A pilot study on treatment content in virtual reality-assisted aggression therapy at a maximum-security forensic psychiatric clinic

Previous findings on results of treatment of aggression in violent offenders show inconsistent results, and implementations of such treatments have demonstrated varying success with sometimes marginal gains in forensic settings. New methods, incorporating virtual reality as a tool for experiential learning, have been put forward yet require deepened investigations concerning both treatment content and effects. The principal objective of this study is to examine the treatment content of the revised VRAPT intervention. Specifically, the study focuses on understanding how the content of the VRAPT intervention is conceptualized from the perspectives of both patients and therapists. Inductive manifest content analysis was applied on content of treatment workbooks (N = 6 + 7), provided by both patients and therapists as part of seven concluded VRAPT treatments at a maximum-security forensic psychiatric clinic in Sweden. Three manifest content categories were identified, relating to treatment content: Skills-training, Tailoring of the intervention, and Self-awareness. While generally quite similar, some potentially important differences between patients' and therapists' perspectives on the VRAPT intervention were apparent. The findings suggest the necessity of further research into optimizing VR-assisted treatments in forensic psychiatry.