Smartphone use can modify the body schema: An ERP study based on hand mental rotation task

A substantial body of prior work has documented the relationship between extensive smartphone use and individuals' psychological features, yet little is known about how smartphone influences people's body representation. Based on previous studies on tool embodiment, this study adapted the hand mental rotation paradigm to determine whether smartphone use would change the body schema. We compared smartphone users' behavioral performances and electrophysiological activities when presented with different stimuli. We found that people had faster and more accurate responses to smartphone in hand stimuli than other two stimuli. ERP results showed that N200 amplitude elicited by gesture of holding a phone stimuli was smaller than smartphone in hand stimuli, which was smaller than non-smartphone in hand stimuli. For the P300 component, gesture of holding a phone stimuli evoked larger P300 amplitude than non-smartphone in hand stimuli, and there was no significant difference in P300 amplitude between gesture of holding a phone stimuli and smartphone in hand stimuli. These results provide new evidence that smartphone is embodied into the body schema. It not only expands the research scope and field of tool embodiment but also provides insight into the impact of smartphone on individuals' body self.