Immersive Virtual Environments and Climate Change Engagement

Climate Change will affect our lives, yet communicating about climate change has proven to be more complicated than initially thought. Recent attention has turned to the potential affordances of immersive virtual environments (IVE) to support public engagement around climate change. We offer theoretical arguments for ways that IVEs may influence understanding, emotion, and behavior related to climate change, and we present a systematic literature review covering IVE applications to climate change. From 619 papers, 55 were fully reviewed. The findings were analyzed and discussed according to how IVEs may influence understanding, emotion, and action related to climate change. Findings suggest that IVE has a positive outcome in climate change engagement and the use of IVEs in the context of climate change warrant further investment of resources toward design and research.

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