Metaverse in Education A Systematic Mapping Review

Abstract

The Metaverse can be seen as a three-dimensional and interactive virtual environment, being considered the next generation of enabling technologies in various application domains, including teaching areas. The literature presents a variety of solutions and approaches involving the Metaverse in the educational area. There is a lack of an overview of these solutions and approaches. In this context, a systematic mapping of the literature on the use of the Metaverse to support educational activities was carried out. 1031 (one thousand and thirty-one) publications from a total of 42 (forty-two) candidates were evaluated. The results mostly present the use of Virtual Reality, Augmented Reality, Mixed Reality and Extended Reality as the main enabling technologies. It was observed that the quantitative ones focus on solutions aimed at Higher Education. The results also indicate that the main challenges in designing Metaverse-based solutions for educational use are: (i) high costs, (ii) security, and (iii) health-related factors.