Abstract:

Sense of body ownership (that one’s body belongs to oneself) in bodily self-representation has always been a core topic in the research of self-consciousness. A good deal of studies indicated that the experience of bodily ownership involves integrating different sensory signals from both outside and inside environments. However, most studies put emphasis on the roles of exteroception such as vison or touch thus neglected the importance of interoception as well as the integration of exteroception and interoception. The effects of exteroception and interoception that revealed by rubber hand illusion experiments and bodily self-disorders support the plasticity hypothesis of sense of body ownership, and the free energy principle proposes a hypothesis that the basis of sense of self is that the brain constantly evaluates and updates possible representations to maintain stability. Future studies need to seek breakthroughs in improving the measurement and presentations of interoception, exploring the higher-level cognitive factors that affect interoception, and paying attention to the interoceptive aspects of patients with specific disorders.

Key words: sense of body ownership, plasticity, multisensory integration, interoception, free energy principle