Virtual Reality as a Window into Sibling Aggression

Area of Science:

• Psychology
• Child Development
• Domestic Violence Research

Background:

• Sibling aggression is a prevalent form of domestic violence impacting child and adolescent mental health.
• Previous research relied on self- or parent-reports, introducing potential reporter bias.
• Objective assessment methods are needed to accurately measure sibling aggression.

Purpose of the Study:

• To evaluate the validity of an interactive Virtual Reality (VR) experiment for assessing adolescent aggressive responses toward siblings.
• To examine the congruence of VR-assessed aggression with other reporting measures.
• To investigate associations between known risk factors and VR-observed sibling aggression.

Main Methods:

• Pairs of young adolescent siblings (N=26, aged 8-15) participated in a laboratory study.
• Participants completed questionnaires and engaged in a custom-made interactive VR experiment involving a virtual sibling.
• Aggressive responses were observed during VR scenarios designed to elicit provocation.

Main Results:

• VR-observed aggression correlated with self-reported aggression.
• No significant associations were found between VR-observed aggression and parent- or sibling-reported aggression.
• Perceived father-child relationship quality was the only significant family factor associated with observed aggression.

Conclusions:

• VR-based assessments show potential for complementing self-report measures in studying sibling aggression.
• The findings underscore the need for multimethod approaches to capture the complexity of sibling aggression.
• VR offers a promising avenue for objective measurement, reducing reporter bias in domestic violence research.