Pairing recreational therapy and virtual reality, a research team in the IU School of Health & Human Sciences is seeking to inform the way older adults experience recreation and travel. Alican Bayram, PhD, a visiting scholar from Turkey, is teaming up with Jennifer Piatt, PhD, CTRS, chair of the school’s Department of Graduate Health Professions, to conduct the community-based research.
Bayram met Piatt, a leading expert in recreational therapy, last year at an international conference in Turkey. A researcher on emerging leisure paradigms in the digital space, Bayram, a professor at Bingöl University, is interested in how “metaleisure”—his theory that explores the intersection of leisure and the digital world—can be applied to support people with disabilities or limitations.
“Alican focuses on how we can recreate virtually and the potential positive health benefits of this type of therapy,” said Piatt. “He’s intrigued with older adults who can no longer travel due to physical limitations and how using virtual reality and immersive technologies could help them continue to experience new places and locations.”
In a paper published in 2022, Bayram describes metaleisure as “leisure activities that can be attended through digital twins (avatars, holograms, etc.) and wearable technologies in three or more dimensional virtual universes. In these virtual universes, many different leisure activities can be done, such as playing games, visiting museums, attending concert events or meeting friends in virtual cafes.”
“The goal of our research is to understand if using metaleisure to travel virtually around the world makes older adults happy or not and how it affects them,” said Bayram, whose interest in virtual forms of recreation stemmed from debilitating injuries he suffered in a paragliding accident in 2021.
“The conference where I met Jen [Piatt] was my first major return to academia and socialization after four years of withdrawal,” Bayram said. “Our discussions about metaleisure and its relevance to therapeutic recreation are what eventually led me to inquire about a visiting scholar opportunity at IU Indianapolis.”
Bayram’s focus on metaleisure complements Piatt’s leadership in recreational therapy—a field in which specially trained therapists adapt and modify recreational experiences for people with disabilities or illness.
Bayram and Piatt are launching the project this summer with qualitative interviews with 30 older adults at local retirement centers. Findings from the interviews will help determine the next phase of the research. The research team also includes Becky Liu-Lastres, associate professor, Tourism, Event, Hospitality & Sport Management, and two undergraduate students at IU Bloomington.
“Alican’s research is exploring a unique phenomenon,” said Piatt. “We’re all aging and will no doubt experience some type of limitation or disabling condition at some point in our life. His research to understand how metaleisure and forms of recreational therapy can help us continue to engage in life and the things we enjoy has important implications for health and well-being.”
Bayram’s visiting scholar opportunity is part of a longstanding relationship between IU and academicians in Turkey influenced by Umit Kesim, PhD, an IU graduate who received the university’s Distinguished Alumni Award in 2004.
Indiana University Bloomington offers both undergraduate and master’s degrees in recreational therapy. It is a popular undergraduate major for pre-occupational therapy students.
