British experts used the brain's ability to bring together information from different senses to make white people feel that they were inhabiting black bodies and adults feel like they had children's bodies.

 

They hope the technique could be developed as a treatment for racism, religious hatred², and gender³ inequality.

 

The researchers say the results are 'remarkable⁴' and have important implications for approaching phenomena⁵ such as race and gender discrimination.

 

Negative attitudes about others are often formed at a young age, and they're thought to remain relatively⁶ stable throughout adulthood⁷.

 

'Our findings are important as they motivate a new research area into how self-identity is constructed and how the boundaries between 'ingroups' and 'outgroups' might be altered,' says Professor Manos Tsakiris.

 

'More importantly though, from a societal point of view, our methods and findings might help us understand how to approach phenomena such as racism, religious hatred, and gender inequality discrimination, since the methods offer the opportunity for people to experience the world from the perspective of someone different from themselves.'

 

Once you change people's representations of what their bodies are like, then you can change their social cognition, which is the way in which we relate to others.'

 

While there is no simple 'cure' for racism or other biases⁸, 'the research shows that integration⁹ of different sensory¹⁰ signals can allow the brain to update its model of the body and cause people to change their attitudes about others,' says Professor Mel Slater of University College London and the University of Barcelona.

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