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.

Proprioception and body schema

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Minoru Asada
Keyword(s):  
Body Image ◽  
Computational Models ◽  
Body Schema ◽  
Body Representation ◽  
The Body ◽  
Proprioceptive Information ◽  
Artificial Agents ◽  
Body Parts ◽  
Joint Angles ◽  
The Relationship

Proprioception is our ability to sense the position of our own limbs and other body parts in space, and body schema is a body representation that allows both biological and artificial agents to execute their actions based on proprioception. The proprioceptive information used by current artificial agents (robots) is mainly related to posture (and its change) and consists of joint angles (joint velocities) given a linked structure. However, the counterpart in biological agents (humans and other animals) includes more complicated components with associated controversies concerning the relationship between the body schema and the body image. A new trend of constructive approaches has been attacking this topic using computational models and robots. This chapter provides an overview of the biology of proprioception and body representation, summarizes the classical use of body schema in robotics, and describes a series of constructive approaches that address some of the mysteries of body representation.

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.

What is the body schema?

2021 ◽  
pp. 3-17
Author(s):  
Frédérique de Vignemont ◽  
Victor Pitron ◽  
Adrian J. T. Alsmith
Keyword(s):  
Motor Control ◽  
Body Schema ◽  
General Term ◽  
The Body ◽  
Body Parts ◽  
Detailed Characterization ◽  
Body Representations ◽  
Local Body

The body schema is commonly defined as the representation of a body for action. But what do we mean exactly by that? What makes the body schema so special? The type of information that it represents? The way this information is represented? Or the function of the representation? And is there more than one type of body schema? There is a sense indeed in which the term ‘body schema’ is ambiguous, in that it functions as a general term that groups together various body representations intervening at different stages in motor control, representing short- or long-term properties, used for positive or negative affordances. In addition, one might want to distinguish between local body schemata, which represent body parts, and a global body schema, which represents the body as a whole. But is this latter holistic representation really necessary? Here this chapter will present a detailed characterization of the manifold of representational processes involved in what we commonly refer to as the body schema, as well as the key mechanisms that contribute to their construal.

Feeling of a presence and anomalous body perception

2021 ◽  
pp. 316-327
Author(s):  
Masayuki Hara ◽  
Olaf Blanke ◽  
Noriaki Kanayama
Keyword(s):  
Body Image ◽  
Cognitive Neuroscience ◽  
Body Schema ◽  
Research Field ◽  
The Body ◽  
Neural Mechanisms ◽  
Healthy Individuals ◽  
Body Perception ◽  
Consciousness Studies ◽  
New Research

The feeling of a presence (FoP) is an illusory vivid feeling that there is another person nearby who is not seen, heard, or felt. In neuropsychiatry, FoP has traditionally been classified among disorders of the body schema but has also been reported from times immemorial by healthy individuals in various conditions. Here the chapter reviews key neurological and psychiatric data on FoP and the involved neural mechanisms. Particular relevance will be given to the distinction between body schema versus body image in the FoP. This is followed by a description of recent efforts in engineering and cognitive neuroscience to apply robotics technology to experimentally induce and study FoP and its phenomenology. The chapter concludes by describing an exciting new research field that integrates consciousness studies, cognitive neuroscience, and engineering—cognetics.

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.

Body schema dynamics in Merleau-Ponty

2021 ◽  
pp. 33-51
Author(s):  
Jan Halák
Keyword(s):  
Body Image ◽  
Body Schema ◽  
The Body ◽  
Ground Structure ◽  
Symbolic Cognition ◽  
The World ◽  
Full Sense ◽  
Perceptual Orientation ◽  
The Relationship

This chapter presents an account of Merleau-Ponty’s interpretation of the body schema as an operative intentionality that is not only opposed to, but also complexly intermingled with, the representation-like grasp of the world and one’s own body, or the body image. The chapter reconstructs Merleau-Ponty’s position primarily based on his preparatory notes for his 1953 lecture ‘The Sensible World and the World of Expression’. Here, Merleau-Ponty elaborates his earlier efforts to show that the body schema is a perceptual ground against which the perceived world stands out as a complex of perceptual figures. The chapter clarifies how Merleau-Ponty’s renewed interpretation of the figure-ground structure makes it possible for him to describe the relationship between body schema and perceptual (body) image as a strictly systematic phenomenon. Subsequently, the chapter shows how Merleau-Ponty understands apraxia, sleep, and perceptual orientation as examples of dedifferentiation and subtler differentiation of the body-schematic system. The last section clarifies how such body-schematic differentiating processes give rise to relatively independent superstructures of vision and symbolic cognition which constitute our body image. It, moreover, explains how, according to Merleau-Ponty, the cognitive superstructures always need to be supported by praxic operative intentionality to maintain their full sense, even though, in some cases, they have the power to compensate for praxic deficiencies.

scholarly journals Body Representations in Children with Cerebral Palsy

2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (8) ◽  
pp. 490 ◽  
Author(s):  
Antonella Di Vita ◽  
Maria Cristina Cinelli ◽  
Simona Raimo ◽  
Maddalena Boccia ◽  
Stefano Buratin ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Cerebral Palsy ◽  
Developmental Stages ◽  
Body Schema ◽  
Poor Performance ◽  
Body Representation ◽  
The Body ◽  
Structural Representation ◽  
Body Representations ◽  
Children With Cerebral Palsy ◽  
And Performance

We constantly process top-down and bottom-up inputs concerning our own body that interact to form body representations (BR). Even if some evidence showed BR deficits in children with cerebral palsy, a systematic study that evaluates different kinds of BR in these children, taking into account the possible presence of a general deficit affecting non-body mental representations, is currently lacking. Here we aimed at investigating BR (i.e., Body Semantics, Body Structural Representation and Body Schema) in children with cerebral palsy (CP) taking into account performance in tasks involving body stimuli and performance in tasks involving non-body stimuli. Thirty-three CP (age range: 5–12 years) were compared with a group of 103 typically-developing children (TDC), matched for age and sex. 63.64% of children with CP showed a very poor performance in body representation processing. Present data also show alterations in different body representations in CP in specific developmental stages. In particular, CP and TDC performances did not differ between 5 to 7 years old, whereas CP between 8 and 12 years old showed deficits in the Body Structural Representation and Body Schema but not in Body Semantics. These findings revealed the importance of taking into account the overall development of cognitive domains when investigating specific stimuli processing in children who do not present a typical development and were discussed in terms of their clinical implications.

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.

Neural underpinnings of body image and body schema disturbances

2021 ◽  
pp. 267-284
Author(s):  
Jasmine Ho ◽  
Bigna Lenggenhager
Keyword(s):  
Body Image ◽  
Body Schema ◽  
Body Representation ◽  
Brain Regions ◽  
The Body ◽  
Special Focus ◽  
Body Image Disturbances ◽  
Posterior Parietal ◽  
Neural Underpinnings ◽  
Multisensory Information

The sense of our body is fundamental to human self-consciousness. Many neurological and psychiatric disorders involve atypical corporeal awareness with symptomatology that might be very heterogeneous, affecting various aspects of the bodily self. A common dichotomy divides disorders of the bodily self into disorders affecting predominantly the body schema and disorders predominantly affecting the body image. Yet, increasing evidence suggests that body schema and body image are mutually dependent, making a clear categorization of most disorders difficult. This interdependence is illustrated with examples of a few selected disorders that encompass an atypical sense of the bodily self. A special focus is placed on underlying neural alterations in various body-related brain regions. While body schema-related disorders might rather be linked to a disruption in the integration of multisensory information into a coherent body representation, especially in premotor and posterior parietal areas, body image disturbances, particularly their affective and cognitive aspects, might be linked to a broader network centred around cortical midline structures that are crucially involved in self-referential processes.

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.

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