Cindy Lombart, Guillaume Moreau, Jean-Marie Normand, Adrien Verhulst, Maki Sugimoto, Centre de recherche nantais Architectures Urbanités (CRENAU), Ambiances, Architectures, Urbanités (AAU ), École nationale supérieure d'architecture de Nantes (ENSA Nantes)-Ministère de la Culture et de la Communication (MCC)-École nationale supérieure d'architecture de Grenoble (ENSAG)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-École Centrale de Nantes (ECN)-École nationale supérieure d'architecture de Nantes (ENSA Nantes)-Ministère de la Culture et de la Communication (MCC)-École nationale supérieure d'architecture de Grenoble (ENSAG)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-École Centrale de Nantes (ECN), École nationale supérieure d'architecture de Nantes (ENSA Nantes)-Ministère de la Culture et de la Communication (MCC)-École nationale supérieure d'architecture de Grenoble (ENSAG)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-École Centrale de Nantes (ECN), 3D interaction with virtual environments using body and mind (Hybrid), Inria Rennes – Bretagne Atlantique, Institut National de Recherche en Informatique et en Automatique (Inria)-Institut National de Recherche en Informatique et en Automatique (Inria)-MEDIA ET INTERACTIONS (IRISA-D6), Institut de Recherche en Informatique et Systèmes Aléatoires (IRISA), Université de Bretagne Sud (UBS)-Institut National des Sciences Appliquées - Rennes (INSA Rennes), Institut National des Sciences Appliquées (INSA)-Université de Rennes (UNIV-RENNES)-Institut National des Sciences Appliquées (INSA)-Université de Rennes (UNIV-RENNES)-Institut National de Recherche en Informatique et en Automatique (Inria)-École normale supérieure - Rennes (ENS Rennes)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-Université de Rennes 1 (UR1), Université de Rennes (UNIV-RENNES)-CentraleSupélec-IMT Atlantique Bretagne-Pays de la Loire (IMT Atlantique), Institut Mines-Télécom [Paris] (IMT)-Institut Mines-Télécom [Paris] (IMT)-Université de Bretagne Sud (UBS)-Institut National des Sciences Appliquées - Rennes (INSA Rennes), Institut Mines-Télécom [Paris] (IMT)-Institut Mines-Télécom [Paris] (IMT)-Institut de Recherche en Informatique et Systèmes Aléatoires (IRISA), Institut National des Sciences Appliquées (INSA)-Université de Rennes (UNIV-RENNES)-Institut National des Sciences Appliquées (INSA)-Université de Rennes (UNIV-RENNES)-École normale supérieure - Rennes (ENS Rennes)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-Université de Rennes 1 (UR1), Institut Mines-Télécom [Paris] (IMT)-Institut Mines-Télécom [Paris] (IMT), École Centrale de Nantes (ECN), Audencia Recherche, Audencia Business School, Keio University, École Centrale de Nantes (ECN)-École nationale supérieure d'architecture de Nantes (ENSA Nantes)-École nationale supérieure d'architecture de Grenoble (ENSAG)-Ministère de la Culture et de la Communication (MCC)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-École Centrale de Nantes (ECN)-École nationale supérieure d'architecture de Nantes (ENSA Nantes)-École nationale supérieure d'architecture de Grenoble (ENSAG)-Ministère de la Culture et de la Communication (MCC)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), École Centrale de Nantes (ECN)-École nationale supérieure d'architecture de Nantes (ENSA Nantes)-École nationale supérieure d'architecture de Grenoble (ENSAG)-Ministère de la Culture et de la Communication (MCC)-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Université de Rennes (UR)-Institut National des Sciences Appliquées - Rennes (INSA Rennes), Institut National des Sciences Appliquées (INSA)-Institut National des Sciences Appliquées (INSA)-Université de Bretagne Sud (UBS)-École normale supérieure - Rennes (ENS Rennes)-Institut National de Recherche en Informatique et en Automatique (Inria)-CentraleSupélec-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-IMT Atlantique (IMT Atlantique), Institut Mines-Télécom [Paris] (IMT)-Institut Mines-Télécom [Paris] (IMT)-Université de Rennes (UR)-Institut National des Sciences Appliquées - Rennes (INSA Rennes), and Institut National des Sciences Appliquées (INSA)-Institut National des Sciences Appliquées (INSA)-Université de Bretagne Sud (UBS)-École normale supérieure - Rennes (ENS Rennes)-CentraleSupélec-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-IMT Atlantique (IMT Atlantique)
International audience; Research in Virtual Reality (VR) showed that embodiment can influence participants' perceptions and behavior when embodied in a different yet plausible virtual body. In this paper, we study the changes an obese virtual body has on products perception (e.g., taste, etc.) and purchase behavior (e.g., number purchased) in an immersive virtual retail store. Participants (of a normal BMI on average) were embodied in a normal (N) or an obese (OB) virtual body and were asked to buy and evaluate food products in the immersive virtual store. Based on stereotypes that are classically associated with obese people, we expected that the group embodied in obese avatars would show a more unhealthy diet, (i.e., buy more food products and also buy more products with high energy intake, or saturated fat) and would rate unhealthy food as being tastier and healthier than participants embodied in "normal weight" avatars. Our participants also rated the perception of their virtual body: the OB group perceived their virtual body as significantly heavier and older. They also rated their sense of embodiment and presence within the immersive virtual store. These measures did not show any significant difference between groups. Finally, we asked them to rate different food products in terms of tastiness, healthiness, sustainability and price. The only difference we noticed is that participants embodied in an obese avatar (OB group) rated the coke as being significantly tastier and the apple as being significantly healthier. Nevertheless, while we hypothesized that participants embodied in a virtual body with obesity would show differences in their shopping patterns (e.g., more "unhealthy" products bought) there were no significant differences between the groups. Stereotype activation failed for our participants embodied in obese avatars, who did not exhibit a shopping behavior following the (negative) stereotypes related to obese people. conversely, while the opposite hypothesis (participants embodied in obese avatars would buy significantly more healthy products in order to "transform" their virtual bodies) could have been made, it was not the case either. We discuss these results and propose hypotheses as to why the behavior of the manipulated group differed from the one we expected. Verhulst et al. Shopping in an Obese Virtual Body Indeed, unlike previous research, our participants were embodied in virtual avatars which differed greatly from their real bodies. Obese avatars should not only modify users' visual characteristics such as hair or skin color, etc. We hypothesize that an obese virtual body may require some other non-visual stimulus, e.g., the sensation of the extra weight or the change in body size. This main difference could then explain why we did not notice any important modification on participants' behavior and perceptions of food products. We also hypothesize that the absence of stereotype activation and thus of statistical difference between our N and OB groups might be due to higher-level cognitive processes involved while purchasing food products. Indeed our participants might have rejected their virtual bodies when performing the shopping task, while the embodiment and presence ratings did not show significant differences, and purchased products based on their real (non-obese) bodies. This could mean that stereotype activation is more complex that previously thought.