Abstract

The role of empathy and perspective-taking in preventing aggressive behaviors has been highlighted in several theoretical models. In this study, we used immersive virtual reality to induce a full body ownership illusion that allows offenders to be in the body of a victim of domestic abuse. A group of male domestic violence offenders and a control group without a history of violence experienced a virtual scene of abuse in first-person perspective. During the virtual encounter, the participants’ real bodies were replaced with a life-sized virtual female body that moved synchronously with their own real movements. Participants' emotion recognition skills were assessed before and after the virtual experience. Our results revealed that offenders have a significantly lower ability to recognize fear in female faces compared to controls, with a bias towards classifying fearful faces as happy. After being embodied in a female victim, offenders improved their ability to recognize fearful female faces and reduced their bias towards recognizing fearful faces as happy. For the first time, we demonstrate that changing the perspective of an aggressive population through immersive virtual reality can modify socio-perceptual processes such as emotion recognition, thought to underlie this specific form of aggressive behaviors.

Details

Title
Offenders become the victim in virtual reality: impact of changing perspective in domestic violence
Author
Seinfeld, S 1 ; Arroyo-Palacios, J 2 ; Iruretagoyena, G 1 ; Hortensius, R 3 ; Zapata, L E 4 ; Borland, D 5 ; de Gelder, B 6 ; Slater, M 7 ; Sanchez-Vives, M V 8   VIAFID ORCID Logo 

1  Institut d’investigacions Biomèdiques August Pi i Sunyer, Systems Neuroscience, Barcelona, Spain; Experimental Virtual Environments for Neuroscience and Technology (EVENT) Laboratory, Department of Clinical Psychology and Psychobiology, University of Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain 
2  Experimental Virtual Environments for Neuroscience and Technology (EVENT) Laboratory, Department of Clinical Psychology and Psychobiology, University of Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain; Sony Interactive Entertainment, Research and Development, California, United States 
3  Brain and Emotion Laboratory, Department of Cognitive Neuroscience, Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, Maastricht, The Netherlands; Wales Institute for Cognitive Neuroscience, School of Psychology, Bangor University, Bangor, Wales, United Kingdom 
4  Institut d’investigacions Biomèdiques August Pi i Sunyer, Systems Neuroscience, Barcelona, Spain 
5  Institut d’investigacions Biomèdiques August Pi i Sunyer, Systems Neuroscience, Barcelona, Spain; Experimental Virtual Environments for Neuroscience and Technology (EVENT) Laboratory, Department of Clinical Psychology and Psychobiology, University of Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain; RENCI, The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, North Carolina, United States 
6  Brain and Emotion Laboratory, Department of Cognitive Neuroscience, Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, Maastricht, The Netherlands 
7  Experimental Virtual Environments for Neuroscience and Technology (EVENT) Laboratory, Department of Clinical Psychology and Psychobiology, University of Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain; ICREA, Barcelona, Spain 
8  Institut d’investigacions Biomèdiques August Pi i Sunyer, Systems Neuroscience, Barcelona, Spain; Experimental Virtual Environments for Neuroscience and Technology (EVENT) Laboratory, Department of Clinical Psychology and Psychobiology, University of Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain; ICREA, Barcelona, Spain 
Pages
1-11
Publication year
2018
Publication date
Feb 2018
Publisher
Nature Publishing Group
e-ISSN
20452322
Source type
Scholarly Journal
Language of publication
English
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-018-19987-7
ProQuest document ID
2000013723
Copyright
© 2018. This work is published under http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (the “License”). Notwithstanding the ProQuest Terms and Conditions, you may use this content in accordance with the terms of the License.