The use of avatars in psychosis therapy can help people who hear voices, research shows
Digital characters – avatars – could help people with psychosis hear voices less often and reduce the distress caused, research suggests.
The therapy involves a series of guided sessions in which patients can have a conversation with an animated digital representation of their distressing voice.
Often with psychosis, as with other conditions, the voices people hear can be insulting or bullying and affect people’s daily lives.
The voices can be experienced as powerful and almost omniscient, seeming to know what the person is thinking and feeling and preventing them from taking the steps they want every day.
According to research from the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience (IoPPN) at King’s College London, avatar therapy using computer-generated animations is an effective way to help people with psychosis who hear voices.
Philippa Garety, Emeritus Professor of Clinical Psychology at King’s IoPPN and lead author of the study, said: “To our knowledge, this is the first therapeutic intervention to have a direct and sustained impact on the frequency with which people hear voices.
“This is an extremely important finding because it is a clear priority for voice hearers, and hearing fewer voices, less often, or the loss of voices can have a hugely positive impact on their daily lives.
“People who hear voices rarely hear just one. In an interesting development, the extended version of the therapy was effective in reducing voice frequency overall, despite participants creating only one avatar for one voice.”
Nick, who took part in the Avatar trial, said: “When I started having the therapy in 2015 I was hearing about 30 to 40 abusive voices a day, which brought it down to about four or five.
“I felt like I was regaining control of my life.”
Before therapy, patients work with a therapist to create a computerized visual representation of the voice they hear (the avatar).
The session involves a three-way conversation between the voice hearer, the therapist and the on-screen avatar, with the therapist both speaking themselves and voicing the avatar using voice conversion software.
The avatar’s likeness and sound were created to match the patient’s description.
Over several sessions, participants learn to stand up to the voice and take control.
The researchers recruited 345 people from four centers based at the universities of Glasgow, Manchester, UCL and King’s.
Miranda Wolpert, director of mental health at Wellcome, who helped fund the research, said: “It is very exciting to see the emergence of a powerful new digital therapy that could be life-changing for people who hear voices.
“This study builds on more than a decade of groundbreaking research.”
The research, published in Nature Medicine, has been recommended by an early value assessment from the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (Nice), with researchers aiming to carry it out in routine NHS settings to provide further real-world evidence of its effectiveness in coming years to collect. three years.