Scientists Create the Strange Sensation of Invisibility in Humans.

Have you ever felt invisible? Scientists have managed to create the perceptual illusion of having an invisible body, which may change our physical stress response in challenging social situations.

Recent studies have actually shown that it's possible to cloak objects and cause them to be invisible. In fact, in the not-too-distant future we may be able to apply similar principles to the human body. However, it's unknown how invisibility would affect our brain and body perception.

That's why researchers conducted this latest study. The scientists conducted an experiment where the participant stood up and wore a set of head-mounted displays. The volunteer was then asked to look down at her body, but instead of her real body, she saw empty space. To evoke the feeling of having an invisible body, the researchers then touched the participant's body in various locations with a large paintbrush while, with another paintbrush held in the other hand, exactly mimicked the movements in midair in full view of the volunteer.

"Within less than a minute, the majority of the participants started to transfer the sensation of touch to the portion of empty space where they saw the paintbrush move and experienced an invisible body in that position," said Arvid Guterstam, lead author of the new study, in a news release. "We showed in a previous study that the same illusion can be created for a single hand. The present study demonstrates that the 'invisible hand illusion' can, surprisingly, be extended to an entire invisible body."

The scientists conducted the experiment with 125 participants in all. The researchers also examined whether the feeling of invisibility affected social anxiety by placing the participants in front of an audience of strangers while the illusion was ongoing.

"We found that their heart rate and self-reported stress level during the 'performance' was lower when they immediately prior had experienced the invisible body illusion compared to when they experienced having a physical body," said Guterstam. "These results are interesting because they show that the perceived physical quality of the body can change the way our brain processes social cues."

The findings may help future clinical research, such as developing new therapies for social anxiety disorder.

The findings are published in the journal Scientific Reports.

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