Effectiveness of virtual reality technology in teaching pedestrian skills to children with intellectual disabilities

Abstract

Pedestrian skills are important for children with intellectual disabilities to continue their daily lives independently. The aim of this study is to determine the effectiveness of virtual reality in the acquisition and maintenance of pedestrian skills for children with intellectual disabilities. In addition, the effect of virtual reality on participants generalizing their pedestrian skills to real environments has also been examined. In the study, social validity data were collected from the participants and their mothers regarding the results of the study. Three intellectual disabled children between the ages of 11 and 15 participated in the study. In the study, a multiple probe design with inter-participant probe trial, which is one of the single-subject research models, was used. It is seen that all participants learned pedestrian skills and continued the skills they learned one, three and five weeks after the completion of the instruction. In addition, all participants were able to generalize their skills to the real environment (pedestrian crossing and illuminated pedestrian crossing). When the social validity data collected from the participants and their mothers were examined, it was revealed that teaching with virtual reality applications is interesting and fun, in addition, it can be used for different educational purposes.