An exploratory study on the effect of mental rehearsal on the virtual body swapping illusion

Abstract

The body swapping illusion is a perceptual phenomenon in which one perceives a virtual (or another) body as being one’s own. The aim of this study was to investigate the effects of mental rehearsal on the generation of the body swapping illusion. Participants were 58 male undergraduate students. Participants were randomly assigned to either the physical rehearsal (n=20), mental rehearsal (n=18), or control condition (n=20). There were no significant differences in state and trait anxiety, simulator sickness, or immersive tendencies between groups, but there were significant differences in the body swapping illusion and a sense of presence between conditions. Subsequent post-hoc analyses revealed that the body swapping illusion was significantly greater in the physical and mental rehearsal conditions than the control condition, and the sense of presence was significantly greater in the physical rehearsal than in the control condition. In conclusion, we found that mental rehearsal exerted similar effects as physical rehearsal ingenerating the illusion of body swapping. This suggests that generating the illusion of body swapping through mental rehearsal may be applicable in clinical settings.