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bioRxiv · 10.1101/2023.03.06.531301

Active self-touch restores bodily self-awareness following disruption by the rubber hand illusion

Crivelli, D.·Cataldo, A.·Bottini, G.·Gomi, H.·Haggard, P.
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Abstract

Bodily self-awareness relies on a constant integration of visual, tactile, proprioceptive, and motor signals. In the "Rubber Hand Illusion" (RHI), conflicting visuo-tactile stimuli lead to changes in self- awareness. It remains unclear whether other, somatic signals could compensate for the alterations in self-awareness caused by visual information about the body. Here, we used the RHI in combination with robot-mediated self-touch to systematically investigate the role of tactile, proprioceptive, and motor signals in protecting and restoring bodily self-awareness. Participants moved the handle of a leader robot with their right hand and simultaneously received corresponding tactile feedback on their left hand from a follower robot. This self-touch stimulation was performed either before or after the induction of a classical RHI. Across three experiments, active self-touch delivered after - but not before - the RHI, significantly reduced the proprioceptive drift caused by RHI, supporting a restorative role of active self-touch on bodily self-awareness. The effect was not present during involuntary self-touch, where the participants hand was passively moved, suggesting that the restorative effect depends on the presence of a voluntary motor command, and that synchrony of bilateral sensory events is insufficient. Unimodal control conditions confirmed that the coordination of both tactile and motor components of self-touch was necessary to restore bodily self-awareness. These results suggest that voluntary self-touch can restore an intrinsic representation of the body following visual capture during RHI.

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Crivelli, D., Cataldo, A., Bottini, G., Gomi, H., Haggard, P.. 2023-03-08. Active self-touch restores bodily self-awareness following disruption by the rubber hand illusion. https://doi.org/10.1101/2023.03.06.531301

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