RTI supported continued development of RVHT through a Strategic Capability Development Award granted to three of its Centers. Out of this investment grew a prototype Virtual Household Respondent field interviewer survey training application and Virtual Standardized Patient medical practitioner clinical training application, demonstrated in January 2000 at the Medicine Meets Virtual Reality conference in Newport Beach, CA.

Army ACT II & Medical Investment
RTI developed the Advanced Maintenance Assistant and Trainer (AMAT) for the maintenance of line replaceable units in the M1A1 tank. Funded with ACT II money, AMAT was an extension of the Virtual Maintenance Trainer (VMAT) developed at RTI for the Army National Guard to enable mechanics to train and update their skills by working on a virtual M1A1 tank. Using AMAT, the mechanic could access important diagnostic information and procedures using voice input and output and manipulate the view in the virtual tank.

The U.S. Army Medical Research and Materiel Command has supported development at RTI of a line of Virtual Medical Trainers for patient assessment and trauma care simulation. The product includes civilian and military trauma scenarios, vividly presenting a trauma victim with life-like and real-time physiological responses. Follow-on work supported by the National Medical Testbed and the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality has led to a chemical agent module and a primary-care clinician application for recognizing bioterrorist attacks.

Justice Training
The National Institute of Justice (NIJ) Office of Science & Technology entered a cooperative agreement with RTI to develop JUST-TALK, interactive computer-based training using RVHT, similar to role-playing, for training officers to recognize and respond appropriately to the mentally ill. RTI fielded the application at the North Carolina Justice Academy in January, May, and October of 2002.

Other Applications
Among other examples of RVHT work that were funded at RTI are:

• A virtual reality application for teaching proper informed consent procedures, as part of a larger grant from the Human Subjects Research Enhancements Program to enhance RTI's IRB program. The virtual human portrays many of the typical questions and concerns involved in informed consent, involving comprehension, capacity and authority to make an informed decision, and voluntariness. Each scenario defines pre-existing knowledge and gaps in knowledge possessed by the virtual human; the gaps are what need to be filled in, by the student, based on information exchanged during the conversation. The application captures data on how questions are answered by the student, on how the virtual human's concerns are addressed, and on the consistency and relevance of provided information. (NIH funding)
• A series of vignettes created to invoke cognitive function consistent with risky decision-making, impulsivity and sensitivity to penalties, as part of a study to identify specific underlying neurocognitive components of psychosocial risk factors associated with adolescent drug abuse under laboratory conditions. The vignettes assess adolescents' situation-specific behavior rather than merely test their understanding of risk, impulsiveness, or sensitivity to penalties. (NIDA funding)
• Engaging, relevant RVHT scenarios developed to monitor treatment effects, as part of a research effort to assess the role of higher order executive cognitive functions and emotional deficits in aggressive inmates, the usefulness of neuropsychological and emotional measures in characterizing this subgroup, and the ability of these measures to predict treatment response and institutional misconduct. (NIJ funding)

Continued Basic Research
The National Science Foundation (NSF), under its Information Technology Research program area, issued RTI and its research team a recently completed grant to advance the development and understanding of how RVHT can be used for interaction skills training. This web site was set up under those NSF funds.

NSF recently awarded RTI and Duke University a grant under its Collaborative Systems program area to explore how well RVHT might extend towards assessment of behavior of different participant groups. The focus will be on adolescents varying in gender, ethnicity, and other factors such as clinical diagnosis.

RTI is working with researchers from Duke University as well, under NCI funding, to quantify and profile childhood cancer survivors' facial recognition deficits that are associated with poor social functioning by using a digital facial expression recognition instrument.

Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed on these pages are those of the researchers and do not necessarily reflect the views of NSF.