Rae, Charlotte L, Larsson, Dennis E O, Eccles, Jessica A, Ward, Jamie and Critchley, Hugo D (2018) Subjective embodiment during the rubber hand illusion predicts severity of premonitory sensations and tics in Tourette Syndrome. Consciousness and Cognition, 65. pp. 368-377. ISSN 1053-8100

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Abstract

In Tourette Syndrome, the expression of tics and commonly preceding premonitory sensations is associated with perturbed subjective feelings of self-control and agency. We compared responses to the Rubber Hand Illusion in 23 adults with TS and 22 controls. Both TS and control participants reported equivalent subjective embodiment of the artificial hand: feelings of ownership, location, and agency were greater during synchronous visuo-tactile stimulation, compared to asynchronous. However, individuals with TS did not manifest greater proprioceptive drift, an objective marker of embodiment observed in controls. An 'embodiment prediction error' index of the difference between subjective embodiment and objective proprioceptive drift correlated with severity of premonitory sensations. Feelings of ownership also correlated with premonitory sensation severity, and feelings of agency with tic severity. These findings suggest that subjective bodily ownership, as measured by the rubber hand illusion, contributes to susceptibility to the premonitory sensations that may be a precipitating factor in tics.

Item Type:	Article
Keywords:	agency; body ownership; premonitory urge for tics scale (PUTS); proprioceptive drift; somatosensory; tics
Schools and Departments:	Brighton and Sussex Medical School > Neuroscience School of Psychology > Psychology
Research Centres and Groups:	Sackler Centre for Consciousness Science Sussex Neuroscience
Depositing User:	Alexei Fisk
Date Deposited:	08 Oct 2018 09:28
Last Modified:	06 Nov 2018 15:00
URI:	http://srodev.sussex.ac.uk/id/eprint/79181

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