The effect of an avatar's emotional expressions on players' fear reactions: The mediating role of embodiment

Why do people engage with the suffering of strangers? Exploring epistemic, eudaimonic, social, and affective motives

Reading violent stories or watching a war documentary are examples in which people voluntarily engage with the suffering of others whom they do not know. Using a mixed-methods approach, we investigated why people make these decisions, while also mapping the characteristics of strangers' suffering to gain a rich understanding. In Study 1 (N = 247), participants described situations of suffering and their reasons to engage with it. Using qualitative thematic analysis, we developed a typology of the stranger (who), the situation (what), the source (how), and the reason(s) for engaging with the situation (why). We categorised the motives into four overarching themes - epistemic, eudaimonic, social, and affective - reflecting diversity in the perceived functionality of engaging with a stranger's suffering. Next, we tested the robustness of the identified motives in a quantitative study. In Study 2, participants (N = 250) recalled a situation in which they engaged with the suffering of a stranger and indicated their endorsement with a variety of possible motives. Largely mirroring Study 1, Study 2 participants engaged to acquire knowledge, for personal and social utility, and to feel positive and negative emotions. We discuss implications for understanding the exploration of human suffering as a motivated phenomenon.

Disrupting the “empathy machine”: The power and perils of virtual reality in addressing social issues

This article looks through a critical media lens at mediated effects and ethical concerns of virtual reality (VR) applications that explore personal and social issues through embodiment and storytelling. In recent years, the press, immersive media practitioners and researchers have promoted the potential of virtual reality storytelling to foster empathy. This research offers an interdisciplinary narrative review, with an evidence-based approach to challenge the assumptions that VR films elicit empathy in the participant—what I refer to as the VR-empathy model. A review of literature from the fields of psychology, computer science, embodiment, medicine, and virtual reality was carried out to question and counter these claims through case studies of both fiction and non-fiction VR experiences. The results reveal that there is little empirical evidence of a correlation between VR exposure and an increase in empathy that motivates pro-social behavior, and a lack of research covering VR films exposure eliciting empathy. Furthermore, the results show an alarming lack of research into the long-term effects of VR films and other VR immersive experiences. This contribution aims to understand and demystify the current “empathy machine” rhetoric and calls for more rigorous, scientific research that can authenticate future claims and systemize ethical best practices.

Reduced ownership over a virtual body modulates dishonesty

Although studies suggest that even higher-order functions can be embodied, whether body awareness may bias moral decisions toward (dis)honesty remains underinvestigated. Here, we tested if the Sense of body Ownership (SoO) and the magnitude of monetary rewards influence the tendency to act immorally. Through a virtual body, participants played a card game in which they could lie to others to steal high or low amounts of money. To manipulate SoO, the virtual body was seen and controlled from a first-person perspective, with hands attached or detached, or from a third-person perspective. In third-person perspective, SoO was significantly reduced and more egoistic lies were produced in high reward conditions. Thus, SoO reduction and high monetary reward facilitate dishonest behavior, likely by separating the self from the dishonest actions performed through the disowned body. Because most future interactions will likely occur in a digital metaverse, our results may have crucial societal impact.

Body ownership as a proxy for individual and social separation and connection

Lee and Schwartz procedures of separation offer a much needed interpretation of the literature on moral cleansing. However, body ownership as a grounded mechanism of separation and connection has been neglected. We argue that embodiment may be employed to connect the self to desirable aspects of cognitive and emotional interactions and disembodiment to disconnect from undesirable elements.