Neuroendocrine Response and State Anxiety Due to Psychosocial Stress Decrease after a Training with Subject’s Own (but Not Another) Virtual Body: An RCT Study

Dalila Burin, Gabriele Cavanna, Daniela Rabellino, Yuka Kotozaki and Ryuta Kawashima
Additional contact information
Dalila Burin: Institute of Development, Aging and Cancer (IDAC), Tohoku University, 4-1 Seiryocho, Aobaku, Sendai 980-8575, Japan
Gabriele Cavanna: Smart Aging Research Center (SARC), Tohoku University, 4-1 Seiryocho, Aobaku, Sendai 980-8575, Japan
Daniela Rabellino: Department of Psychiatry, Western University, 550 Wellington Rd., London, ON N6C 5J1, Canada
Yuka Kotozaki: Division of Clinical Research and Epidemiology, Iwate Tohoku Medical Megabank Organization, Iwate Medical University, 1-1-1, Idaidori, Yahaba, Iwate, Morioka 028-3694, Japan
Ryuta Kawashima: Institute of Development, Aging and Cancer (IDAC), Tohoku University, 4-1 Seiryocho, Aobaku, Sendai 980-8575, Japan

IJERPH, 2022, vol. 19, issue 10, 1-24

Abstract: Previous research involving healthy participants has reported that seeing a moving virtual body from the first person perspective induces the illusion of ownership and agency over that virtual body. When a person is sitting and the virtual body runs, it is possible to measure physiological, behavioral and cognitive reactions that are comparable to those that occur during actual movement. Capitalizing on this evidence, we hypothesized that virtual training could also induce neuroendocrine effects that prompt a decreased psychosocial stress response, as occurs after physical training. While sitting, 26 healthy young adults watched a virtual avatar running for 30 min from the first person perspective (experimental group), while another 26 participants watched the virtual body from the third person perspective (control group). We found a decreased salivary alpha-amylase concentration (a biomarker for the stress response) after the virtual training among the experimental group only, as well as a decreased subjective feeling of state anxiety (but no difference in heart rate). We argue that the virtual illusion of a moving body from the first person perspective can initiate a cascade of events, from the perception of the visual illusion to physiological activation that triggers other biological effects, such as the neuroendocrine stress response.

Keywords: psychosocial stress; immersive virtual reality training; body ownership; agency; salivary alpha-amylase; anxiety (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/19/10/6340/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/19/10/6340/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:19:y:2022:i:10:p:6340-:d:822075

Access Statistics for this article

IJERPH is currently edited by Ms. Jenna Liu

More articles in IJERPH from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().