The 2023 Virtual Ability Inc., (VAI) Mental Health Symposium on Friday, May 17th, 2024, marking the internationally supported Mental Health Awareness Week (May 13th through 19th, 2024, inclusive). As such, it forms a part of a wide range of physical world and virtual world events framed around Mental Health Awareness Month, which has been throughout May observed in the United States since 1949.
2023 marks the 13th such symposium hosted by Virtual Ability Inc., and has the theme Our Youth, Our Elders, carrying a focus on the fact that children and the elderly face unique mental health challenges that are not well understood and often not adequately addressed.
The Symposium will take place in the virtual world of Second Life, at the Sojourner Auditorium on Virtual Ability Island. Those from outside of Second Life wishing to attend can do so by creating a free Second Life account through Virtual Ability’s Sign-Up Portal, and then entering Second Life via Virtual Ability’s New Resident Orientation Course.
The schedule of speakers for the event can be found on the Virtual Ability Inc., website, and presentations commence at 07:30 SLT (US PDT) on the morning of Friday, May 17th, and run through to the concluding presentation, which starts at 14:30 SLT, with each session lasting approximately one hour. For ease of reference, a brief summary of the presentations is provided below – but do please check the complete schedule via the link above for the fullest information on speakers and talks.
- 07:30 SLT: Dr. Esther Gachuri, PhD and Dr. Anne Wambugu, PhD, MAMFT, MA, Pan Africa Christian University (Nairobi, Kenya) – “Elderly Peoples’ Perception of Their Wellbeing in Selected Mainstream Churches in Kenya”.
- 09:00 SLT: Dr. Folajinmi Oluwasina, PhD, FRSPH, University of Calgary (Canada) – “Invisible Struggles: Addressing Mental Health Among Black Youth in Canada”.
- 10:30 SLT: Mr. Horta Reis da Silva, Lecturer in Nursing Education at King’s University, England – “Loneliness in Older Adults”.
- 12:00 noon SLT: Dr. Valerie Hill, MLIS, PhD, director of the Community Virtual Library in the metaverse and co-coordinator of the Virtual Worlds Education Consortium, and Rose Hill, MLIS, CPC, SUDP-T, is a Certified Peer Counsellor with a focus in trauma and crisis counselling – “The Impact of Parasocial Relationships with AI on Mental Health”
- 13:00 SLT: Jessica Simionato, MPH, BSp, La Trobe University (Melbourne, Australia) – “Intergenerational programs – bringing youth and elders together to enhance social connectedness”.
- 14:30 SLT: Robert Walker, MS, COAPS, Massachusetts Department of Mental Health, USA – “Older Adult Peer Support: Our Time Has Come”.
For those unable to attend in-world, the symposium will be live streamed on You Tube.
About Virtual Ability
Virtual Ability, Inc. is a non-profit corporation, chartered in the state of Colorado, USA. It is a non-profit tax exempt organization under section 501(c)(3) of the United States Internal Revenue Code. This means that for US citizens, contributions made are deductible as a charitable donation for federal income tax purposes.
Virtual Ability hosts this annual Symposium to share information about mental health and mental disabilities with the general population. Within its cross-disability community, VAI has members who deal with a variety of mental health issues. So, not only is this an opportunity for VAI community members to learn more about topics related to mental health from experts they probably would not have a chance to meet otherwise, it allows the general public to attend a professional conference at no cost.
With thanks to Gentle Heron for the information.
Related links
- Virtual Ability 13th Annual Mental Health Symposium
- Schedule
- Virtual Ability Sojourner Auditorium (Rated: General)
- You Tube live stream
- Virtual Ability Inc website
- Virtual Ability on Twitter
- Virtual Ability coverage in this blog
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