14 ms·
Neural anticipation of virtual infection triggers an immune response
- Terr_ 1y agoSo if I'm reading this right, subjects wore a VR headset and had simulated avatars approaching into their personal-space, where some looked neutral, healthy-but-afraid, and some visibly-diseased. Another set of subjects had no VR exposure, but were given a flu-vaccine shot. It seems seeing "diseased" humans, much like getting a flu-shot, correlates with an increase in certain immune-activity measures in blood.