While VR has been talked about for some time, it now appears to be reaching a tipping point as several companies are looking to launch VR headsets on the market this year.

Thirty-seven per cent had heard of Samsung Gear VR, 35% Oculus Rift, 33% Sony Project Morpheus and 31% Google Cardboard.

When expressing their concerns about VR the most common worries were: cause health issues; the headsets being too heavy; the risk of people hurting themselves; and getting addicted to VR.

And the most popular things for children to do with VR were to visit another country virtually ( 64%); explore a place they couldn’t go to in reality ( 64%); go to a virtual amusement park ( 62%) ; visit a fantasy-world ( 61%) and travel back in time virtually ( 58%).

Aaron Burch, president of Touchstone Research, said: “VR will likely impact every major industry including gaming, education, healthcare, fitness, ecommerce, social, mobile, entertainment, technology and travel. In addition, we feel that VR will have a significant impact on the market research and consumer insights space. Think about what it would be like to conduct a focus group in a virtual environment without ever leaving the office, conducting concept test, ad-tests or study shopping behaviour all within a virtual space.”

Touchstone Research conducted an online survey with 500 10- to 17-year-olds in the US via its Youth and Family research panel .