The first-person narrative is an excellent way through which a reader can get into the mind or imagination of the narrator. It is an intimate expression of emotions and portrays one’s thoughts. Every narrator has their uniqueness from the perspective of themselves or the world around them. The first-person perspective brings out this significant part as one speaks highly of themselves and radiates energy and confidence. Nevertheless, most people have a weakness which leads to dissatisfaction with the physical self when the overestimation of body sizes is done virtually; hence, affecting the power of the first-person narrative (Banakou et al. 2013).
Besides, people tend to hide the part of their physical selves that they are not comfortable with. For instance, for a lady with lots of fat around her tummy, she can choose to hide it by wearing very baggy clothes, which ends up covering her beauty and curves. This is seen in experiments with virtual bodies, where participants who show discomfort in their posture change their feelings when presented with a virtual collection of their own, with a comfortable position. Thus, body ownership illusion can affect psychological states of people; hence, their first-person perspectives (Bergström et al., 2016). The narrative is usually incomplete when the narrator does not fully show their feelings and emotions.
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One of the significant reasons for physical self-discomfort is having an extreme body-size, that is, being too thick or thin. I have had a bad experience, whereby people bullied me because I was too small. When I walked with other girls with good body figures, people would mock me saying that I was trying too hard to fit where I did not belong. It was devastating because deep down, I knew I was a brilliant person and kind to people, yet they could not see that in me. The discomfort affected my authenticity and body ownership illusion.
Overly, extreme body sizes may be a source of discomfort and lack of confidence, which, in turn, hurts the first-person narrative.
References
Banakou, D., Groten, R., & Slater, M. (2013). Illusory ownership of a virtual child body causes overestimation of object sizes and implicit attitude changes. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences , 110 (31), 12846-12851.
Bergström, I., Kilteni, K., & Slater, M. (2016). First-person perspective virtual body posture influences stress: a virtual reality body ownership study. PloS one , 11 (2).
