Similar social presence effects when reaching for real and digital objects

Though digital images and real objects are represented differently at a neural level and can evoke different behaviours, little work has directly compared the magnitude of social effects on real and digitally represented stimuli. Object-directed reaches are modified in the near space of others, while image-directed reaches are not, but the exact role of the presence versus location of the other person is unknown (Dosso and Kingstone, 2018). The present work probed the unique contribution of social presence (a passive observer) in shaping object- and image-directed reaching behaviour. In a shape-matching game, movements were performed more slowly and less efficiently when participants were observed by the experimenter, regardless of whether participants handled real objects or digital images. Our finding that social presence affects real- and image-directed reaches similarly supports the continued use of computer-generated objects to approximate human behaviour towards real objects when social effects on object-directed actions are studied.