## 2 Materials and Methods
### Experimental Process  
The present study employed a voluntary recruitment method to enlist a sample of 30 Chinese university students, aged between 20 and 30 years. All participants possessed prior experience residing and pursuing education in rural areas and demonstrated a comprehensive understanding of rural environments. Sensitivity analysis for this sample size was conducted using G*power. This analysis was performed considering a \(t\)-test for within-subjects design--with two conditions (after viewing current scenes and after viewing transformation scenes), of 0.05, and a power of 0.8. Thus, our sample can detect the effects of medium or large size. Participants were invited to participate on-site, and a summary of their basic information is provided in Table 2. All subjects possessed satisfactory visual acuity or had their eyesight corrected and were devoid of any mental disorders to ensure accurate identification of visual stimuli. We aimed to examine the disparity in EEG response between the transformed scene pair and the present scene, as well as explore the emotional alterations induced by the present scene by designing the transformed scene to influence the present scene. Consequently, we selected participants who had no prior exposure to both the original scenario and the modified scene. Given that all participants were seeing the scenario we presented for the first time, their emotions were stimulated for the first time as well. Consequently, the EEG response signals collected were genuine and impactful. Figure 4 illustrates the experimental methodology and setting employed in this investigation, along with the designated region for EEG measurements. The experiment was conducted in batches from 15 September to 25 September 2023, from 2:00 to 6.00 pm, due to the substantial number of participants. The studies were conducted within the Perceptual Engineering Laboratory, where the ambient temperature was consistently kept at 25\({}^{\circ}\). Additionally, no external distractions were present during the trials. The experiments were conducted utilizing an EEG device as a measuring instrument. The EEG device recorded data from 32 channels at a sampling rate of 500 Hz. We characterize the placements of 32-channel EEG electrodes based on the International 10-20 method. The utilization of selective channels is a commonly employed preprocessing technique in the analysis of EEG signals. It reduces the use of too many unnecessary steps [35; 36]. As the M1 and M2 electrodes are in the motor cortex, they are not considered to be part of the primary regions of the brain. POz electrodes are typically excluded from research investigations, \begin{table}
\begin{tabular}{c c c c} \hline \hline
**Item** & **Details** & **Frequency** & **\%** \\ \hline \multirow{2}{*}{Gender} & Male & 12 & 40 \\  & Female & 18 & 60 \\ \hline \multirow{2}{*}{Age} & 20–25 & 24 & 80 \\  & 26–30 & 6 & 20 \\ \hline \multirow{2}{*}{Education background} & Undergraduate & 2 & 6.67 \\  & Master & 28 & 93.33 \\ \hline \hline \end{tabular}
\end{table} 
Table 2: Participants’ basic information (n = 30). resulting in their eventual omission from analysis. EEG data were collected from 29 selected electrodes of the brain, including the frontal lobe (Fp1, Fpz, Fp2, F3, Fz, F4), left temporal lobe (F7, Fc5, T7, Cp5, P7), right temporal lobe (F8, Fc6, T8, Cp6, P8), central lobe (Fc1, Fc2, C3, Cz, C4), parietal lobe (Cp1, Cp2, P3, Pz, P4), and occipital lobe (O1, Oz, O2). The brain wave data were recorded using the SAGA64/32 portable EEG device from TIMS ([[https://www.tmsi.com/products/saga-32-64-128/](https://www.tmsi.com/products/saga-32-64-128/)]([https://www.tmsi.com/products/saga-32-64-128/](https://www.tmsi.com/products/saga-32-64-128/)) (accessed on 10 January 2024)). It is understood that short durations, like a 30 s window, are often used in psychological and cognitive research to assess immediate responses to stimuli, including those in VR environments.