Professor Marcel Brass | Investigating Group Influences on Motor and Social Cognition Using a Virtual Group Approach

Research on how groups influence individuals has a long-standing tradition in social psychology, exploring topics such as social contagion and conformity. However, the cognitive mechanisms underlying these group phenomena remain largely unexplored due to limited experimental control and the high costs of studies involving larger groups. Advances in virtual reality and gaming technology present new opportunities to study the effects of virtual groups on individual behavior and cognition, offering high experimental control in complex group settings. In my presentation, I will share examples of how we have used the virtual group approach to investigate topics such as the sensorimotor basis of social contagion, the experience of agency in groups, and collective rule breaking. These examples demonstrate how the virtual group approach can generate new insights into group-related phenomena.