Virtual worlds, such as World of Warcraft and Second Life, have seen remarkable mainstream uptake in the last decade. Such environments have grown from hosting niche interest groups to providing sites for leisure, business and education for tens of millions of Internet users. Concurrently, a multi-disciplinary research field exploring the…

In the changing context of globalised higher education, a series of pedagogical shifts have occurred, and with them, a number of interactive learning approaches have emerged. This article reports on findings taken from a large-scale study that explored the socio-political impact of virtual world learning on higher education in the UK, specifically…

Background: The literature on immersive virtual worlds and e-learning to date largely indicates that technology has led the pedagogy. Although rationales for implementing e-learning have included flexibility of provision and supporting diversity, none of these recommendations has helped to provide strong pedagogical location. Furthermore, there is…