Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Consciousness and Cognition journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/concog Influence of cognitive stance and physical perspective on subjective and autonomic reactivity to observed pain and pleasure: An immersive virtual reality study M. Fusaro a,c, ⁎ ,1 , G. Tieri a,c,1 , S.M. Aglioti a,b, ⁎ a Fondazione Santa Lucia, IRCCS, Rome, Italy b SCNLab, Department of Psychology, University of Rome “La Sapienza”, Rome, Italy c Unitelma Sapienza, Rome, Italy ARTICLE INFO Keywords: Empathy Vicarious Pain Pleasant touch Feeling of Ownership Immersive Virtual Reality Cognitive and physical perspective-taking ABSTRACT Observing others’ pain may induce a reaction called personal distress that may be influenced by top-down (imagine self or other in pain, i.e., self- vs other-oriented stance) and bottom-up (physical perspective of those who suffer, i.e., first vs third person perspective- 1PP vs 3PP) processes. The different contributions of these processes have not been teased apart. By capita- lizing on the power of Immersive Virtual Reality, we explored how behavioural (subjective ratings) and physiological reactivity (skin conductance reactivity, SCR) to pain and pleasure delivered to an avatar was influenced by Cognitive stance and Physical perspective. Taking an Other-Oriented stance leads to attributing higher congruent valence (i.e. pain rated as unpleasant and pleasure as pleasant) and intensity to the stimuli and induces reduced SCR. Ownership over the virtual limb was maximal in 1PP where physiological reactivity to the stimuli was compar- able. Our results highlight different components underpinning reactivity to pain and pleasure. 1. Introduction The inter-individual sharing of emotions, feelings and beliefs characterize human social interactions, a condition that is con- stitutive of empathy. This multidimensional construct includes a variety of components ranging from the automatic and involuntary reactivity that occurs on the self when we see others (e.g. sensorimotor contagion) to the other-oriented stance that allows us to understand others through cognition (e.g. perspective-taking) (Davis, 1980; Decety & Jackson, 2004). Studies on empathy for pain indicate that people who see or imagine others in pain tend to empathically share what others feel at both behavioral and neural levels (Betti and Aglioti, 2016; Lamm, Decety, & Singer, 2011). Contrary to empathic concern (which maintains a clear self-other distinction), sensorimotor contagion is likely to (1) increase the personal distress in the observer (e.g. when witnessing painful stimuli being delivered to others) (Batson et al., 1997) and (2) lead to ego-centered reactivity. In contrast, perspective-taking, i.e. the mechanism that allows one to project self upon another individual (Davis, 1980), may allow one to take a distinct stance and https://doi.org/10.1016/j.concog.2018.11.010 Received 7 August 2018; Received in revised form 9 November 2018; Accepted 27 November 2018 Abbreviations: 1PP, first-Person Perspective; 3PP, third-Person Perspective; HMD, Head Mounted Display; IVR, Immersive Virtual Reality; SCR, Skin Conductance Response; FO, Feeling of Ownership; IRI, Interpersonal Reactivity Index; EPS, Empathy for Pain Scale; STQ, Social Touch Questionnaire ⁎ Corresponding authors at: Department of Psychology, University of Rome “La Sapienza”, Via dei Marsi, 00185 Rome, Italy and Fondazione Santa Lucia, Via Ardeatina 306, Rome, Italy. E-mail addresses: martina.fusaro@uniroma1.it (M. Fusaro), salvatoremaria.aglioti@uniroma1.it (S.M. Aglioti). 1 These authors contributed equally to this work. Consciousness and Cognition 67 (2019) 86–97 1053-8100/ © 2018 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. T