Gareth Walkom, a student at Nottingham Trent University has created virtual reality software which will help people with speech impediments to overcome tough situations by undergoing virtual therapy sessions.

Gareth who is a 24-year-old MSc Medical Product Design student had a stutter from the age of six, and therefore understands the big impact of speech impediment on a person's life.His software provides exposure therapy, where through virtual reality, users are put in situations that provoke anxiety and they learn to tackle the situations and overcome their fear.

The principle scene is one where the user talks to an animated avatar in a one-on-one interaction situation. Their eye gaze behaviour is measured to know where they are looking while interacting with the avatar. The software then gives feedback about the user's anxiety levels and suggests ways to improve .

There will also be a scene which will help to reduce anxiety and induce calm. It is natural for a person suffering from stutter to look away while speaking and their eyes usually tend to close or flicker. The headsets will help to track the eye movements which will help to suggest improvements and show progress.

According to Nottingham Trent University,  participants from a stutter self-help group who used this software showed a decrease in anxiety levels over repeated sessions which resulted in improvement of speech. Mr Walkom said that Real-Time Analysis of Speech Fluency (RTASF) scale which gives a measure of different types of disfluency occurring in a speech sample will be used to measure the participants' speech.

The data will be examined  by counting fluency and identifying typical behaviours of stuttering. This feedback can be used by the participant to reflect and improve on his speech in future sessions or even in real life situations.