scholarly journals No specific relationship between hypnotic suggestibility and the rubber hand illusion: a commentary with new and verification analyses

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
H. Henrik Ehrsson ◽  
Aikaterini Fotopoulou ◽  
Dominika Radziun ◽  
Matthew Longo ◽  
Manos Tsakiris
Keyword(s):  
Visual Hallucination ◽  
Rubber Hand Illusion ◽  
Experimental Paradigm ◽  
Top Down ◽  
Rubber Hand ◽  
Perceptual Illusion ◽  
Specific Relationship ◽  
Significant Relationships ◽  
Control Of Perception ◽  
General Influence

In a recent study, Lush et al. (Nat Commun 11, 4853, 2020) claimed that they found “substantial relationships” between hypnotizability and experimental measures of the rubber hand illusion. The authors proposed that hypnotizable participants control their phenomenology to meet task expectations arising from the experimental paradigm. They further suggest that the rubber hand illusion “may or may not” be entirely explained by hypnotic suggestions driven by task expectancies and therefore could reflect top-down control of perception, instead of multisensory mechanisms. However, in reanalyzing their data, we observe no significant relationships between hypnotic suggestibility and the rubber hand illusion when quantified using a control condition in line with the authors’ preregistered hypothesis. Furthermore, we note that the relationships that the authors describe are weak and observed for a visual “hallucination” control experience and in the control condition, indicating a general influence of hypnotizability on cognition, rather than sensations that specifically relate to the rubber hand illusion. Overall, the results fit well with the view that the rubber hand illusion is a perceptual illusion driven primarily by multisensory mechanisms.

scholarly journals The Emotional Glue of the Senses: Affective Certainty and Congruency in the Rubber Hand Illusion

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Maria Laura Filippetti ◽  
Louise P. Kirsch ◽  
Laura Crucianelli ◽  
Aikaterini Fotopoulou
Keyword(s):  
Multisensory Integration ◽  
Sensory Stimulation ◽  
Rubber Hand Illusion ◽  
Body Ownership ◽  
Top Down ◽  
Rubber Hand ◽  
Spatial Properties ◽  
Affective Quality ◽  
Temporal And Spatial

AbstractOur sense of body ownership relies on integrating different sensations according to their temporal and spatial congruency. Nevertheless, there is ongoing controversy about the role of affective congruency during multisensory integration, i.e. whether the stimuli to be perceived by the different sensory channels are congruent or incongruent in terms of their affective quality. In the present study, we applied a widely used multisensory integration paradigm, the Rubber Hand Illusion, to investigate the role of affective, top-down aspects of sensory congruency between visual and tactile modalities in the sense of body ownership. In Experiment 1 (N = 36), we touched participants with either soft or rough fabrics in their unseen hand, while they watched a rubber hand been touched synchronously with the same fabric or with a ‘hidden’ fabric of ‘uncertain roughness’. In Experiment 2 (N = 50), we used the same paradigm as in Experiment 1, but replaced the ‘uncertainty’ condition with an ‘incongruent’ one, in which participants saw the rubber hand being touched with a fabric of incongruent roughness and hence opposite valence. We found that certainty (Experiment 1) and congruency (Experiment 2) between the felt and vicariously perceived tactile affectivity led to higher subjective embodiment compared to uncertainty and incongruency, respectively, irrespective of any valence effect. Our results suggest that congruency in the affective top-down aspects of sensory stimulation is important to the multisensory integration process leading to embodiment, over and above temporal and spatial properties.

scholarly journals Rubber Hand Illusion does not arise from comparisons with internal body models: a new multisensory integration account of the sense of ownership

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Piotr Litwin
Keyword(s):  
Multisensory Integration ◽  
Human Body ◽  
The Body ◽  
Rubber Hand Illusion ◽  
Multisensory Perception ◽  
Top Down ◽  
Rubber Hand ◽  
Sense Of Ownership ◽  
Body Model ◽  
Internal Body

Human body sense is surprisingly flexible – precisely administered multisensory stimulation may result in the illusion that an external object is part of one’s body. There seems to be a general consensus that there are certain top-down constraints on which objects may be incorporated: in particular, to-be-embodied objects should be structurally similar to a visual representation stored in an internal body model for a shift in one’s body image to occur. However, empirical evidence contradicts the body model hypothesis: the sense of ownership may be spread over objects strikingly distinct in morphology and structure (e.g., robotic arms or empty space) and direct empirical support for the theory is currently lacking. As an alternative, based on the example of the rubber hand illusion (RHI), I propose a multisensory integration account of how the sense of ownership is induced. In this account, the perception of one’s own body is a regular type of multisensory perception and multisensory integration processes are not only necessary but also sufficient for embodiment. In this paper, I propose how RHI can be modeled with the use of Maximum Likelihood Estimation and natural correlation rules. I also discuss how Bayesian Coupling Priors and idiosyncrasies in sensory processing render prior distributions interindividually variable, accounting for large interindividual differences in susceptibility to RHI. Taken together, the proposed model accounts for exceptional malleability of human body perception, fortifies existing bottom-up multisensory integration theories with top-down models of relatedness of sensory cues, and generates testable and disambiguating predictions.

Is This My Hand I See Before Me? The Rubber Hand Illusion in Reality, Virtual Reality, and Mixed Reality

2006 ◽  
Vol 15 (4) ◽  
pp. 455-464 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wijnand A IJsselsteijn ◽  
Yvonne A. W de Kort ◽  
Antal Haans
Keyword(s):  
Virtual Reality ◽  
Mixed Reality ◽  
Self Report ◽  
Strong Sense ◽  
Rubber Hand Illusion ◽  
Rubber Hand ◽  
Perceptual Illusion ◽  
Actual Position

This paper presents a first study in which a recently reported intermodal perceptual illusion known as the rubber hand illusion is experimentally investigated under mediated conditions. When one's own hand is placed out of view and a visible fake hand is repeatedly stroked and tapped in synchrony with the unseen hand, subjects report a strong sense in which the fake hand is experienced as part of their own body. In our experiment, we investigated this illusion under three conditions: (i) unmediated condition, replicating the original paradigm, (ii) virtual reality (VR) condition, where both the fake hand and its stimulation were projected on the table in front of the participant, and (iii) mixed reality (MR) condition, where the fake hand was projected, but its stimulation was unmediated. Dependent measures included self-report (open-ended and questionnaire-based) and drift, that is, the offset between the felt position of the hidden hand and its actual position. As expected, the unmediated condition produced the strongest illusion, as indicated both by self-report and drift towards the rubber hand. The VR condition produced a more convincing subjective illusion than the MR condition, although no difference in drift was found between the mediated conditions. Results are discussed in terms of perceptual mechanisms underlying the rubber hand illusion, and the illusion's relevance to understanding telepresence.

scholarly journals EXPRESS: Vicarious Pain is an Outcome of Atypical Body Ownership: Evidence from the Rubber Hand Illusion and Enfacement Illusion

2021 ◽  
pp. 174702182110248
Author(s):  
V. Botan ◽  
Abigail Salisbury ◽  
H.D. Critchley ◽  
Jamie Ward
Keyword(s):  
Sensory Information ◽  
Rubber Hand Illusion ◽  
Body Ownership ◽  
Multiple Sources ◽  
Top Down ◽  
Rubber Hand ◽  
Single Body ◽  
Sensory Evidence ◽  
Different Response ◽  
Bodily Illusion

Some people report localised pain on their body when seeing other people in pain (sensory-localised vicarious pain responders). In this study we assess whether this is related to atypical computations of body ownership which, in paradigms such as the Rubber Hand Illusion (RHI), can be conceptualised as a Bayesian inference as to whether multiple sources of sensory information (visual, somatosensory) belong together on a single body (one’s own) or are distributed across several bodies (vision=other, somatosensory=self). According to this model, computations of body ownership depend on the degree (and precision) of sensory evidence, rather than synchrony per se. Sensory-localised vicarious pain responders exhibit the RHI following synchronous stroking and – unusually – also after asynchronous stroking. Importantly, this occurs only in asynchronous conditions in which the stroking is predictable (alternating) rather than unpredictable (random). There was no evidence that their bottom-up proprioceptive signals are less precise, suggesting individual differences in the top-down weighting of sensory evidence. Finally, the Enfacement illusion (EI) was also employed as a conceptually-related bodily illusion paradigm that involves a completely different response judgment (based on vision rather than proprioception). Sensory-localised responders show a comparable pattern on this task after synchronous and asynchronous stroking. This is consistent with the idea that they have top-down (prior) differences in the way body ownership is inferred that transcends the exact judgment being made (visual or proprioceptive).

scholarly journals Phenomenological control: response to imaginative suggestion predicts measures of mirror touch synaesthesia, vicarious pain and the rubber hand illusion

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter Lush ◽  
Vanessa Botan ◽  
Ryan Bradley Scott ◽  
Anil Seth ◽  
Jamie Ward ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Rubber Hand Illusion ◽  
Top Down ◽  
Rubber Hand ◽  
Large Sample ◽  
Psychological Science ◽  
Task Requirements ◽  
Control Response ◽  
Psychological Experiments ◽  
Psychological Studies ◽  
Normally Distributed

[Published in Nature Communications as Trait phenomenological control predicts experience of mirror synaesthesia and the rubber hand illusion] The control of top down processes to generate experience has been studied within the context of hypnosis since the birth of psychological science. In hypnotic responding, expectancies arising from imaginative suggestion drive striking experiential changes (e.g., hallucinations) – which are experienced as involuntary – according to a normally distributed and stable trait ability (hypnotisability). Such experiences can be triggered by implicit suggestion and occur outside the hypnotic context. The possibility that they account for experiential change in psychological studies has been overlooked. In large sample studies (of 156, 404 and 353 participants) we report substantial relationships between hypnotisability and experimental measures of experiential change (mirror-sensory synaesthesia and the rubber hand illusion) comparable to relationships between hypnotisability and individual hypnosis scale items. The control of phenomenology to meet expectancies arising from perceived task requirements can account for experiential change in psychological experiments.

scholarly journals The territory of my body: Testosterone prevents limb cooling in the Rubber Hand Illusion

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Donné van der Westhuizen ◽  
Teneille Page ◽  
Mark Solms ◽  
Jack van Honk
Keyword(s):  
Social Power ◽  
Steroid Hormone ◽  
Rubber Hand Illusion ◽  
Body Ownership ◽  
Experimental Paradigm ◽  
Social Emotional ◽  
Rubber Hand ◽  
Double Blind ◽  
Double Blind Placebo ◽  
Proprioceptive Drift

ABSTRACTThe Rubber Hand Illusion (RHI) is an experimental paradigm for assessing changes in body ownership. Recent findings in the field suggest that social-emotional variables can influence such changes. Since body ownership is a mechanism that enables subjects to organise information about the environment and interact efficiently in it, changes in body ownership should have important implications for social power. In the current study, we investigated whether 0.5mg of testosterone, a steroid hormone strongly implicated in the achievement of power and dominance, affected the RHI. Forty-nine females participated in a double-blind, placebo-controlled experiment in which the RHI was induced. Compared to placebo, testosterone had no effects on the usual alteration of subjective ownership over the rubber limb or on subjective sense of proprioceptive drift. However, unlike the placebo group, testosterone-treated participants did not display an objective decline in the temperature of their own (hidden) hand following induction of the illusion. These findings suggest that testosterone strengthens implicit but not explicit bodily self-representations. We propose that effective maintenance of implicit body boundaries can be regarded, conceptually, as a primary defensive state facilitating integrity of the self.

scholarly journals The Territory of my Body: Testosterone Prevents Limb Cooling in the Rubber Hand Illusion

2020 ◽  
Vol 33 (2) ◽  
pp. 161-187 ◽  
Author(s):  
Donné van der Westhuizen ◽  
Teneille Page ◽  
Mark Solms ◽  
Jack van Honk
Keyword(s):  
Steroid Hormone ◽  
Rubber Hand Illusion ◽  
Body Ownership ◽  
Experimental Paradigm ◽  
Social Emotions ◽  
Rubber Hand ◽  
Double Blind ◽  
Body Representations ◽  
Double Blind Placebo ◽  
Proprioceptive Drift

Abstract The Rubber Hand Illusion (RHI) is an experimental paradigm for assessing changes in body ownership. Recent findings in the field suggest that social emotions can influence such changes and that empathic motivation in particular appears to positively predict the malleability of body representations. Since the steroid hormone, testosterone, is well known to interrupt certain forms of empathic processing, in the current study we investigated whether 0.5 mg of testosterone affected ownership indices of the RHI. Forty-nine females participated in a double-blind, placebo-controlled experiment in which the RHI was induced. Compared to placebo, testosterone had no effects on the alteration of subjective ownership over the rubber limb or on subjective sense of proprioceptive drift. However, unlike the placebo group, testosterone-treated participants did not display an objective decline in the temperature of their own (hidden) hand following induction of the illusion. These findings suggest that testosterone strengthens implicit but not explicit bodily self-representations. We propose that effective maintenance of implicit body boundaries can be regarded, conceptually, as a primary defensive state facilitating integrity of the self.

Illusions With Hands, but Not With Balloons – Comparing Ownership and Referral of Touch for a Corporal and Noncorporal Object After Visuotactile Stimulation

Perception ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 48 (5) ◽  
pp. 447-455 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andreas Kalckert ◽  
Ian Bico ◽  
Jia Xi Fong
Keyword(s):  
Subjective Experience ◽  
Body Part ◽  
Rubber Hand Illusion ◽  
Questionnaire Data ◽  
Rubber Hand ◽  
Perceptual Illusion ◽  
Fine Grained ◽  
Human Body Part ◽  
Significant Difference ◽  
Successful Induction

The rubber hand illusion is a perceptual illusion of perceiving an object like a model hand as part of the own body. The question whether the illusion can be induced with noncorporal objects that do not look like a human body part is not perfectly resolved yet. In this study, we directly assessed the subjective experience of two different components within the illusion (i.e., ownership and referral of touch) when a model hand and a balloon are stimulated. We observed significantly stronger illusion ratings for the hand as compared with the balloon, and only the hand ratings showed a clear affirmation of the illusion. We further conclude that (a) a significant difference between synchronous and asynchronous conditions may not be sufficient to argue for the successful induction of the illusion and (b) the subcomponents show a different pattern in the different conditions, which may lead to alternative interpretations. These observations call for a more fine-grained interpretation of questionnaire data in rubber hand illusion studies.

scholarly journals High-Level Perception and Multimodal Perception

2021 ◽  
pp. 147-173
Author(s):  
Dan Cavedon-Taylor
Keyword(s):  
Experimental Studies ◽  
Mcgurk Effect ◽  
Rubber Hand Illusion ◽  
Experimental Paradigm ◽  
Rubber Hand ◽  
Perceptual Illusions ◽  
Perceptual Psychology ◽  
High Level ◽  
Multimodal Perception ◽  
Ventriloquist Effect

What is the correct procedure for determining the contents of perception? Philosophers tackling this question increasingly rely on empirically oriented procedures. This chapter argues that this strategy constitutes an improvement over the armchair methodology of phenomenal contrast arguments, but that there is a respect in which current empirical procedures remain limited: they are unimodal in nature, wrongly treating the senses as isolatable. The chapter thus has two aims: first, to motivate a reorientation of the admissible contents debate into a multimodal framework. The second is to explore whether experimental studies of multimodal perception support a so-called Liberal account of perception’s admissible contents. The chapter concludes that the McGurk effect and the ventriloquist effect are both explicable without the postulation of high-level content, but that at least one multimodal experimental paradigm may necessitate such content: the rubber hand illusion. One upshot is that Conservatives who claim that the Liberal view intolerably broadens the scope of perceptual illusions, particularly from the perspective of perceptual psychology, should pursue other arguments against that view.

The Impact of Experimentally Induced Limb Ischemia on the Rubber Hand Illusion

Perception ◽  
2020 ◽  
pp. 030100662097779
Author(s):  
Max Teaford ◽  
Jared Fitzpatrick ◽  
L. James Smart
Keyword(s):  
Tactile Stimulation ◽  
Limb Ischemia ◽  
Rubber Hand Illusion ◽  
Rubber Hand ◽  
Perceptual Illusion ◽  
Cardiovascular Pathology ◽  
Future Studies ◽  
Peripheral Ischemia ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Experimentally Induced

The rubber hand illusion (RHI) is a perceptual illusion in which one experiences an object as part of their body when synchronous visuo-tactile stimulation is applied to one’s hand and the object. There are a variety of factors that can impact the occurrence of the RHI. In the present study, we demonstrate that experimentally induced peripheral ischemia can impact the RHI, namely it can result in larger alterations to the perceived position of one’s hand. This study suggests that alterations to the cardiovascular system may be a source of individual differences in the RHI literature. Future studies with samples of individuals with cardiovascular pathology are recommended.

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