A Virtual Model of Migrant Students' Social and Living Skills Development in the Conditions of the Host University: Need Analysis of Migrant Students

Virtual reality tools and interventions have already proved their efficiency in treatment of people with disabilities. Their validation and extensive use in developing social and living skills and abilities and in psychological adaptation gave the opportunity to develop and adapt such tools to the needs of migrant students and assist them in overcoming challenges they face with in the host country. The paper is aimed at studying the process of the ‘Social Mirror’ simulator adapting and developing to the needs and purposes of social and psychological adaptation of migrant students to the receiving university environment. The new version of the simulator was named ‘Social Integrator’ and it was supposed to increase the level of migrant students' social and living skills and abilities development due to the repeated training and analysis of constructive behavioural patterns in certain virtual environments associated with learning in host institution and at the same time increasing their level of social literacy. The pilot study involved 171 migrant students. To meet the real needs of migrant students while developing such simulators a needs analysis was carried out. It revealed the number of challenges migrant students face while adapting to the host university environment and helped to develop the modules included into the scenarios for the virtual reality simulator ‘Social integrator’.