Theory 09/Consciousness & Attention/Self-model
The Self Is Interoceptive Confidence
Selfhood is studied through body ownership illusions. The load-bearing variable may be confidence in the body's internal state.
The sense of self is a model of the precision of interoceptive prediction rather than of body ownership, so manipulations that change interoceptive noise should change self-report more than manipulations of ownership.
01The evidence
Body-ownership illusions alter self-report transiently, while interoceptive accuracy correlates with self-related measures more stably.
02The tension
Self-models centre on ownership and agency. Those explain illusions and do not explain the stability of self-report across them.
03The mechanism
The self is what remains when the brain models its own reliability. Interoceptive signals are noisy, and the estimated precision of that noise is what feels like being a self.
That makes interoceptive precision the variable, and predicts that changing it should change self-report more than changing ownership.
04What this is not
Those centre on body attribution. This centres on confidence, which explains self-report stability.
05Predictions
- P1Self-report should track interoceptive precision.
- P2Noise manipulations should shift it more than ownership manipulations.
- P3Dissociation should accompany precision loss.
06Refutation
Self-report tracking ownership at controlled precision would favour the ownership model.
07What it changes
It would change how dissociative symptoms are assessed.