Putting yourself in the skin of a black avatar reduces implicit racial bias
Abstract
Although it has been shown that immersive virtual reality (IVR) can be used to induce illusions of ownership over a virtual body (VB), information on whether this changes implicit interpersonal attitudes is meager. Here we demonstrate that embodiment of light-skinned participants in a dark-skinned VB significantly reduced implicit racial bias against dark-skinned people, in contrast to embodiment in light-skinned, purple-skinned or with no VB. 60 females participated in this between-groups experiment, with a VB substituting their own, with full-body visuomotor synchrony, reflected also in a virtual mirror. A racial Implicit Association Test (IAT) was administered at least three days prior to the experiment, and immediately after the IVR exposure. The change from pre- to post-experience IAT scores suggests that the dark-skinned embodied condition decreased implicit racial bias more than the other conditions. Thus, embodiment may change negative interpersonal attitudes and thus represent a powerful tool for exploring such fundamental psychological and societal phenomena.
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Ownership of an outgroup body is associated with a significant reduction in implicit biases against that outgroup.
“Ownership of an outgroup body has been found to be associated with a significant reduction in implicit biases against that outgroup.”
From Changing bodies changes minds: Owning another body affects social cognition (2015) · cites this paper as [10]
Changes in the mental representation of one's own body affect the perceived similarity between one's own body and that of an outgroup, resulting in significant changes in implicit biases.
“Taken together, the findings show that changes in the mental representation of one's own body affect the perceived similarity between one's own body and that of an outgroup, resulting in significant changes in implicit biases.”
From Changing bodies changes minds: Owning another body affects social cognition (2015) · cites this paper as [10]
The manipulations used to induce bodily illusions involve highly salient multisensory cues that are strongly predictive of body ownership, and thus may override top-down modulations by social attitudes.
“However, the manipulations used to induce bodily illusions involve highly salient multisensory cues which are strongly predictive of body ownership, and thus may override top-down modulations by social attitudes [9][10][11][12][13].”
From Changing bodies changes minds: Owning another body affects social cognition (2015) · cites this paper as [10]
Embodiment of light-skinned people in a dark-skinned virtual body reduced their implicit racial bias as measured by a racial IAT.
“In a similar way, using an immersive virtual reality set-up [10], embodiment of lightskinned people in a dark-skinned virtual body reduced their implicit racial bias as measured by a racial IAT.”
From Changing bodies changes minds: Owning another body affects social cognition (2015) · cites this paper as [10]
The age study demonstrated a role of self-association in attitude change, whereas previous research had investigated more generic positive or negative associations with the embodied social group.
“This study was notable because it demonstrated a role of the self-association in attitude change, whereas previous research [9,10] had investigated more generic positive or negative associations with the embodied social group.”
From Changing bodies changes minds: Owning another body affects social cognition (2015) · cites this paper as [10]
The outgroup becomes associated not only with the self-concept but also with positive concepts more generally.
“This results in the outgroup not only being associated with the self-concept, as already shown by [11], but also with positive concepts more generally, as shown by [9,10].”
From Changing bodies changes minds: Owning another body affects social cognition (2015) · cites this paper as [10]
Participants who embodied a Black avatar showed a decrease in their implicit biases against Black individuals, which was significantly greater than for those who embodied a White avatar.
“Participants who embodied a Black avatar showed a decrease in their implicit biases against Black individuals, which was significantly greater than for those who embodied a White avatar.”
From Changing bodies changes minds: Owning another body affects social cognition (2015) · cites this paper as [10]
The IVR setup results in sensorimotor correlations (visual, proprioceptive, tactile and motor) that elicit illusions of ownership and agency over the virtual body.
“This set up results in sensorimotor correlations (visual, proprioceptive, tactile and motor) that elicit illusions of ownership and agency over the virtual body [10,11,54].”
From Changing bodies changes minds: Owning another body affects social cognition (2015) · cites this paper as [10]
It is not only prior experience of a body type that influences the extent of perceptual, attitudinal, and behavioral correlates of the body ownership illusion.
“These experiments provide evidence supporting the idea that it is not only prior experience of a body type that influences the extent of perceptual, attitudinal, and behavioral correlates of the body ownership illusion.”
From Illusory ownership of a virtual child body causes overestimation of object sizes and implicit attitude changes (2013) · cites this paper as [42]
Recent experiments induced light-skinned people to experience the illusion of ownership over a black rubber arm and over a dark-skinned virtual body.
“There is further evidence for this in recent experiments where light-skinned people were induced to experience the illusion of ownership over a black rubber arm (41) and over a dark-skinned virtual body (42).”
From Illusory ownership of a virtual child body causes overestimation of object sizes and implicit attitude changes (2013) · cites this paper as [42]
In those experiments, there was a reduction in implicit racial bias associated only with the illusion of ownership of a dark-skinned body.
“In both cases, there was a reduction in implicit racial bias associated only with the illusion of ownership of a dark-skinned body.”
From Illusory ownership of a virtual child body causes overestimation of object sizes and implicit attitude changes (2013) · cites this paper as [42]
Previous studies on the perceptual, behavioural and cognitive correlates of body transformation have concentrated on embodiment of adult participants in bodies that are representative of a group: for example, children or a different race.
“Previous studies on the perceptual, behavioural and cognitive correlates of body transformation have concentrated on embodiment of adult participants in bodies that are representative of a group: for example, children16 or a different race20212324.”
From Conversations between self and self as Sigmund Freud—A virtual body ownership paradigm for self counselling (2015) · cites this paper as [20]
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- Authors
- Peck, T. C., Seinfeld, S., Aglioti, S. M., & Slater, M.
- Affiliations
- Universitat de Barcelona (ES)
- Fondazione Santa Lucia (IT)
- Institució Catalana de Recerca i Estudis Avançats (ES)
- Corresponding author
- Slater, Mel
- Venue
- Consciousness and Cognition
- Publisher
- Elsevier BV
- Published
- 2013-09
- Volume
- 22
- Issue
- 3
- Pages
- 779-787
- ISSN
- 1053-8100 (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W1973787747
- Cited by
- 967
- References
- 44
- Citations by year
- 2026: 71 · 2025: 93 · 2024: 105 · 2023: 130 · 2022: 105 · 2021: 111 · 2020: 73 · 2019: 72 · 2018: 72 · 2017: 43 · 2016: 42 · 2015: 19 · 2014: 26 · 2013: 5
- FWCI
- 55.61
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Consciousness and Cognition (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- UCL Discovery (University College London) (submittedVersion)
- IRIS Research product catalog (Sapienza University of Rome) (submittedVersion)
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Computer Science › Human-Computer Interaction › Virtual Reality Applications and Impacts
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Social and Intergroup Psychology
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Social Psychology › Social Robot Interaction and HRI
- Keywords
- implicit racial bias, embodiment, virtual body, immersive virtual reality, Implicit Association Test, interpersonal attitudes, virtual mirror, prejudice reduction
- MeSH terms
- Body Image, Computer Simulation, Female, Humans, User-Computer Interface, Racism
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