A Critical Review of Virtual and Extended Reality Immersive
Police Training: Application Areas, Benefits & Vulnerabilities

Lena Podoletz; Mark McGill; David McIlhatton; Jill Marshall; Niamh Healy; Leonie Maria Tanczer

doi:10.1145/3641825.3687707

A Critical Review of Virtual and Extended Reality Immersive Police Training: Application Areas, Benefits & Vulnerabilities

Lena Podoletz
, Mark McGill
, David McIlhatton
, Jill Marshall
, Niamh Healy
, Leonie Maria Tanczer

Senior Research Management Group

Lancaster University
University of Glasgow
University College London
Royal Holloway, University of London

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Chapter › peer-review

9 Citations (Scopus)

335 Downloads (Pure)

Abstract

Virtual and Extended Reality (VR/XR) headsets have promised to enhance police training through the delivery of immersive simulations able to be conducted anywhere, anytime. However, little consideration has been given to reviewing the evidenced benefits and potential issues posed by XR police training. In this paper, we summarise the evidenced usage and benefits of XR police training through a formative targeted literature review (n=41 publications).We then reflect on the prospective technical, security, social and legal issues posed by XR police training, identifying four areas where issues or vulnerabilities exist: training content, trainees and trainers, systems and devices, and state and institutional stakeholders. We highlight significant concerns around e.g. the validity of training; the psychological impact and risks of trauma; the safety and privacy risks posed to trainees and trainers; and the risks to policing institutions. We aim to encourage end-user communities(e.g. police forces) to more openly reflect on the risks of immersive training, so we can ultimately move towards transparent, validated,trusted training that is evidenced to improve policing outcomes.

Original language	English
Title of host publication	VRST '24: Proceedings of the 30th ACM Symposium on Virtual Reality Software and Technology
Editors	Benjamin Weyers, Daniel Zielasko
Publisher	ACM
Number of pages	21
ISBN (Electronic)	979-8-4007-0535-9
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1145/3641825.3687707
Publication status	E-pub ahead of print - 9 Oct 2024
Event	VRST '24 - 30th ACM Symposium on Virtual Reality Software and Technology - Trier, Germany Duration: 9 Oct 2024 → 11 Oct 2024

Conference

Conference	VRST '24 - 30th ACM Symposium on Virtual Reality Software and Technology
Abbreviated title	VRST '24
Country/Territory	Germany
City	Trier
Period	9/10/24 → 11/10/24

Bibliographical note

This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative
Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/),
which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium,
provided the original work is properly cited

Funding

This work was made possible by funding and support from SPRITE+ / SPRITE+2, the EPSRC-funded Security, Privacy, Identity and Trust Engagement NetworkPlus [EP/S035869/1 and EP/W020408/1]. The outputs came from the SPRITE+ project First RespondXR: Digital vulnerability of immersive training for first responders. Dr Mark McGill's research time was supported by UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) under the UK Government's Horizon Europe funding guarantee (AUGSOC) [EP/Z000068/1]. Prof. David Mcilhatton's time was provided through the Resilience Beyond Observed Capabilities Network Plus (RBOC Network+), a project funded by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) and Defence Science and Technology in the UK [EP/X009947/1]. During this research until the article's submission, Dr Leonie Maria Tanczer's salary was supported by various research grants: The REsearch centre on Privacy, Harm Reduction and Adversarial INfluence online (REPHRAIN) [EP/V011189/1], the Violence, Abuse and Mental Health Network (VAMHN) [ES/S004424/1], the Violence, Health, and Society Consortium (VISION) [MR-VO49879/1], and a UKRI Future Leaders Fellowship (FLF) [MR/W009692/1]. Finally, we want to thank Marina Heilbrunn for their invaluable assistance in examining legal outputs pertaining to police training as part of First RespondXR.

Funders
Horizon Europe
Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council
Violence, Abuse and Mental Health Network
UK Research and Innovation
National Research Centre on Privacy, Harm Reduction and Adversarial Influence Online
Violence, Health, and Society Consortium
Defence Science and Technology

Keywords

Police Training
Extended Reality
Virtual Reality

Access to Document

10.1145/3641825.3687707Licence: CC BY

McIlhatton2024VORFinal published version, 1.04 MBLicence: CC BY

Cite this

Podoletz, L., McGill, M., McIlhatton, D., Marshall, J., Healy, N., & Tanczer, L. M. (2024). A Critical Review of Virtual and Extended Reality Immersive Police Training: Application Areas, Benefits & Vulnerabilities. In B. Weyers, & D. Zielasko (Eds.), VRST '24: Proceedings of the 30th ACM Symposium on Virtual Reality Software and Technology Article 38 ACM. Advance online publication. https://doi.org/10.1145/3641825.3687707

A Critical Review of Virtual and Extended Reality Immersive Police Training: Application Areas, Benefits & Vulnerabilities. / Podoletz, Lena; McGill, Mark; McIlhatton, David et al.
VRST '24: Proceedings of the 30th ACM Symposium on Virtual Reality Software and Technology. ed. / Benjamin Weyers; Daniel Zielasko. ACM, 2024. 38.

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Chapter › peer-review

Podoletz, L, McGill, M, McIlhatton, D, Marshall, J, Healy, N & Tanczer, LM 2024, A Critical Review of Virtual and Extended Reality Immersive Police Training: Application Areas, Benefits & Vulnerabilities. in B Weyers & D Zielasko (eds), VRST '24: Proceedings of the 30th ACM Symposium on Virtual Reality Software and Technology., 38, ACM, VRST '24 - 30th ACM Symposium on Virtual Reality Software and Technology, Trier, Germany, 9/10/24. https://doi.org/10.1145/3641825.3687707

Podoletz L, McGill M, McIlhatton D, Marshall J, Healy N, Tanczer LM. A Critical Review of Virtual and Extended Reality Immersive Police Training: Application Areas, Benefits & Vulnerabilities. In Weyers B, Zielasko D, editors, VRST '24: Proceedings of the 30th ACM Symposium on Virtual Reality Software and Technology. ACM. 2024. 38 Epub 2024 Oct 9. doi: 10.1145/3641825.3687707

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