer. Although the avatars in second life cannot move their mouths, they are free to use. There is not much investment in second life compared with puppets. Moreover, we can arrange instruments and atmosphere as a real situation in both second life and the place where the students took the interviewing test. These help the students feel like they are in a real clinic. I hope someday my nursing students will have this practice with interviewing and physical examination of virtual patients before they interview real patients .

By the way, I was very impressed what all staff at the medical simulation center and ITAC did. They were very active and willing to help the researcher conduct her research.