‘Prosocial’ virtual reality as tool for monitoring engagement in intergroup helping situations

The aim of the present work is to test a noninvasive procedure to test attentive and emotional resources in in helping situations where person in need belongs to another group in terms of ethnicity. At this purpose, we created a set of virtual scenarios by crossing two main crucial variables for help decision: ethnicity (white vs black actor) and helper appearance (business man, casual and beggar). During the VR session the participant’s attention, distraction and engagement were measured by means of EEG tool. Results pointed out that white helpers show higher levels of attention and engagement in counter-stereotypical situations during the giving session. The attention and engagement measures in VR settings shed a light on the role played by the helper’s expectations concerning ingroup/outgroup features and their potential effects on the helping decision.