Abstract
Mirrors allow us to view our own body from a third-person (observer) perspective. However, how viewing ourselves through a mirror affects central body representations compared with true third-person perspective is not fully understood. Across a series of experiments, multisensory full-body illusions were used to modulate feelings of ownership over a mannequin body that was viewed from a third-person perspective through a mirror, from a third-person perspective without a mirror, and from a first-person perspective. In contrast to non-mirror third-person perspective, synchronously touching the participant’s actual body and the mannequin body viewed in the mirror elicited strong feelings of ownership over the mannequin and increased physiological responses to the mannequin being threatened compared to the equivalent asynchronous (non-ownership) control condition. Subjective reports of ownership viewing the mannequin through a mirror were also statistically equivalent to those following the first-person perspective illusion. These findings suggest that mirrors have a special role for viewing the self. The results also support the importance of egocentric reference frames for body ownership and suggest that mirror reflections of one’s own body are related to peripersonal space, which enables updating of central body representations.
Highlights
Some studies, claim that it is possible to elicit multisensory body illusions when the body is viewed from a third-person perspective far from the body, i.e., outside peripersonal space[20,21,22,23,24]
Twenty-four healthy participants took part in Experiment One, in which the subjective strength of the full-body illusion elicited when a mannequin body was viewed in a mirror was compared to that elicited when a mannequin body was viewed from a non-mirror third-person perspective
The current study investigated whether viewing a mannequin body in a mirror modulated the strength of the full-body illusion
Summary
Claim that it is possible to elicit multisensory body illusions when the body is viewed from a third-person (observer) perspective far from the body, i.e., outside peripersonal space[20,21,22,23,24]. This view disregards peripersonal space constraints of body illusions and the nature of ego-centric spatial reference frames (body-, and body-part-centred coordinates)[12,15,16,17,27] These third-person perspective illusions may rely more on self-recognition than body ownership mechanisms, in that the participant recognises the observed body as a virtual representation of their own body instead of experiencing a genuine body illusion such as the rubber hand illusion[2,28]. This self-recognition is facilitated by immersing participants in a virtual environment, which is essential for full-body illusion paradigms in which participants are required to wear a virtual reality headset[18,25] According to this approach, when observing a body from the third-person perspective that is several metres in front of your own body, you are not directly projecting ownership and tactile sensations to this body (as in the rubber hand illusion); instead, the experience is more akin to recognising yourself in a photograph. Bertamini’s results make sense in that visual information derived from the mirror reflection of the hand could contribute to the rubber hand illusion, the relationship between mirror reflections and limb ownership is still not fully understood
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