Abstract
Own-perceived body matching – the ability to match one’s own body with an observed body – is a difficult task for both general and clinical populations. Thus far, however, own-perceived body matching has been investigated in situations that are incongruent with how we are used to experience and perceive our body in daily life. In the current study, we aimed to examine own-perceived body matching in a context that more closely resembles real life. More specifically, we investigated the effects of body movement dynamics and clothing cues on own-perceived body matching. We asked participants to match their own body with an externally perceived body that was a 3D-generated avatar based on participants’ real bodies, fitted with a computer-generated dress. This perceived body was (1) either static (non-walking avatar) or dynamic (walking avatar), (2) either bigger, smaller, or the same size as participants’ own body size, and (3) fitted with a dress with a size either bigger, smaller, or the same as participants’ own dress size. Our results suggest that movement dynamics cues did not improve the accuracy of own-perceived body matching, but that confidence about dress fit was higher for dynamic avatars, and that the difference between dynamic and static avatars was dependent on participants’ self-esteem. Furthermore, when participants were asked to rate the observed body in reference to how they wanted to represent themselves to others, dynamic avatars were rated lower than static avatars for the biggest-sized bodies only, possibly reflecting the influence of movement cues on amplifying socio-cultural stereotypes. Finally, while smaller body/dress sizes were systematically rated higher than bigger body/dress sizes for several self-report items, the interplay between body and dress size played an important role in participants’ self-report as well. Thus, while our research suggests that movement and garment dynamics, allowing for realistic, concrete situations that are reminiscent of daily life, influence own-body perception, these cues did not lead to an improvement in accuracy. These findings provide important insights for research exploring (own-) body perception and bodily self-awareness, with practical (e.g., development of online avatars) and clinical (e.g., anorexia nervosa and body dysmorphic disorder) implications.
Highlights
We experience and interact with the world through our body
Concerning the effect of movement dynamics, we hypothesized that the addition of dynamic movement cues would increase participants’ ability to accurately determine their own body size/shape given the additional information that these movement cues provide and the resemblance to our everyday real-life environment. This comparison of static vs. dynamic avatars was our main effect of interest, since we expected these findings to render important insights into the role of action cues in own-body perception and bodily self-awareness, with both clinical and practical implications. To further examine these implications, we investigated whether this effect of movement dynamics was modulated by bodily self-esteem and personality differences given that previous research has shown that both self-esteem (e.g., Maister et al, 2021) and personality variables (e.g., De Coster et al, 2020) influence body size estimation
For Animation, a significant effect was observed for the “Dress confidence” item only [F(1,13) = 6.33, p = 0.026, η2p = 0.33, BF10 = 3.137], indicating more confidence about dress fit for dynamic (M = 56.90, SD = 5.96) compared to static (M = 50.90, SD = 5.98) avatars
Summary
We experience and interact with the world through our body. In order to do so efficaciously and efficiently, humans need to be able to accurately and dynamically perceive their own body. Ownbody perception has been extensively investigated using body illusions where the perception of one’s body deviates from the physical one (for a review see Kilteni et al, 2015) These include body distortion illusions, in which the size or posture of the body or its body parts are perceived as distorted (e.g., Goodwin et al, 1972; Ramachandran and Hirstein, 1998); out-of-body illusions, in which people perceive their self to be dislocated from their own body and/or people look at their body from a distance (e.g., Ehrsson, 2007; Lenggenhager et al, 2007); and body ownership illusions, in which non-bodily objects are perceived as a part of one’s own body (e.g., Botvinick and Cohen, 1998; Petkova and Ehrsson, 2008; Dummer et al, 2009; Peck et al, 2013; Maselli and Slater, 2014). Despite its clinical and practical importance, this form of own-body perception, which involves matching an externally perceived body with one’s own, has remained difficult to improve
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