A radical phenomenology of the body: subjectivity and sensations in body image and body schema

2021 ◽  
pp. 52-68
Author(s):  
Helena De Preester
Keyword(s):  
Body Image ◽  
Sensory Input ◽  
Body Schema ◽  
The Body ◽  
Traditional View ◽  
Body Experience ◽  
Bodily Experience ◽  
Body Representations ◽  
Phenomenology Of The Body

The role of sensations for body experience and body representations such as body image and body schema seems indisputable. This chapter discusses the link between sensory input, the experience of one’s own body, and body representations such as body image and body schema. That happens on the basis of Michel Henry’s radical phenomenology of the body, which unites body and subjectivity and reconsiders the role of sensory input for the experience of the body and related representations. Without supporting, but inspired by, Henry’s ontological dualism between subjective and objective body, it is argued that the traditional view that considers sensory signals as all-important for bodily experience misses out a bodily dimension crucial for subjectivity—the body’s subjective dimension, not reigned by current sensory input. Cognitive science seems willing to accept representations that are over and above sensory input but still experiential in nature. The exact status of these ‘offline’ representations is, however, unclear. If it is true that these offline representations are responsible for crucial aspects of bodily subjective life (e.g., unity, ownership, presence), then it is unclear how these representations bring this experience about. Whereas online bodily representations are based on sensory input, offline bodily representations seem to be based on bodily experience over and above sensory life. In other words, they seem to represent or mediate what they are supposed to explain—the subjective body.

The Role of Hand Size in the Fake-Hand Illusion Paradigm

Perception ◽  
10.1068/p5853 ◽  
2007 ◽  
Vol 36 (10) ◽  
pp. 1547-1554 ◽  
Author(s):  
Francesco Pavani ◽  
Massimiliano Zampini
Keyword(s):  
Body Image ◽  
Body Schema ◽  
Body Representation ◽  
The Body ◽  
Video Image ◽  
Body Parts ◽  
Statistical Correlations ◽  
Hand Size ◽  
Visible Hand

When a hand (either real or fake) is stimulated in synchrony with our own hand concealed from view, the felt position of our own hand can be biased toward the location of the seen hand. This intriguing phenomenon relies on the brain's ability to detect statistical correlations in the multisensory inputs (ie visual, tactile, and proprioceptive), but it is also modulated by the pre-existing representation of one's own body. Nonetheless, researchers appear to have accepted the assumption that the size of the seen hand does not matter for this illusion to occur. Here we used a real-time video image of the participant's own hand to elicit the illusion, but we varied the hand size in the video image so that the seen hand was either reduced, veridical, or enlarged in comparison to the participant's own hand. The results showed that visible-hand size modulated the illusion, which was present for veridical and enlarged images of the hand, but absent when the visible hand was reduced. These findings indicate that very specific aspects of our own body image (ie hand size) can constrain the multisensory modulation of the body schema highlighted by the fake-hand illusion paradigm. In addition, they suggest an asymmetric tendency to acknowledge enlarged (but not reduced) images of body parts within our body representation.

Body Schema and Body Image

2021 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Body Image ◽  
Body Dysmorphic Disorder ◽  
Body Schema ◽  
The Body ◽  
Body Parts ◽  
Neural Activities ◽  
Body Shapes ◽  
Influential Book ◽  
Social And Cultural Factors

Body schema refers to the system of sensory-motor functions that enables control of the position of body parts in space, without conscious awareness of those parts. Body image refers to a conscious representation of the way the body appears—a set of conscious perceptions, affective attitudes, and beliefs pertaining to one’s own bodily image. In 2005, Shaun Gallagher published an influential book entitled ‘How the Body Shapes the Mind’. This book not only defined both body schema (BS) and body image (BI), but also explored the complicated relationship between the two. The book also established the idea that there is a double dissociation, whereby body schema and body image refer to two different, but closely related, systems. Given that many kinds of pathological cases can be described in terms of body schema and body image (phantom limbs, asomatognosia, apraxia, schizophrenia, anorexia, depersonalization, and body dysmorphic disorder, among others), we might expect to find a growing consensus about these concepts and the relevant neural activities connected to these systems. Instead, an examination of the scientific literature reveals continued ambiguity and disagreement. This volume brings together leading experts from the fields of philosophy, neuroscience, psychology, and psychiatry in a lively and productive dialogue. It explores fundamental questions about the relationship between body schema and body image, and addresses ongoing debates about the role of the brain and the role of social and cultural factors in our understanding of embodiment.

scholarly journals Body schema(tism) and the logos of life: a phenomenological reconsideration

2014 ◽  
pp. 55
Author(s):  
Denisa Butnaru
Keyword(s):  
Body Image ◽  
Body Schema ◽  
The Body ◽  
Surrounding World ◽  
Present Text

Body image and body schema are two phenomenological concepts which generated a revival of Maurice Merleau-Ponty’s philosophical heritage. In the present text I intend to inquire on the relation between these two concepts and that of Logos of life, another challenging point in the Merleau-Pontyan thought.In order to delineate the correlation between body schema, body image and my understanding of a logic of life, I will first explore how what I term “schematism of the body” is connected to an inherent model of life and living and how this schematism is reflected in the body image. I will turn further to the relation between body and world and highlight how the life of the body defines itself as meaningful in the context of both the surrounding world (Umwelt) and the lifeworld (Lebenswelt). In a third part of my analysis I shall point out how the relation between body schematism and motile intentionality redefines corporeal inten-tionality. I shall conclude by noting the role of the Logos of life, through which corporeity, in its position of meaning project, is instituted as body schematism.Los conceptos fenomenológicos de imagen corporal y esquema corporal han dado lugar a un resurgimiento del legado filosófico de Maurice Merleau-Ponty. En este texto pretendo investigar la relación entre estos dos conceptos y el de Logos de la vida, otro elemento estimulante del pensamiento Merleau-Pontiano.Con el fin de trazar la correlación entre es-quema corporal, imagen corporal y mi interpretación de la lógica de la vida, exploraré en pri-mer lugar cómo el término “esquematismo del cuerpo” está conectado con un modelo inheren-te de vida y de vivir, y cómo este esquematis-mo se refleja en la imagen corporal. Consideraré después la relación entre cuerpo y mundo y remarcaré cómo la vida del cuerpo se define como significativa en el contexto tanto del mundo circundante (Umwelt) como del mundo de la vida (Lebenswelt). En la tercera parte de mi análisis señalaré cómo la relación entre esquematismo corporal e intencionalidad moto-ra redefine la intencionalidad corporal. Concluiré destacando el papel del Logos de la vida, a través del cual la corporeidad, en su posición de proyecto significativo, se instituye como esquematismo corpora

scholarly journals Body models in humans, animals, and robots: mechanisms and plasticity

2021 ◽  
pp. 152-180
Author(s):  
Matej Hoffmann
Keyword(s):  
Biological Sciences ◽  
Body Image ◽  
Body Schema ◽  
Internal Representation ◽  
The Body ◽  
Body Representations ◽  
Sensory Modalities ◽  
Human Animal ◽  
The Brain ◽  
Combining Information

Humans and animals excel in combining information from multiple sensory modalities, controlling their complex bodies, adapting to growth or failures, or using tools. The key foundation is an internal representation of the body that the agent—human, animal, or robot—has developed. In the biological realm, evidence has been accumulating in diverse disciplines, giving rise to the concepts of body image, body schema, and others. In robotics, a model of the robot is an indispensable component that enables to control the machine. This chapter compares the character of body representations in biology with their robotic counterparts and relates that to the differences in performance observed. Conclusions are drawn about how robots can inform the biological sciences dealing with body representations and which of the features of the ‘body in the brain’ should be transferred to robots, giving rise to more adaptive and resilient self-calibrating machines.

scholarly journals Body Representations and Cognitive Ontology: Drawing the boundaries of the body image

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephen Gadsby
Keyword(s):  
Body Image ◽  
Cognitive Neuroscience ◽  
Body Schema ◽  
Body Representation ◽  
The Body ◽  
Reciprocal Interaction ◽  
Body Representations ◽  
Alice In Wonderland ◽  
The Relationship

The distinction between body image and body schema has been incredibly influential in cognitive neuroscience. Recently, researchers have begun to speculate about the relationship between these representations (Gadsby, 2017; 2018; Pitron & de Vignemont, 2017; Pitron et al., 2018). Within this emerging literature, Pitron and colleagues (2018) proposed that the long-term body image and long-term body schema co-construct one another, through a process of reciprocal interaction. In proposing this model, they make two assumptions: that the long-term body image incorporates the spatial characteristics of tools, and that it is distorted in the case of Alice in wonderland syndrome. Here, I challenge these assumptions, with a closer examination of what the term “long-term body image” refers to. In doing so, I draw out some important taxonomic principles for research into body representation.

Taxonomies of Body Representations

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Frédérique de Vignemont
Keyword(s):  
Body Image ◽  
Spatial Organization ◽  
Body Schema ◽  
Action Planning ◽  
The Body ◽  
Body Parts ◽  
Body Representations ◽  
Planning And Control ◽  
Body Map ◽  
The One

This chapter considers the relationship between body representations, action, and bodily experiences. It first clarifies the conceptual landscape of body representations and stresses the conceptual and empirical difficulties that the current body schema/body image taxonomy faces, difficulties that can be explained by their constant interaction but not only. There is indeed a lack of precise understanding of the functional role of the body schema as opposed to the body image. Instead of these unclear notions, the chapter proposes distinguishing different types of body representations on the basis of their direction of fit and of their spatial organization. On the one hand, there is a purely descriptive body map that represents well-segmented categorical body parts, in which one can localize one’s sensations. On the other hand, there is a body map that is both descriptive and directive (i.e. pushmi-pullyu representation), and that encodes structural bodily affordances for action planning and control.

Embodied Aesthetics

2018 ◽  
pp. 890-910
Author(s):  
Barbara Gail Montero
Keyword(s):  
Aesthetic Experience ◽  
The Body ◽  
Traditional View ◽  
Bodily Experience ◽  
Aesthetic Pleasure ◽  
Embodied Aesthetics ◽  
The Aesthetic ◽  
Bodily Movements

Although great art frequently revers the body, bodily experience itself is traditionally excluded from the aesthetic realm. This tradition, however, is in tension with the experience of expert dancers who find intense aesthetic pleasure in the experience of their own bodily movements. How to resolve this tension is the goal of this chapter. More specifically, in contrast to the traditional view that denigrates the bodily even while elevating the body, I aim to make sense of dancers’ embodied aesthetic experience of their own movements, as well as observers’ embodied aesthetic experience of seeing bodies move.

The embodied and social self: insights on body image and body schema from neurological conditions

2021 ◽  
pp. 229-243
Author(s):  
Jonathan Cole
Keyword(s):  
Body Image ◽  
Emotional Experience ◽  
Sense Of Self ◽  
Body Schema ◽  
The Body ◽  
Sensory Loss ◽  
Social Self ◽  
Facial Disfigurement ◽  
The Social ◽  
Neurological Illnesses

In neurological illnesses, the body may present itself to perception in ways which allows insights into the concepts of body image and body schema. Three such conditions are explored. From those who live with spinal cord injury, paralysed and insentient from the neck down, aspects of the importance of the body in one’s sense of self are revealed. Some also describe a coming to terms with their altered bodies. When considering the body image, its adaptability and this reconciliation to a new normal should be considered. Studies on acquired severe sensory loss explore how conscious control, at the body image level, may partially replace the deafferented body schema. There is little evidence, however, for these subjects extending access to previously non-conscious motor schema. Lastly, some narratives from those with congenital absence of movement of facial muscles describe reduced emotional experience and felt embodiment as children. These can be developed as young adults, through shared social interactions. The importance of the social in elaboration of the body image is further implicit in a consideration of the stigma associated with facial disfigurement. Others’ responses to one’s body are crucial in developing our body image and sense of self.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document