  Emotions are multifaceted phenomena that affect our behaviour, perception,
and cognition. Increasing evidence indicates that induction mechanisms play a
crucial role in triggering emotions by simulating the sensations required for
an experimental design. Over the years, many reviews have evaluated a passive
elicitation mechanism where the user is an observer, ignoring the importance of
self-relevance in emotional experience. So, in response to the gap in the
literature, this study intends to explore the possibility of using Virtual
Reality (VR) as an active mechanism for emotion induction. Furthermore, for the
success and quality of research settings, VR must select the appropriate
material to effectively evoke emotions. Therefore, in the present review, we
evaluated to what extent VR visual and audio-visual stimuli, games, and tasks,
and 360-degree panoramas and videos can elicit emotions based on the current
literature. Further, we present public datasets generated by VR and
emotion-sensing interfaces that can be used in VR based research. The
conclusions of this survey reveal that VR has a great potential to evoke
emotions effectively and naturally by generating motivational and empathy
mechanisms which makes it an ecologically valid paradigm to study emotions.
