Virtual Reality Training and Library Science Education: Examining the Possibilities

The use of virtual reality (VR) in social work (SW) and pre-service teacher education has become a promising tool for skills development for students. A review of existing scholarship was conducted to provide an overview of the current landscape of VR in SW and pre-service teacher education. This analysis focused on the use of VR in fields that involved working with people, particularly people in crisis. After an initial review of 115 articles, 60 were identified as relevant to this study. Our analysis of recent trends in the literature emphasizes the potential of VR for library and information science (LIS) education. This literature review provides a basis for a study that examines how VR training approaches may be implemented to support LIS graduate students to build communication and de-escalation skills and confidence in interacting with patrons in crisis. Therefore, this literature review demonstrates the value of using VR and informs our proposed future project examining the viability and usability of VR training for this skill development using the social VR platform Mozilla Hubs.