Recent events in Philadelphia show why Starbucks should use immersive technologies like Virtual Reality to train employees on empathy skills.

On Thursday April 12, 2018 two black men were arrested in a Philadelphia Starbucks while waiting for a colleague. Starbucks CEO Kevin Johnson issued an immediate apology, met and apologized to the two men, and announced that all U.S. Starbucks will be closed on the afternoon of May 29, 2018 for racial-bias education for its employees.

My worry is that a half-day of training focused more on words, and less on actions will be ineffective
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Starbucks should be praised for strongly condemning this action and for embracing the need for implicit (racial) bias training. From a science of learning perspective, however, the crucial question that arises is this:

“What can be learned in a half-day and will that training be effective in changing the workplace culture and employee’s behavior in the long-term?”

I have spent the last 30 years studying the psychological and brain science of learning. I have shown that people skills, such as embracing diversity, effective interpersonal interactions, and checking unconscious (racial) biases, are about behavior. They are about what we “do”, “how” we do it, and our “intent”. True behavior change occurs only when training engages the behavioral skills learning system in the brain. This system learns through incremental, dopamine-mediated changes in neural connections in the basal ganglia that drive behavior. Learning occurs when behavior is following in real-time, literally within 100s of milliseconds, by feedback that rewards correct behaviors and punishes incorrect behaviors. Behavior change can begin in a half-day of training, if delivered effectively, but the training must target the behavioral skills learning system.

Starbucks should be praised for strongly condemning this action and for embracing the need for implicit (racial) bias training
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Training that leads to true behavior change can be contrasted with training that recruits the cognitive skills learning system in the brain and the prefrontal cortex, in particular. This type of training focuses on knowing the definition of unconscious (racial) bias, knowing what constitutes appropriate and inappropriate behaviors and providing verbal guidance on what one should do. This system focuses on knowing the “what” whereas the behavioral skills learning system focuses on knowing “how”. The cognitive aspects of unconscious bias can be trained in a half-day.

Observational VR can allow one to walk a mile in someone else’s shoes
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Although knowing “what” to do and being able to identify it is important, this is not the same as knowing “how” to behave. I worry that Starbuck’s half-day training will focus more on the “what” and less on the “how” and will not target effective behavior change.

What can be learned in a half-day and will that training be effective in changing the workplace culture and employee’s behavior?
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My hope is that training based on virtual reality will become embedded in the corporate world and will be available to employees essentially 24/7. This will allow true behavior change training and has the potential to revolutionize the workplace. The psychological and brain science suggests that two types of virtual reality offerings can be used to effectively train people skills.

I hope VR training will become embedded in the corporate world and will be available to employees essentially 24/7. This will allow true behavior change training and has the potential to revolutionize the workplace
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First, passive observational VR can be utilized to allow one to “walk a mile in someone else’s shoes”. Although not the same as living a lifetime of racial bias, there is value in the empathy and emotional reaction to seeing oneself as someone else and experiencing some trauma. There is nothing quite like allowing a middle-aged, heterosexual, Caucasian male to live the life, even for a few minutes, of a transgender youth, an African American man, or a disabled child being harassed or disrespected, to help them understand the negativity associated with this experience. Although this involves passive, observational learning it targets emotional processing centers in the brain and helps the learner understand at a visceral level what it is like to be in a position of weakness, and to be the direct target of harassment, prejudice or bias. This type of experience leaves the learner poised for true behavior change.

Interactive VR can be used to train behavior in a safe and protected setting
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Second, interactive VR can be used to train behavior in a safe and protected setting. Whether live actors or artificial intelligence drives the behavior of avatars, the idea is that learners can be placed in real-time interactive settings in which feedback rewards correct behaviors and punishes incorrect behaviors. The learner can be placed in situations in which they must interact with an individual who is poor in people skills so that they learn how to deal with situations like those, or they can be placed in situations in which their behavior is responded to in a negative manner. More importantly, the learner can be placed in a broad range of situations and scenarios that include small or large numbers of bystanders, a broad or narrow array of ethnicities and genders, etc. Broad-based training enhances generalization and transfer and trains the individual to be prepared for any situation.

The psychological and brain science suggests that two types of virtual reality offerings can be used to effectively train people skills
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I applaud Starbucks for taking the initiative to train their employees and I believe their CEO when he says that this is not about public relations but rather about real behavior change. My worry is that a half-day of training focused more on words, and less on actions will be ineffective. Further training will be needed to change behavior and virtual reality may hold that key.

Behavior change can begin in a half-day of training, if delivered effectively, but the training must target the behavioral skills learning system
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For companies looking to get into Immersive technologies such as VR/AR/MR/XR our Virtual Reality Consultancy services offer guidance and support on how best to incorporate these into your brand strategy.

Todd Maddox is Science, Sports and Training Correspondent at Tech Trends, and the CEO of Cognitive Design and Statistical Consulting. Follow him on Twitter @wtoddmaddox

The post Training Against Bias with VR appeared first on Tech Trends.

Immersive tech and training go back 50 years, but how has that relationship changed? Are we in for disruption or just another buzz-term?

By Daniel Fraga and Christophe Mallet – Somewhere Else

As VR is evolving, we’re not only learning skills safely through simulations anymore. We have started to improve cognition and retention of knowledge through immersive learning environments. Tomorrow, with the advent of AI, we will be able to retrain vast portions of our workforce towards better human relationships-driven jobs.

At this point in 2018, to affect behaviour with VR is fast becoming less of a sci-fi question and more one of scalability
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The Past – Learning Skills through Simulation

Throwback to 1966: The Beatles release “Revolver”, the Vietnam war rages on and Time Magazine reports on the effects of a strange new substance called LSD. In another mind-expanding event, Thomas A. Furness III creates the first visual flight simulator – and takes the first steps into Virtual Reality (VR) Training.

Furness created these simulators to train US Air Force pilots. He built head-mounted displays so that trainees could experience real-world scenarios too costly or dangerous to recreate in reality. Pilots repeated key tasks and learned incident management tactics in simulated conditions. This is an example of what we call the Skills-Based Model of VR training – teaching practical skills by using the body as a natural interface, and thus developing physical memory through repetition. With the cost of hardware having dropped in the past few years, the model of the flight simulator is quickly being replicated across multiple task-based jobs. Firefighters, Crane Operators and Couriers can be trained in VR today.

The value proposition of Skills-Based VR training is clear. Any number of people can receive first hand skills-training on-demand and on-location, by using virtual or augmented reality solutions. VR removes significant travel & infrastructure not to mention the need to recreate costly and potentially hazardous simulations. However, there is more to immersive training than teaching practical skills.

We have barely scratched the surface of how Immersive Technologies will impact the way we learn throughout our lives
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The Present – Improved Cognition & Memorability

Edgar Dale built his Cone of Experience theory in 1969 based on the premise that the medium in which training is delivered is key to learning efficiency. We remember 10% of the material we read, 20% of the information we hear, but a staggering 90% of what we do. So where does VR fit in the cone?

Image Credit: Edgar Dale, Cone of Experience

Researchers in China tested the effects of VR on children’s performance in school. They compared the test results of students that learned about Astrophysics with and without VR. 90% of the students who learned with VR passed their test vs. 40% of students from the other group. Both short-term retention (+27%) and long-term memorability (+32%) improved.

This is the Knowledge-Based Model of VR training. The content is replaced in its spatial context, enhancing cognition. In the classroom, we’re taught through passive learning. In VR, we learn through interactions. It is mere common sense, for example, that subjects like anatomy or cosmology are more easily studied by interacting with 3D models than by deciphering 2D sketches. 

90% of the students who learned with VR passed their test vs. 40% of students from the other group. Both short-term retention (+27%) and long-term memorability (+32%) improved
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One of the biggest challenges faced by Fortune 500 companies today is the alignment of their employees around a common culture and shared knowledge systems.This is largely due to the difficulties of implementing change quickly and accurately across complex organisations. With virtual reality, companies can now provide continuous expert knowledge-training across their ranks. It helps them create a common, company-wide context, based on continuous learning.

Individually, they create knowledge. Collectively, they build culture.

Image Credit: Virtual Speech, Experience Snapshot

The Future – Changing Behavior

Today, VR training platforms are built on the Skills-Based or Knowledge-Based models. With automation threatening to replace millions of what McKinsey calls “predictable physical jobs”, vast portions of the workforce will need to be retrained towards less automatable jobs. Those jobs include management, customer service and other kinds of sophisticated human-to-human interactions. Can we use VR to train for human interactions? To teach empathy? To cure us of a variety of biases?

In the latest wave of VR adoption, the service industry has started training retail, customer service, and insurance staff with basic social simulations
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At this point in 2018, to affect behaviour with VR is fast becoming less of a sci-fi question and more one of scalability. VR already uses the body as natural interface, which allows us to simulate social, emotional and even near-spiritual experiences. So from powerful experiences, we can engender perspectives.

In 2013, The Virtual Human Interaction Lab (VHIL) at Stanford University tested the link between VR and empathy in the Superman experiment. Two groups of students, one playing the role of doctors in a helicopter and the others being Superman, were tasked to find and help a child as they flew around a city in VR. Even after the experience, subjects who played Superman continued to show significantly higher levels of empathy than their doctors counterparts. This went to show how subtle VR experience design can create empathy on a subconscious level. Make way for the Behavior-Altering Model.

We have started to improve cognition and retention of knowledge through immersive learning environments
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In the latest wave of VR adoption, the service industry has started training retail, customer service, and insurance staff with basic social simulations. Beyond the service industry, experiences following the Behavior-Altering Model can address the biggest issues of today – and tomorrow. As conversational AI progresses, we will very soon be able to simulate human relationships in immersive environments and train social and humanitarian workers, law enforcement officers and pretty much anyone who has to interact with humans as part of their daily jobs. VR ‘experience design’ will soon be ‘human experience’ design.

Image Credit: Somewhere Else, 3 Models for Immersive Learning

We have barely scratched the surface of how Immersive Technologies will impact the way we learn throughout our lives. As we create our immersive tools and our environments, they affect and design us in return. Immersive technology training offers us the chance to deeply design human behaviour. The medium is the message, and our medium is reality itself. With this future fast-approaching, ask yourself: What kind of reality will you build?

Christophe Mallet and Daniel Fraga are respectively Co-founder and VR Designer at Somewhere Else, a London-based innovation agency specialising in immersive technologies (VR/AR/MR). Somewhere Else exists to partner with brands, agencies and innovators to help them navigate and reach their full potential in the Age of Experience. Check out their latest work recent work with adidas, Three and France Télévisions.

The post Expert View: 3 ways VR is transforming Learning & Development appeared first on Tech Trends.