Safe sex in a virtual world

Sexual health campaigner and Salford senior nursing lecturer Barbara Hastings-Asatourian is re-locating to the virtual world in a bid to advise more young people on practising safe sex.

In a ground-breaking move, Barbara, former nurse and managing director of Contraception Education, will be hosting a live seminar on sexual health on Thursday 13 December in the cult social networking site Second Life.

Barbara said: “As far as I know, this is the first time that a seminar focusing on sexual health has been delivered on the Second Life website. Over the last 12 months I’ve been looking at social networking sites as a way of getting through to young people. Far from just being a source of amusement for people, it offers a huge opportunity for education.”

Second Life is a vast virtual world, inhabited by millions of ‘avatars’ - online 3D personas created by each individual user of the site - where events take place, items are bought and sold, people interact and education can be facilitated.

Barbara’s seminar will be broadcast live on the Second Life website live at 8.00pm on 13 December 2007. The session will have sound, but the slides and text will be available in different languages after the event for anyone who has trouble with accessibility.

“At 8.00pm, I’ll be sitting at my computer, with my headphones on and the microphone in place, and I’ll start to deliver my seminar,” said Barbara. “I was a bit nervous about doing it to start with, but now, as I’ve found out more about it, I’m feeling more excited.”

The opportunity to deliver the lecture came about through Salford’s links with the University of Plymouth, where academics are conducting a Second Life project entitled ‘A Sexual Health Public Education and Outreach SIM in Second Life’.