Background. Virtual reality technologies (VR) allow users to absorb a lot of visual information in a short time and have become an important feature in education. The advisability of using virtual reality as a tool to improve the learning processes in the modern digital environment is an open question. Despite some studies devoted to assessing the effectiveness of virtual reality applications to the education process, there are no clear conclusions on this issue.

Objective. The study of features of foreign language learning material using VR.

Design. 29 young participants (22 females, 7 males) with a high level of foreign language competence were selected. They received three types of stimuli: text, 2D video, and VR. The efficiency of their learning was tested with questions before and after each experiment. VR stimuli were presented by Samsung Gear VR.

Results. It was shown that “VR” and “Text” conditions were the most efficient material for foreign language learning as compared to the “2D-video” condition. The results also showed a strong negative correlation between the participants’ baseline level of knowledge and their knowledge gain under all experimental conditions.

Conclusion. VR offers an effective method for improving the process of learning, but traditional teaching methods still play an important role in education. Young people in the modern world have developed ways to use the VR as an educational tool.

Acknowledgments: The study was supported by the Russian Federal Property Fund grant No. 18-29-22049.

The academic methodological rethinking of the actual educational process at a single higher education institution is considered as an important component of the institution’s inner research and identity. The sociological and, especially, educational psychological research, from author’s perspective, create the necessary informational background for the improvement of the educational process at the each higher education institution, as well as for the promotion of reforms at the level of the education system of the state. A short characteristic of the special branch of the international academic and applied research – an Institutional Research (the within-institutional studies at a university), and of the work at the Center of inner monitoring of the Higher School of Economics — National Research University are presented as an argument. It is concluded that such studies are underestimated in the context of improvement and development of the professional training of students at the department of psychology of the Lomonosov Moscow State University, and that there is a necessity of the creation of such kind of center.