TY - JOUR

T1 - Can the self become another?

T2 - Investigating the effects of self-association with a new facial identity

AU - Payne, Sophie

AU - Tsakiris, Manos

AU - Maister, Lara

PY - 2017/6/1

Y1 - 2017/6/1

N2 - The mental representation of the self is a complex construct, comprising both conceptual information and perceptual information regarding the body. Evidence suggests that both the conceptual self-representation and the bodily self-representation are malleable, and that these different aspects of the self are linked. Changes in bodily self-representation appear to affect how the self is conceptualized, but it is unclear whether the opposite relationship is also true: Do changes to the conceptual self-representation affect how the physical self is perceived? First, we adopted a perceptual matching paradigm to establish an association between the self and an unfamiliar face (Experiment 1). Robust attentional and perceptual biases in the processing of this newly self-associated object suggested that the conceptual self-representation was extended to include it. Next, we measured whether the bodily self-representation had correspondingly changed to incorporate the new face (Experiment 2). Participants rated morphs between their own and the newly-associated according to how similar they were to the self, before and after performing the perceptual matching task. Changes to the conceptual self did not have an effect on the bodily self-representation. These results suggest that modulatory links between aspects of the mental self-representation, when focused on the non-social self, are unidirectional and flow in a bottom-up manner.

AB - The mental representation of the self is a complex construct, comprising both conceptual information and perceptual information regarding the body. Evidence suggests that both the conceptual self-representation and the bodily self-representation are malleable, and that these different aspects of the self are linked. Changes in bodily self-representation appear to affect how the self is conceptualized, but it is unclear whether the opposite relationship is also true: Do changes to the conceptual self-representation affect how the physical self is perceived? First, we adopted a perceptual matching paradigm to establish an association between the self and an unfamiliar face (Experiment 1). Robust attentional and perceptual biases in the processing of this newly self-associated object suggested that the conceptual self-representation was extended to include it. Next, we measured whether the bodily self-representation had correspondingly changed to incorporate the new face (Experiment 2). Participants rated morphs between their own and the newly-associated according to how similar they were to the self, before and after performing the perceptual matching task. Changes to the conceptual self did not have an effect on the bodily self-representation. These results suggest that modulatory links between aspects of the mental self-representation, when focused on the non-social self, are unidirectional and flow in a bottom-up manner.

KW - Analysis of Variance

KW - Body Image

KW - Face

KW - Facial Expression

KW - Humans

KW - Pattern Recognition, Visual/physiology

KW - Photic Stimulation

KW - Reaction Time/physiology

KW - Recognition (Psychology)/physiology

KW - Self Concept

U2 - 10.1080/17470218.2015.1137329

DO - 10.1080/17470218.2015.1137329

M3 - Article

C2 - 26822152

VL - 70

SP - 1085

EP - 1097

JO - Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology

JF - Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology

SN - 1747-0218

IS - 6

ER -