The Use of Virtual Reality to Combat Weight-Based Implicit Bias Among Physicians in Training at Brigham and Women's Hospital: A Pilot Study

Summary

The goal of this pilot implementation study is to evaluate the impact of a virtual reality (VR) intervention on implicit bias for resident physicians. The main question it aims to answer are: Does watching VR experience of two clinical encounters reduce implicit bias association test scores? Is the VR experience an acceptable intervention tool for reducing implicit bias? Researchers will compare weight-based VR experiences consisting of two observed clinical encounters to a neutral education VR encounter to see if our intervention significantly impacts implicit bias association scores. Participants will be asked 1. Complete Implicit Association test for weight-based bias pre-intervention and post-intervention (immediately, at one week, and one month after the intervention) to assess their implicit bias 2. Watch either experimental clinical encounter videos or neutral education video using a VR headset 3. Participants will also complete an abbreviated IAT related to views on compliance

Eligibility

Age range

18+ years

Sex

All

Healthy volunteers

Yes

Interventions

• Behavioral
  360 Video on a Virtual Reality Headset

  Two 360- videos watched via a VR headset where the study subject will witness a positive physician encounter with a compliant obese patient and a negative encounter with a non-compliant non-obese patient