Changing Bodies Changes Minds-and Behavior? An Economists Guide to Embodiment Interventions

Nina Rapoport
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Nina Rapoport: Aix Marseille Univ, CNRS, AMSE, Marseille, France

No 2603, AMSE Working Papers from Aix-Marseille School of Economics, France

Abstract: This review examines how virtual embodiment interventions can inform economic research on inequality across social groups. These interventions, widely used in psychology and related disciplines, consist of using virtual reality to embody individuals in virtual bodies whose appearance can be experimentally manipulated. By varying key characteristics such as skin-tone, gender, or age, researchers caninduce the illusion of inhabiting the body of an outgroup member. I synthesize existing research on outgroup embodiment and provide both a practical guide to designing embodiment interventions and a critical assessment of the methodological trade-offs involved in their implementation. In addition, I discuss how combining embodimentinterventions with tools from experimental economics can serve two purposes: first, to advance research on social inequality by introducing new methods to study its socio-cognitive foundations; and second, to address open questions in the embodiment literature by testing whether “changing bodies” can change not only minds but also behavior.

Keywords: Discrimination; Inequality; Prejudice; Identity; Virtual reality; Experimental economics (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C91 D91 J16 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2026-02-11
Note: Working paper AMSE 2026-03
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