In separate reporting, the “metaverse” could be a serious problem for children worldwide. If there is only one thing that technology companies, retailers, content creators and investors can agree upon, is that there is money to be made from the metaverse. The metaverse is planned as a virtual-reality space in which users can interact with a computer generated environment and other users.[1] As technology CEOs try to win a market position in the still developing digital space, some psychologists and mental health experts say the race to turn a profit is taking attention away from a crucial question, will the metaverse be a safe place, especially for kids and teens? Will this new “world” keep them away from “real life” activities such as sports, fresh air, playing with pets and making friends in person?
See: https://redskyalliance.org/xindustry/so-what-s-metaverse
The answer is not encouraging. Recent research has shown myriad negative effects of social media on the psyches of children and adolescents, from the prevalence of bullying and harassment to self-esteem and body image issues. Those same pitfalls could be just as prevalent if not worse in the wide-open metaverse, with its series of vast virtual worlds intended for both work and play. If tech companies take those concerns seriously from the beginning, and build solutions into their metaverse products, they could actually benefit children’s mental health, some experts say. “All of these new tools, and all of these new possibilities, could be used for good or for evil,” says a clinical psychologist who serves as chief science officer for the American Psychological Association.
Today’s social media platforms are already dangerous for some kids and teens. Virtual reality’s level of immersion could make those problems even worse, says another psychologist who serves as the director for medical virtual reality at USC’s Institute for Creative Technologies. “There’s a potency about being immersed in a world that is different than observing and interacting…through a flat screen monitor,” he says. “Once you’re actually embodied in a space, even though you can’t be physically touched, we can be exposed to things that take on a level of realism that could be psychologically assaulting.”
The use of 3D digital avatars in the metaverse carries another problem, too. Being able to modify your likeness to project a version of yourself that differs from real life can be “pretty dangerous for adolescents. You are what other people think about you in adolescence,” he says. “And the idea of being able to fictionalize your identity and receive very different feedback can really mess with a teenager’s identity.”
There is a serious concern tech companies are targeting their social media and metaverse platforms at this highly suggestible demographic during an important stretch of their brains’ mental and emotional development with potentially dire consequences. “This is just an exacerbation of the problems that we’ve already started to see with the effects of social media,” he says. “This is creating more loneliness. This is creating far more body image concerns [and] exposure to dangerous content that’s related to suicidality.”
In December 2021, Meta launched a virtual reality social platform, Horizon Worlds. In March 2021, Microsoft launched a cloud collaboration service for virtual 3D business meetings. Other companies, like Roblox and Epic Games, are grabbing toeholds in the metaverse through popular online games.
One such game publisher, VRChat, already shows evidence of dangers for young users. In December 2021, research from the nonprofit Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH) found that minors were regularly exposed to graphic sexual content, racist and violent language, bullying and other forms of harassment on VRChat’s platform, which is typically accessed through Meta’s Oculus headsets.
Meta and Oculus have policies prohibiting these sorts of negative behaviors on their VR platforms. When reached for comment, a Meta spokesperson referred to the company’s previous statements on trying to build a metaverse “Responsibly,” and the Oculus platform’s tools for reporting abuse and blocking other users.
That is part of the problem, says the CEO of CCDH, “Safety policies, however well-intentioned, can be difficult to monitor and enforce in virtual spaces. Virtual reality really does need a lot of safety built in from the start, because you can’t search [the metaverse] for hate or sexual abuse,” he says. “You can’t. It happens in an instant [and] there’s nothing you can do.”
A prediction is that parents will need to be wary about their kids’ access to the metaverse. “I think parents will be asking themselves: Do I feel safe knowing that Mark Zuckerberg is the guy in charge of deciding who influences my children, who might be able to bully them, and whether or not they’re safe in cyberspace?” he says.
The irony is that virtual reality and the metaverse have massive promise for improving users’ mental health. USC research indicates potential for virtual reality treatments to promote empathy in patients and help with issues like psychological trauma and PTSD. USC and other experts agree the responsibility is on tech companies to prioritize the safety of their users over their own incentive to turn a profit. Tech companies could employ tools to ensure the metaverse’s safety for young users, including strict age verification tools to prevent predators from posing as younger users, plentiful content moderators and “rapid response” when users report violations of inappropriate behavior. “There’s no reason why there couldn’t be the presence of moderators in spaces in which children are present [or] virtual chaperones,” it is said. “But, of course, that would require money.”
Many experts believe it is too much to ask parents, most of whom have “relatively little personal experience with understanding these platforms” to monitor what their children are exposed to in the metaverse. Suggestions are being offered to find ways “to incentivize these companies to use these brilliant tools to actually improve society...Right now, they’re incentivized to make a profit.” Unfortunately, money and profits outweigh safety.
Stock shares in Facebook, who in a recent marketing move changed their name to Meta, fell 20% last week in US. This in premarket trades after the social media company issued a bleak forecast, blaming Apple's privacy changes and increased competition.
In other tech stock news, a flaw in Apple's software and exploited by Israeli surveillance firm NSO Group to break into iPhones in 2021 was concurrently exploited by a competing company. Google’s parent company Alphabet advanced nearer to joining peers Apple and Microsoft in the elite $2 trillion market valuation club as the search giant's shares surged more than 8% following a blowout quarterly report. Spotify forecast current-quarter subscribers lower than Wall Street expectations, but its executives sought to reassure investors that growth had not cratered even as it deals with the fallout from the controversy around The Joe Rogan Experience podcast. Last week, the company's shares fell as much as 18% in late trading.
Some financial analysts predict that “the party is over” for technology start-ups rushing to go public at ever-higher valuations. This as current volatile US stock markets have stifled investor desire for high-growth stocks.[2]
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[1] https://www.cnbc.com/2022/01/31/psychologists-metaverse-could-be-a-problem-for-kids-mental-health.html
[2] https://www.reuters.com/technology/meta-platforms-frankfurt-listed-shares-drop-tepid-forecast-2022-02-03/
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