Real-Time Mental Health Monitoring for Metaverse Consumers to Ameliorate the Negative Impacts of Escapism and Post Trauma Stress Disorder

The emergence of the metaverse, like any other technology, presents both advantages and disadvantages. On the positive side, it can greatly enhance experiences in gaming, entertainment, training, and more, offering significant benefits to users. Conversely, there are notable drawbacks, particularly concerning mental health issues such as escapism and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). The detection of the signs of the disorders can help users to take precautions. This paper introduces a novel annotated dataset for monitoring mental health of consumers in metaverse environments, with a specific emphasis on escapism and PTSD. The dataset encompasses user-generated content, chat logs, virtual world activities, and demographic information, collected from reddit and twitter posts. A team of mental health experts has systematically annotated the dataset, categorizing content, conducting sentiment analysis, and providing contextual assessments to facilitate research on mental health patterns in virtual spaces. This resource opens opportunities for investigating escapism and PTSD.