{"id":3414,"date":"2014-11-06T23:33:05","date_gmt":"2014-11-07T04:33:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/?p=3414"},"modified":"2014-11-06T23:33:05","modified_gmt":"2014-11-07T04:33:05","slug":"this-robot-makes-you-feel-like-theres-someone-behind-you","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/this-robot-makes-you-feel-like-theres-someone-behind-you\/","title":{"rendered":"This robot makes you feel like there\u2019s someone behind you"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_3415\" style=\"width: 537px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/11\/ghost_currentbiology_AlainHerzog.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-3415\" class=\"wp-image-3415\" src=\"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/11\/ghost_currentbiology_AlainHerzog.jpg\" alt=\"A volunteer holds a robot devised to make her feel as though she\u2019s reaching out in front of her and, at the same touching her own back. (Credit: Alain Herzog\/EPFL)\" width=\"527\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/11\/ghost_currentbiology_AlainHerzog.jpg 720w, http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/11\/ghost_currentbiology_AlainHerzog-300x170.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 527px) 100vw, 527px\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-3415\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">A volunteer holds a robot devised to make her feel as though she\u2019s reaching out in front of her and, at the same touching her own back. (Credit: Alain Herzog\/EPFL)<\/p><\/div>\n<p>A new study sheds light on the mechanisms underlying the \u201cfeeling of presence\u201d phenomenon, where people feel like there is a presence with them in a room even though they are alone. Scientists usually attribute this feeling to medical conditions such epilepsy, stroke, migraine and tumors.<\/p>\n<p>Researchers have now devised a robot capable of giving otherwise healthy people a &#8220;feeling of a presence&#8221; phenomenon by making them feel as though they were reaching out in front of them and touching their own backs. The brains of participants, unable to process the mixed-up signals, then generate an illusory experience that the felt touch was not caused by themselves, but by another person behind them.<\/p>\n<p>The findings could help further our understanding of hallucinations and schizophrenia.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.cell.com\/current-biology\/abstract\/S0960-9822(14)01212-3\" target=\"_blank\"><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">Original research paper<\/span><\/a>\u00a0published in <em>Current Biology\u00a0<\/em>on\u00a0<span class=\"aBn\" tabindex=\"0\" data-term=\"goog_453723367\"><span class=\"aQJ\"><strong>November 6, 2014<\/strong>.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><em><strong>Names and affiliations of selected\u00a0authors<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/p>\n<h4>Olaf Blanke, University Hospital of Geneva, Switzerland<\/h4>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A new study sheds light on the mechanisms underlying the \u201cfeeling of presence\u201d phenomenon, where people feel like there is a presence with them in a room even though they are alone. Scientists usually attribute this feeling to medical conditions such epilepsy, stroke, migraine and tumors. Researchers have now devised a robot capable of giving [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":3415,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[25],"tags":[51,53,1000,200],"class_list":["post-3414","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-paper-of-interest","tag-health","tag-medicine","tag-mental-health","tag-neurology"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/11\/ghost_currentbiology_AlainHerzog.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4DqbN-T4","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3414","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3414"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3414\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3417,"href":"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3414\/revisions\/3417"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3415"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3414"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3414"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sciencemediacentre.ca\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3414"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}