One thing that stands out to me is the identification of feelings of disgust and anger to support that the VR setting can be used to elicit social change. This implies that the participants would not have felt disgust or anger had their avatar been male; or if it was a normal videogame; or if this wasn’t a game at all but a film instead; or if this wasn’t audiovisual but a book instead…
Genuinely, I’m not sure how you come to that conclusion from reading the paper, it’s very much not what the authors say. It never makes the claim that they wouldn’t have also felt that disgust and anger in an altered situation (male avatar etc.), only that there was a difference between the control group and the catcalled group, and that the difference was observable using their novel (and really cool) VR+AI methodology. That’s quite explicitly their entire thesis. They don’t investigate other scenarios, presumably because it was outside the scope of the research.
The conclusion from the paper:
Our study demonstrates that first-person virtual embodiment of a female target of catcalling is a useful method for eliciting morally salient negative emotions in male participants. Our findings indicate that this simulated experience goes beyond mere observation, inducing significant increases in disgust and anger – emotions intrinsically linked to moral evaluation and behavioral change. The study not only validates virtual reality as a tool for perspective-taking, but also introduces a novel computational approach to quantify the nuanced, implicit dimensions of this experience.
Our findings contribute to cognitive and methodological advancements as much as for promoting social safety. Employing virtual embodiment to enhance emotional sensitivity in men holds promise for both clinical and educational applications. In clinical settings, it may serve as an intervention to increase emotional awareness and empathy among individuals who have engaged in harassment, with the aim of modifying their behavior. In educational contexts, VR can be employed to simulate ecological environments that vividly illustrate the negative impact of street harassment, such as catcalling, by enabling participants to directly experience the emotional distress caused by such situations. Unlike real-world harassment, Virtual Reality simulation can be immediately terminated if distress becomes excessive, and it is able to offer embodiment experiences impossible through traditional methods.
They don’t say this can be used to fix catcalling or improve society on it’s own, just that the results seem to indicate there is a basis to believe that VR can elicit varying emotional responses between different scenarios and that we can measure the differences in reaction.
We hypothesize that this embodied experience will elicit morally salient emotions like disgust and anger. By inducing this moral discomfort, the intervention aims to foster self-awareness and encourage a reconsideration of the behavior’s impact, serving as a potential strategy to promote behavioral change.
It speaks to a truly fundemental lack of understanding of the scientific method, given you’re criticizing them for their hypothesis and presenting it like it’s their conclusion. That’s just not how science works.
So you’re talking about my reading on the paper, not the paper’s conclusion.
Yes, because your conclusion of what the paper is saying is absolutely not what the paper actually says.
Which is exactly what they in fact said in their hypothesis.
Yes, in their hypothesis. It seems evident that you don’t know what a hypothesis is in a scientific paper given you keep incorrectly presenting something taken from the hypothesis as a claim the authors are making.
This is so basic it’s literally taught in the first grade. You have absolutely no grounds from which to criticize this article if you do not even understand the basic structures of scientific inquiry, foremost in this particular discussion that the ideas in a hypothesis are by no means automatically going to be reflected in the conclusion.
I’ve never once claimed (or implied) that the author’s hypothesis wasn’t supported by their conclusion, just that basing your criticisms off the hypothesis belies a total lack of understanding for how the scientific process works - and showed that at that point you hadn’t even read the paper, or you could have simply quoted the relevant portion from the conclusion.
What I initially was pointing out is that this criticism,
This implies that the participants would not have felt disgust or anger had their avatar been male; or if it was a normal videogame; or if this wasn’t a game at all but a film instead; or if this wasn’t audiovisual but a book instead…
was completely baseless. It still is, too.
(my statement and the author’s conclusions absolutely agree, as well. I don’t… see how you could misinterpret that. It’s really explicitly clear.)
Genuinely, I’m not sure how you come to that conclusion from reading the paper, it’s very much not what the authors say. It never makes the claim that they wouldn’t have also felt that disgust and anger in an altered situation (male avatar etc.), only that there was a difference between the control group and the catcalled group, and that the difference was observable using their novel (and really cool) VR+AI methodology. That’s quite explicitly their entire thesis. They don’t investigate other scenarios, presumably because it was outside the scope of the research.
The conclusion from the paper:
They don’t say this can be used to fix catcalling or improve society on it’s own, just that the results seem to indicate there is a basis to believe that VR can elicit varying emotional responses between different scenarios and that we can measure the differences in reaction.
Here’s how I came to that conclusion.
That’s… the hypothesis.
Ok lol not sure where this is going, but we’re done.
It speaks to a truly fundemental lack of understanding of the scientific method, given you’re criticizing them for their hypothesis and presenting it like it’s their conclusion. That’s just not how science works.
Removed by mod
Yes, because your conclusion of what the paper is saying is absolutely not what the paper actually says.
Yes, in their hypothesis. It seems evident that you don’t know what a hypothesis is in a scientific paper given you keep incorrectly presenting something taken from the hypothesis as a claim the authors are making.
This is so basic it’s literally taught in the first grade. You have absolutely no grounds from which to criticize this article if you do not even understand the basic structures of scientific inquiry, foremost in this particular discussion that the ideas in a hypothesis are by no means automatically going to be reflected in the conclusion.
Removed by mod
I’ve never once claimed (or implied) that the author’s hypothesis wasn’t supported by their conclusion, just that basing your criticisms off the hypothesis belies a total lack of understanding for how the scientific process works - and showed that at that point you hadn’t even read the paper, or you could have simply quoted the relevant portion from the conclusion.
What I initially was pointing out is that this criticism,
was completely baseless. It still is, too.
(my statement and the author’s conclusions absolutely agree, as well. I don’t… see how you could misinterpret that. It’s really explicitly clear.)