Processi neuroplastici associati all’adozione della realtà virtuale: una revisione sistematica verso un nuovo approccio del trattamento dei disturbi mentali

Abstract

The application of virtual reality (VR) is attracting the interest of clinicians and researchers in various fields such as neuropsychology, rehabilitation and education. The shared utility is to promote a process of improvement of services for the well-being of the person towards the realization of proximity support. The research question of the present work focuses on the investigation of the neural correlate that mediates the relationship of psycho-cognitive and motor changes with the use of virtual reality. To this end, a systematic review is conducted following the PRISMA guidelines, investigating the time frame 2016–2022. The qualitative analysis of the articles supports the hypothesis that virtual reality is associated with neuroplastic processes characterized by the repair, albeit partial, of the damage suffered or the restructuring of neural activation networks.