Psychological safety of students with disabilities when using virtual technologies in physical education classes

<p><strong>Context and relevance</strong>. Within the framework of the UNESCO project “Education for All”, special educational projects will be developed for people with disabilities. Modern technologies, including virtual reality, are used to implement such programs. There is a need to assess the psychological safety of using such technologies. <strong>Hypothesis</strong>. Conducting physical education classes using virtual reality technologies for students with disabilities does not violate their psychological safety. <strong>Methods and materials</strong>. The study involved 140 college students, of whom 70 students had health restrictions (based on which they were exempted by the medical commission from basic physical education classes) and 70 healthy students. Students with health restrictions were divided into 2 groups by randomization: experimental and control, 35 people each. Methods: questionnaire “Emotional safety of the environment”, express diagnostics of psychological safety of the individual, questionnaire of the feeling of security, questionnaire “Quality of interpersonal relationships in the educational environment”, methods of mathematical statistics (U criterion Mann Whitney, T criterion Wilcoxon. Training was conducted with the experimental group, 4 lessons, 1 time per week, VR simulators were used: archery (VR: Mediaeval archery), games of Bowling and Darts, educational simulators Boxing and Swimming, a simulator of the game of volleyball and basketball (the All-in-one sports application), games with rackets (First Person Tennis). <strong>Results</strong>. No differences were found between students with disabilities and ordinary students in the indicators of the safety of the educational environment and the feeling of security. 2 differences were found in the scales of safety of relationships: increased conflict with adults and decreased tolerance with peers. In the process of physical education classes, the indicators of personal safety improve: trust in people increases (trend) (trend), value-semantic security increases reliably and the risk of post-traumatic growth decreases. Confidence in control of the surrounding world increases. Interpersonal communication indicators are restored: conflict, aggressiveness and manipulative attitude decrease in relationships with adults (trend). In relationships with peers, hostility and aggressiveness decrease (at the trend level). <strong>Conclusions</strong>. Conducting physical education classes in virtual reality is safe for students with disabilities.</p>