Vicarious experiences and detection accuracy while observing pain and touch: The effect of perspective taking

Abstract

In this study, we investigated the effects of observing pain and touch in others on vicarious somatosensory experiences and the detection of subtle somatosensory stimuli. Furthermore, the effect of taking a first-versus a third-person perspective was investigated. Undergraduates (N = 57) viewed videos depicting hands being pricked (pain), hands being touched by a cotton swab (touch), and control scenes (same approaching movement of a hand as in the other video categories, but without the painful/touching object) while experiencing vibrotactile stimuli themselves on the left, on the right, or on both hands. Participants reported the location at which they felt a somatosensory stimulus. The vibrotactile stimuli and visual scenes were applied in a spatially congruent or incongruent way, and other trials were presented without vibrotactile stimuli. The videos were depicted in first-person perspective and third-person perspective (i.e., the videos were shown upside down). We calculated the proportions of correct responses and false alarms (i.e., numbers of trials on which a vicarious somatosensory experience was reported congruent or incongruent to the site of the visual information). Painrelated scenes facilitated the detection of tactile stimuli and augmented the number of vicarious somatosensory experiences, as compared with observing the touch or control videos. Detection accuracy was higher for videos depicted in first-person perspective than for those in third-person perspective. Perspective had no effect on the number of vicarious somatosensory experiences. This study indicates that somatosensory detection is particularly enhanced during the observation of pain-related scenes, as compared to the observation of touch or control videos. These research findings further demonstrate that perspective taking impacts somatosensory detection, but not the report of vicarious experiences.

The role of the right temporoparietal junction in the elicitation of vicarious experiences and detection accuracy while observing pain and touch

“…This is again in line with the findings of other studies demonstrating that observing somatosensation may facilitate somatosensory experiences (e.g. Cardini et al, 2013;Serino et al, 2008;Vandenbroucke et al, 2015). Our results suggest that the different video categories (touch, pain, control) may modulate somatosensation differently.…”

“…In line with previous research (Vandenbroucke et al, 2015), our results show that participants reported more vicarious somatosensory experiences when pain-related videos were shown compared with control and touch videos. The presentation of touch did not enhance the report of vicarious experiences compared with control videos, illustrating the specific modulatory effects of observing pain compared with touch.…”

“…These results are in line with previous research demonstrating an increased number of neglect errors in which participants only report sensory experiences on the side congruent with the visual stimuli when this contained pain-related information compared with control stimuli (Vandenbroucke et al, 2014a(Vandenbroucke et al, ,2014bVandenbroucke et al, 2015). In general we can say that observing pain-related information increases the likelihood of reporting tactile stimulation, particularly at a location congruent with the pain observed in the video.…”

“…Furthermore, in a recent study, we showed that detection accuracy of somatosensory stimuli of low intensity was generally higher for videos depicted in first-4 person perspective compared with third-person perspective (180° angle) irrespective of the content of the video (e.g. pain-related, touch or control) (Vandenbroucke et al, 2015).…”

Modulating vicarious tactile perception with transcranial electrical current stimulation

“…dummy body parts). Previous behavioural research has also found that viewing touch to hands in a first‐ vs. third‐person perspective can influence task performance (Vandenbroucke et al ., ), but whether visual perspective influences performance change following brain stimulation has not been studied. Additional work is therefore needed to (i) examine the replicability of findings indicating that increasing excitability within the somatosensory system can induce MTS in non‐synaesthete controls and (ii) consider how variations in stimulus presentation (e.g.…”