Dataset Information

The rubber hand illusion induced by visual-thermal stimulation.

ABSTRACT: In the rubber hand illusion (RHI), synchronous touch of a real hand and an artificial hand leads to the feeling of the artificial hand belonging to one's own body. This study examined whether the RHI can be induced using visual-thermal instead of visual-tactile stimulus patterns and to which extent the congruency between temperature and colour of the visual stimulus influences the RHI. In a within-subject design, we presented cold vs. warm thermal stimuli to the participants' hidden hand combined with red vs. blue visual stimuli presented synchronously vs. asynchronously at a fake hand. The RHI could be induced using visual-thermal stimuli, yielding RHI vividness ratings comparable to the visual-tactile variant. Congruent (warm-red, cold-blue) synchronous stimulus patterns led to higher RHI vividness than incongruent (warm-blue, cold-red) synchronous combinations; in the asynchronous conditions, an inverse effect was present. Temperature ratings mainly depended on the actual stimulus temperature and were higher with synchronous vs. asynchronous patterns; they were also slightly higher with red vs. blue light, but there were no interactions with temperature or synchrony. In conclusion, we demonstrated that the RHI can be induced via visual-thermal stimuli, opening new perspectives in research on multi-sensory integration and body representations.

SUBMITTER: Trojan J

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6102275 | biostudies-literature | 2018 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

ACCESS DATA

Publications

The rubber hand illusion induced by visual-thermal stimulation.

Trojan Jörg J Fuchs Xaver X Speth Sophie-Louise SL Diers Martin M

Scientific reports 20180820 1

In the rubber hand illusion (RHI), synchronous touch of a real hand and an artificial hand leads to the feeling of the artificial hand belonging to one's own body. This study examined whether the RHI can be induced using visual-thermal instead of visual-tactile stimulus patterns and to which extent the congruency between temperature and colour of the visual stimulus influences the RHI. In a within-subject design, we presented cold vs. warm thermal stimuli to the participants' hidden hand combine ...[more]

PMID: 30127441

Similar Datasets

Project description:Tactile feedback plays a vital role in inducing ownership and improving motor control of prosthetic hands. However, commercially available prosthetic hands typically do not provide tactile feedback and because of that the prosthetic user must rely on visual input to adjust the grip. The classical rubber hand illusion (RHI) where a brush is stroking the rubber hand, and the user's hidden hand synchronously can induce ownership of a rubber hand. In the classic RHI the stimulation is modality-matched, meaning that the stimulus on the real hand matches the stimulus on the rubber hand. The RHI has also been used in previous studies with a prosthetic hand as the "rubber hand," suggesting that a hand prosthesis can be incorporated within the amputee's body scheme. Interestingly, previous studies have shown that stimulation with a mismatched modality, where the rubber hand was brushed, and vibrations were felt on the hidden hand also induced the RHI. The aim of this study was to compare how well mechanotactile, vibrotactile, and electrotactile feedback induced the RHI in able-bodied participants and forearm amputees. 27 participants with intact hands and three transradial amputees took part in a modified RHI experiment. The rubber hand was stroked with a brush, and the participant's hidden hand/residual limb received stimulation with either brush stroking, electricity, pressure, or vibration. The three latter stimulations were modality mismatched with regard to the brushstroke. Participants were tested for ten different combinations (stimulation blocks) where the stimulations were applied on the volar (glabrous skin), and dorsal (hairy skin) sides of the hand. Outcome was assessed using two standard tests (questionnaire and proprioceptive drift). All types of stimulation induced RHI but electrical and vibration stimulation induced a stronger RHI than pressure. After completing more stimulation blocks, the proprioceptive drift test showed that the difference between pre- and post-test was reduced. This indicates that the illusion was drifting toward the rubber hand further into the session.

Project description:Recent evidence suggests that imagined auditory and visual sensory stimuli can be integrated with real sensory information from a different sensory modality to change the perception of external events via cross-modal multisensory integration mechanisms. Here, we explored whether imagined voluntary movements can integrate visual and proprioceptive cues to change how we perceive our own limbs in space. Participants viewed a robotic hand wearing a glove repetitively moving its right index finger up and down at a frequency of 1 Hz, while they imagined executing the corresponding movements synchronously or asynchronously (kinesthetic-motor imagery); electromyography (EMG) from the participants' right index flexor muscle confirmed that the participants kept their hand relaxed while imagining the movements. The questionnaire results revealed that the synchronously imagined movements elicited illusory ownership and a sense of agency over the moving robotic hand-the moving rubber hand illusion-compared with asynchronously imagined movements; individuals who affirmed experiencing the illusion with real synchronous movement also did so with synchronous imagined movements. The results from a proprioceptive drift task further demonstrated a shift in the perceived location of the participants' real hand toward the robotic hand in the synchronous versus the asynchronous motor imagery condition. These results suggest that kinesthetic motor imagery can be used to replace veridical congruent somatosensory feedback from a moving finger in the moving rubber hand illusion to trigger illusory body ownership and agency, but only if the temporal congruence rule of the illusion is obeyed. This observation extends previous studies on the integration of mental imagery and sensory perception to the case of multisensory bodily awareness, which has potentially important implications for research into embodiment of brain-computer interface controlled robotic prostheses and computer-generated limbs in virtual reality.

Dataset Information

The rubber hand illusion induced by visual-thermal stimulation.

Publications

The rubber hand illusion induced by visual-thermal stimulation.

Similar Datasets

OmicsDI is part of the ELIXIR infrastructure

Tweets