Original Rubber Hand Experiment

In 1998 researchers matthew botvinick and jonathan cohen of the university of pittsburgh pa detailed an experiment that people would later refer to as the rubber hand illusion rhi.

Original rubber hand experiment. The experimenter stood in front of each seated participant who was asked to extend both arms on the table. Since earlier work suggests a right hemispheric dominance for body ownership experience ocklenburg et al 2011 our current experiment was administered only to each participant s left hand and a corresponding rubber hand was employed. It can be induced experimentally by manipulating the visual perspective of the subject and also supplying visual and sensory signals which correlate to the subject s body. Body transfer illusion is the illusion of owning either a part of a body or an entire body other than one s own thus it is sometimes referred to as body ownership in the research literature.

Watch how you can trick your brain by stroking a fake rubber hand and your real hand at. A cloth covered the stump of the hand but the fingers remained visible.