[DC] Dynamic facial expressions on virtual humans for virtual reality (VR) mental health therapy

This PhD research aims to implement dynamic facial expressions on virtual humans and explore their potential to enhance the efficacy of virtual reality (VR) mental health therapy. A systematic review of virtual humans in mental health VR indicated that only around 10% of applications used dynamic facial expressions. The potential of virtual humans' emotion richness is understudied and it is unclear how the facial expressions affect the individuals in VR. Therefore, we will focus on understanding people's behavioural, physiological, and psychological reactions toward facial-animated humans in VR experimental studies. The first study examines whether particular non-verbal behaviours can enhance people's therapy engagement, by applying warm facial expressions and head nods on a virtual coach. Future experiments will further look at individuals' interpretations of facial expressions on virtual crowds and the virtual infant. This research will explore how best to use facial expressions to facilitate VR therapy through the practice of psychiatric research, VR programming and 3D animation.