Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) is a debilitating mental illness present in approximately 6% of the United States population, with a prevalence rate twice as high in war veterans. Based on the DSM-V, this disorder involves the persistent experience of post-traumatic stress symptoms (e.g., cognitive distortions, nightmares, hyperarousal, avoidance) after being directly or indirectly exposed to a traumatic event. In addition to the significant personal cost of this disorder, it is also an important burden on society. One study found that the 2018 economic burden of PTSD in the United States was approximately $232.2 billion.

Various types of treatments have been created and validated for PTSD, including trauma-focused cognitive behavioural therapy, eye movement desensitisation and reprocessing, and narrative exposure therapy. All of these interventions have proven efficacious. Likewise, exposure therapy is highly effective, and it has been recommended as a first-line treatment for PTSD by various guidelines, including the American Psychological Association. Exposure therapy for PTSD is practiced by exposing the client, either through imagination or by means of in vivo exposure, to feared stimuli related to their traumatic experience, with the aim of gradually extinguishing (i.e., eliminating) their fear response. Nevertheless, while efficacious, exposure therapy is vastly underutilised in treating PTSD, with a 2004 study finding that only 17% of clinicians were using the treatment in their practice.

Recent research has pointed to the potential value of a digitised version of exposure therapy, integrating it within the virtual reality (VR) medium. Individuals have reported difficulty with traditional exposure therapy due to the challenge of vividly imagining the stimuli. Moreover, it is often impossible to receive in vivo exposure in traditional exposure therapy, owing to the nature of their trauma. For example, if an individual presents with PTSD symptoms centered around a traumatic encounter with a bear, in vivo exposure therapy would be limited by the impossibility of using a real bear in therapy. Through its use of technology, virtual reality exposure therapy (VRET) avoids these difficulties and immerses the individual in a virtual setting, also offering them additional control over their exposure. A meta-analysis concluded that VRET has an effectiveness comparable to other validated psychological treatments. However, keep in mind that the research on treatments for PTSD was predominantly done with war veterans, which means that the results might not generalize to other groups of individuals affected by PTSD (e.g., sexual assault survivors, domestic abuse survivors).

When pondering the implementation of VRET into PTSD treatment, it is important to consider both its potential advantages and its possible drawbacks. In particular, training to administer VRET is not currently standardized. Due to its relative novelty and continuous development, comprehensive training for VRET use is scarce. Based on the aforementioned meta-analysis, the authors suggest that VRET be used to complement traditional manual-based exposure therapy, instead of replacing it altogether. Unfortunately, to this day, access to VRET is limited as only few clinicians use it in their practice.