perceptions of others along the warm-cold dimension can be elicited by sensory experiences (e.g., physical warmth).
Here we show that effects of this kind can also be triggered by mentally simulating physical temperature, but only under certain theoretically important imagery conditions. Specifically, impressions of a target were impacted by imagined warmth or coldness (i.e., thinking about holding a cup of hot/iced coffee) only when an event was simulated from an egocentric (i.e., first-person) perspective. No such effect emerged when an allocentric (i.e., third-person) orientation was adopted. This finding underscores the functional nature of mental simulation
and identifies spatial visual perspective as a critical boundary condition of embodied cognition.