Final Project: Concept
Final Project: Development Plan
How does Virtual Reality impact on our body? What are the neurological responses to a VR experience?
“Final Sense” is designed to better understand neurological processes during a VR experience and to enable critical discussion about contemporary applications of technology. The wearable will be used during the “body swap” experience in the multisensory system “The Machine To Be Another”, created by the artist collective BeAnotherLab. The bracelet includes a GRS (or EDA or galvanic skin) sensor to measure electro-dermal activity. Sweat glands are controlled by the sympathetic nervous system. Hence the electric conductance of the skin offers an indication of neurological excitement. The generated data activates 15 LEDs according to biosignal intensity. The neurological data will be discussed with the user and anonymously collected for further analysis as part of my PhD in Social Anthropology.
The device will be used in the work of the artist collective BeAnotherLab and become intergrated in the multi-sensory system the Lab developed: The Machine To Be Another (see context description below). The generated data will inform our research in the fields of rehabilitation & therapy; education; conflict mediation & resolution. As approximately 10.000 persons have tried the Machine between 2012 and 2016 I hope that a large but anonymous data set can tell us more about the different stages the user goes through while being "in the Machine". I was reluctant to make something with no additional value apart from my learning experience. Developing a device that measures neurological responses during a VR experience allows me to combine forces across fieldsites. The generated analysis will inform my PhD research in Social Anthropology creating a toolbox of new methods within the discipline.
BeAnotherLab is an independent, interdisciplinary research collective. Since 2012 we develop multi-sensory systems based on our key invention The Machine To Be Another by combining digital technology, performance art and interaction protocols from neuroscientific research. We create interactions and sense stimulations for the medium of Embodied Virtual Reality to research the relationship between identity and empathy. The Lab questions and subverts hierarchies between different ways of knowing, namely art, science and technology; instead approaching these as complementary, overlapping bodies of knowledge. We aim to stimulate ambiguity tolerance, self-understanding and to actively increase empathy. Our work seeks to reduce negative bias and empower narratives from marginalised communities through embodied storytelling and perspective taking. Projects wit The Machine To Be Another are grounded in an action-research method that seeks to engage individuals and communities in the design, development and research across borders to build a “culture of peace”. We present our work in festivals, exhibitions, conferences etc. and offer talks, workshops and consultancy services in the fields of communication, therapy, conflict mediation and resolution as well as technology development. We currently work on scaling up the project to provide the Machine in libraries, universities and social or cultural centers. Our work is protected by a Creative Commons noncommercial sharealike license.
The Machine enables the unique experience of interacting with another person by perceiving oneself in the other´s body - in real time. While users interact with each other in a playful manner, the team stimulates the "body transfer illusion" by engaging users in interaction protocols taken from neuroscientific research. These interaction protocols conflate visual and tactile sensory inputs, which trigger the strangely embodied but out-of-my-body experience, a "brain hack". This can be very powerful, liminal and potentially transformative. Users often have the urge to hug each other after the Machine, even if they were complete strangers.
The prototype of the Machine was initiated during the MA program in Digital Arts at the Universitat Pompeu Fabra in Barcelona in 2012. The first video documentation "Gender Swap" published in early 2014 generated 3.4 million views. We have developed the basic "body swap" set up in a wide range of further experiences, most importantly the variations of "embodied storytelling". The technological set up involves two VR headsets, two cameras, two computers and many cables. The code is on github. See the turorial of how to do the body swap here.
BeAnotherLab´s interaction protocols are inspired by embodiment research conducted by the Event Lab in BCN and the Ehrsson Lab in Stockholm. The Event Lab works with artifical VR envrionments. The team around Mel Slater demonstrated that implicit racial bias could be reduced when a white person experiences themself as a black avatar in VR. The Ehrsson Lab research the sense of body ownership we have eg through the "rubberhand illusion" or the "manequin experiments". Both Labs could show that body immersion or the body transfer illusion occurs when tactile and visual sensory input overlap. Lacking the expansive technology of these Labs and wanting to work with "real people", we went for a DIY neuroscience approach. Incorporating protocols that would generate the body transfer illusion into an artistic context gave us the freedom to experiment apart from the constraints of scientific research. In consequence we created an instrument, tool or system relevant for institutionalised scientific research today.
To explain how VR works on the embodied mind to create the illusion of physical presence: There are at least two main aspects to generate the experience of "presence": attention and immersive sensorimotor couplings. Attention is key as a person can be present or not in any task regardless of its apparent immersiveness. For example, you can have a high sense of presence when playing a Game Boy, or not haveing a high sense of presence at all in "actual reality". Combining attention with sensorimotor capabilities makes VR particularly powerful for providing the sense of presence. Sensorimotor capabilities describe for example the ability to turn the head to one side and have the image correspond to such movements. This, together with a full-view first person perspective makes VR different from other media and render it a highly immersive technology. Having said that, good films and literature surely are highly immersive technologies as well, which can show us the world through another person's eyes and make us feel their personal truths. The difference between VR and books or films is the sense of physical presence and movement, while the difference between any of these technologies and The Machine To Be Another is it´s social dimension. Whereas VR often transports the user as an avatar in an artificial gaming environment, the Machine combines the presence of VR with the active engagement with another person in real time. It is a unique system.
Media Features: Motherboard Vice; Wired; Verge; BBC; El País; The New York Times; LeMonde.fr, Gizmodo; HuffPost Live; designboom; Business Insider; engadged; Elle US; The Discovery Channel Canada;
Recently presented & exhibited at: EU Culture Forum, Brussels 2016; Humans+ The Future of Our Species at CCCB, BCN 2015/16; 70th United Nations General Assembly, NYC 2015; Tribeca Film Festival, NYC 2015; LesArc Film Festival, France 2015; IDFA, Amsterdam 2014; MIT Cultural Runners 2014;
Awards: N.I.C.E Award (2015); Laval Virtual Learning Sciences and Humanities Award (2014); Ars Electronica Honorary Mention (2014); Fast Company Innovation by Design finalist (alongside Google and MIT Media Lab; 2014).
Past & Present Academic Collaborations: MIT, Yale University, Pace University (USA); Max Planck Institute (Germany); L’Université Paris Descartes (France); Universitat Pompeu Fabra (Spain); Unifesp, Poli-USP (Brazil); Universidad Iberoamericana (Mexico).