Hasler, BS;
Spanlang, B;
Slater, M;
(2017)
Virtual race transformation reverses racial ingroup bias.
PLoS ONE
, 12
(4)
, Article e0174965. 10.1371/journal.pone.0174965.
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Abstract
People generally show greater preference for members of their own racial group compared to racial out-group members. This type of ‘in-group bias’ is evident in mimicry behaviors. We tend to automatically mimic the behaviors of in-group members, and this behavior is associated with interpersonal sensitivity and empathy. However, mimicry is reduced when interacting with out-group members. Although race is considered an unchangeable trait, it is possible using embodiment in immersive virtual reality to engender the illusion in people of having a body of a different race. Previous research has used this technique to show that after a short period of embodiment of White people in a Black virtual body their implicit racial bias against Black people diminishes. Here we show that this technique powerfully enhances mimicry. We carried out an experiment with 32 White (Caucasian) female participants. Half were embodied in a White virtual body and the remainder in a Black virtual body. Each interacted in two different sessions with a White and a Black virtual character, in counterbalanced order. The results show that dyads with the same virtual body skin color expressed greater mimicry than those of different color. Importantly, this effect occurred depending on the virtual body’s race, not participants’ actual racial group. When embodied in a Black virtual body, White participants treat Black as their novel in-group and Whites become their novel out-group. This reversed in-group bias effect was obtained regardless of participants’ level of implicit racial bias. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications of this surprising psychological phenomenon.
| Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Title: | Virtual race transformation reverses racial ingroup bias |
| Open access status: | An open access version is available from UCL Discovery |
| DOI: | 10.1371/journal.pone.0174965 |
| Publisher version: | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0174965 |
| Language: | English |
| Additional information: | © 2017 Hasler et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. |
| Keywords: | Science & Technology, Multidisciplinary Sciences, Science & Technology - Other Topics, Bodily Self-Consciousness, Intergroup Contact Theory, In-Group Bias, Perspective-Taking, Body-Ownership, Behavioral Mimicry, Social-Context, Empathy, Neuroscience, Affiliation |
| UCL classification: | UCL UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS > Faculty of Engineering Science UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS > Faculty of Engineering Science > Dept of Computer Science |
| URI: | https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/1554458 |
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