A Short Virtual Reality (VR) Exposure Improves Rural Older Adult Attitudes Towards VR

Virtual reality (VR) offers a promising solution to deliver portable, engaging rehabilitation services, yet its adoption among older adults may be hindered by unfamiliarity or apprehension towards the technology, and visually induced motion sickness. We examined whether a brief intervention – either an informational handout or an immersive VR experience – could improve attitudes towards VR technology in healthy older adults, and whether using a low-cost VR system would produce tolerable motion sickness levels. Sixty-four rural adults aged 60 and older received either an informational handout describing VR or completed four immersive VR activities. Attitudes and motion sickness were assessed using pre-post intervention surveys. Data collected in 2023 showed that the VR experience did not increase reported motion sickness (t(60) = -78.46, p > 0.001), suggesting strong feasibility of VR use in older adults. Attitudes towards VR improved similarly following both the handout and immersive experience interventions (d = 1.02, 95% CI [0.64, 1.40]). These findings suggest that VR is well-tolerated by older adults and that even a brief, low-resource intervention can increase user receptiveness. VR represents an accessible and well-received rehabilitation option for older adults in rural areas, though further research is needed to establish feasibility and effectiveness in clinical populations.