TORONTO, ON – Researchers have found a significant amount of health-related activity on Second Life and are calling for more research to study the impact the acivity has on real-life behavior.

The genesis of the study, conducted by the University of Toronto and the University Health Network’s Centre for Innovation in Complex Care (CICC), was the realization that health-related activity in the virtual world already was taking place by individuals as well as governments, health care agencies, companies and private groups.

The objective of the study – A Survey of Health-Related Activities on Second Life – was “to survey and categorize the range of health-related activities on Second Life; to examine the design attributes of the most innovative and popular sites; and to assess the potential utility of Second Life for the dissemination of health information and for health behavior change.”

To explore Second Life, the research team opened a free basic account and created an avatar named Ellebee Helendale. After downloading the software, they tabulated all sites that either disseminated health information or provided a health experience to users with some English content, excluding websites that did not directly disseminate health information or provide a health experience to users; for example, sites that served solely as memorials for victims of specific diseases but contained no information on the disease itself.

The study identified 5 primary types of health-related activity on second Life:

Education and Awareness

These sites focused primarily on offering information about various health issues, redirecting users to other websites and real-life information centers. Many of these sites also included discussion groups, lectures, classrooms, and events for communicating information about specific topics.

Support

Sites in this category often offered one-on-one discussion with real-life doctors, therapists, nurses, librarians, and other health care professionals. Some sites also facilitate peer support groups, both moderated and not, with specific topics, group membership, events, and meeting places.

Training

Training sites focus on educating people in the health care industry. Some sites are specific to the type of training they provide, and offer classrooms, discussions, lectures, simulations of health experiences, and patient interactions. Training sites that are linked to schools sometimes offer real-life academic credit for training completed within the Second Life site.

Marketing & Promotion of Health Services

These sites exist primarily to promote new or future health services, organizations, fundraising efforts, and real-life health care initiatives. Some sites offer users an experiential simulation of an organization’s future plans for health care, while others recruit real-life volunteers for fund raising projects.

Research

These sites are actively engaged in recruiting participants and conducting health research in both Second Life and real world settings.

The study also discusses some actual health-related destinations in Second Life, such as Healthinfo Island, run by real-life health librarians and medical experts, The Sexual Health Sim, run by the University of Plymouth (UK) and CDC Island, a 3-D virtual representation of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.