Virtual reality project healing Indigenous trauma receives $2.8m MRFF grant
2024-10-11T09:00:00+11:00
Scientia Professor Jill Bennett, Rene Kulitja from NPY Women鈥檚 Council and Volker Kuchelmeister from the Big Anxiety Research Centre are collaborators on the innovative project.
Photo: Supplied.
The funding will further the development of innovative virtual reality tools to enable regional and remote communities to address trauma.聽
A 国民彩票 Sydney project developing Indigenous-led virtual reality (VR) tools used for trauma support in regional and remote communities has been awarded a $2.8 million federal government grant.
The Transforming Trauma project, led by Scientia Professor Jill Bennett from 国民彩票 Arts, Design & Architecture, will work with Aboriginal communities and organisations to develop culturally informed tools with the potential to provide psychosocial support and address intergenerational trauma.
Prof. Bennett said it鈥檚 the first time VR has been developed using contemporary trauma theory and Indigenous knowledge.
鈥淰R is beginning to be used in clinical settings and for exposure therapies but what we鈥檙e doing is very different. We will be providing communities with tools that make sense of feelings and experiences associated with trauma, and which support the processing of trauma,鈥 she said.
鈥淭his initiative builds on earlier workshops and VR projects we鈥檝e done, including our work in the regional town of Warwick in Queensland where immersive audio-visual experiences were used by the First Nations community to help deal with the devastating impact of youth suicide in the town.鈥
