Virtual Reality Goggles for Treating Phobias: A Rumor of Empathy 

The one thing that immediately occurred to me: Psychotherapy invokes a virtual reality all its own – even without goggles.

 

This is especially the case with dynamic psychotherapy that activates forms of transference in which one relates to the therapist “as if” in conversations with a past or future person or reality. Indeed, with the exception of being careful not to step in front of a bus while crossing the street on the way to therapy, we are usually over-confident that we know the reality of how our relationship work or what people mean by their communications.

 

This is less the case with certain forms of narrowly focused behavioral therapies, which are nevertheless still more ambiguous than is commonly recognized. Never was it truer that meaning – and fear – are generated in the mind of the beholder. 

 

louagosta.com