Our paper “Probing high-stakes performance pressure in virtual reality: physiological and personality attributes of behavioral responses” by Pei-Cheng Shih, Adrien Verhulst, Masato Hirano, Shunichi Kasahara, and Shinichi Furuya has been published in Computers in Human Behavior Reports (open access).
Thirty expert pianists performed in immersive virtual reality under conditions designed to evoke high-stakes pressure, including a rare “jackpot” trial with a higher reward and a larger virtual audience. Under pressure, they showed higher heart rate and electrodermal activity, took longer to start playing, and looked longer at the virtual jury afterwards. Half of them played better and half made more errors, a difference that may relate to trait conscientiousness.
Shih, P.-C., Verhulst, A., Hirano, M., Kasahara, S., & Furuya, S. Computers in Human Behavior Reports 23: 101222. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chbr.2026.101222