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How the sense of body ownership shapes honesty: evidence from behavioural, clinical and immersive virtual reality studies
Full text linkDespite the increasing interest towards the relationship between body and morality, the evidence for a specific link remains rather controversial. One open question is whether being aware of our body signals (Body Self-Consciousness) biases our moral decisions towards dishonesty (by making us more sensitive to rewards) or honesty (by increasing the desire to preserve a moral image).
In this series of studies, we focused on one of the components of Body Self-Consciousness, namely, the sense of Body Ownership. This is the feeling of having a body that belongs to the self in its entirety and its parts. Here we used different approaches to test whether body ownership could bias decisions towards honesty or dishonesty. Through a correlational study, we first investigated how the sense of ownership towards the physical body relates to moral identity and behaviour of individuals. Then, we experimentally manipulated the feelings of ownership associated to a virtual body and assessed how these modulations influenced the tendency to act (dis)honestly. Lastly, we tested a group of participants reporting long-term reductions of the sense of ownership for part of their body, which results in the desire to have that part amputated (Body Integrity Dysphoria). Specifically, participants with and without a leg-related amputation desire could communicate moral and immoral decisions by using the owned and disowned leg.
The results of these studies suggest that reductions of body ownership are associated with an increase of dishonesty. This seems to highlight a role of body ownership as a way to distance the self from immorality and lessen its effects. In other words, it is possible that modulations of the sense of ownership can facilitate preservation of a moral concept of self. Thus, specific training programmes aimed at enhancing corporeal awareness may increase the occurrence of honest behaviours in everyday interactions and contexts
The role of bodily self-consciousness in morality and (dis)honest behaviour
No full textBodily self-consciousness (BSC) mainly consists of the sense of owning one’s own body, -Sense of Ownership (OW)-, and of being in control of one’s own actions -Sense of Agency (AG)-. The way in which BSC signals can influence morality and the tendency to deceive is still unclear, with studies suggesting that attention towards body signals can make us more sensitive to our needs and thus dishonest, and others suggesting that BSC signals would make us feel more in control of our actions and therefore more honest. Here, we tested (N=658) whether self-report measures of BSC differently relate to Moral Identity (measured by a questionnaire) and Moral Behavior (measured as participants’ tendency to cheat for money). Our results show that i) higher OW predicts higher morality (but higher dishonesty) in people who are less sensitive to Monetary Reward; ii) higher AG increases Morality by boosting the effect of Sense of Power and diminishing that of Moral Disengagement. The dissociation between Moral Identity and Moral Behavior found in people who are less sensitive to Monetary Reward is in line with moral credit models: being aware of the fact that we are not tempted by rewards enhances moral self-image but impairs Moral Behavior
Human moral decision-making through the lens of Parkinson's disease
Full text linkParkinson's disease (PD) is a neurodegenerative disorder characterized by the loss of dopaminergic neurons in the basal ganglia (BG) and thalamocortical circuitry. While defective motor control has long been considered the defining symptom of PD, mounting evidence indicates that the BG are fundamentally important for a multitude of cognitive, emotional, and motivational processes in addition to motor function. Here, we review alterations in moral decision-making in people with PD, specifically in the context of deceptive behavior. We report that PD patients exhibit two opposite behavioral patterns: hyper- and hypo-honesty. The hyper-honest subgroup engages in deception less often than matched controls, even when lying is associated with a monetary payoff. This behavioral pattern seems to be linked to dopaminergic hypo-activity, implying enhanced harm avoidance, risk aversion, non-impulsivity, and reduced reward sensitivity. On the contrary, the hypo-honest subgroup-often characterized by the additional diagnosis of impulse control disorders (ICDs) and dopamine dysregulation syndrome (DDS)-deceives more often than both PD patients without ICDs/DDS and controls. This behavioral pattern appears to be associated with dopaminergic hyperactivity, which underpins enhanced novelty-seeking, risk-proneness, impulsivity, and reward sensitivity. We posit that these two complementary behavioral patterns might be related to dysfunction of the dopaminergic reward system, leading to reduced or enhanced motivation to deceive. Only a few studies have directly investigated moral decision-making in PD and other neurodegenerative disorders affecting the BG, and further research on the causal role of subcortical structures in shaping moral behavior is needed
The role of Bodily Self Consciousness in Morality and (dis)honest behaviors
No full textBodily self-consciousness (BSC) mainly consists of the sense of owning one’s own body, i.e., the Sense of Ownership (OW), and of being in control of one’s own actions, i.e., the Sense of Agency (AG). The way in which BSC signals can influence morality and the tendency to deceive is still unclear, with studies suggesting that attention towards body signals can make us more sensitive to our needs and thus dishonest, and others suggesting that BSC signals would make us feel more in control of our actions and then more honest. Here, we tested (in 658 participants) whether self-report measures of BSC differently relate to Moral Identity (measured by a questionnaire) and Moral Behavior (measured as participants’ tendency to cheat in a task where they could gain more money by lying). Our results show that the relationship between OW and internalized morality is moderated by sensitivity to Monetary Reward with less sensitive participants showing higher internalized morality; higher AG seems to increase Internalized Morality by boosting the effect of Sense of Power and diminishing that of Moral Disengagement. Interestingly, analysis of Moral Behavior shows that the effect of OW on dishonesty is higher in those who are not very sensitive to Monetary Reward. Our data show an interesting dissociation between Moral Identity and Behavior: when high OW is associated to low sensitivity to Monetary Reward, people feel more moral but behave less honestly. This suggests that being aware of the fact that we are not tempted by rewards enhances our moral self-image but impairs Moral Behavior. This is in line with moral credit models which posit that we use moral behavior to balance our moral self: when moral identity is high, we allow ourselves to misbehave (moral self-licensing) and when low, we enhance honest behaviors (moral cleansing). To further investigate the impact of Body Ownership over (dis)honesty in social situations, we used Virtual Reality (VR) to modulate participants’ OW of a virtual body while interacting with another person and having the opportunity to lie for a monetary reward. Our preliminary results (N = 28) suggest that people behave less honestly when their virtual hand appears disconnected from the virtual body, but this effect does not seem to be modulated by reward
Equilibrioception: a Method to Evaluate the Sense of Balance
No full textIn this study, we present an algorithm for the assessment of one’s own perception of balance (equilibrioception). Upright standing position is maintained by continuous updating and integration of vestibular, visual and proprioceptive information, so that a compensatory reaction can be implemented when perturbations occur. This ability to monitor and maintain balance can be considered as a physiological sense, so, as for the other senses, it is fair to assume that healthy people can perceive and evaluate differences between balance states. The aim of this study is to investigate how changes in stabilometric parametres are perceived by young, healthy adults. Participants were asked to stand still on a Wii Balance Board (WBB) with feet in a constrained position; 13 trials of 30 s each were performed by each subject, the order of Eyes Open (EO) and Eyes Closed (EC) trials being semi-randomized. At the end of each trial (except the first one), participants were asked to judge if their performance was better or worse than the one in the immediately preceding trial. SwayPath ratio data were used to calculate the Just Noticeable Difference (JND) between two consecutive trials, which was of 0.2 when participants improved their performance from one trial to the next, and of 0.4 when performance on a trial was worse than in the previous one. This “need” of a bigger difference for the worsening to be perceived seems to suggest a tendency towards overestimation of one’s own balance. Interestingly, participants’ judgement was more reliable when evaluating consecutive EC rather than EO trials, at least when performance was worsening
Morality in the flesh: on the link between bodily self-consciousness, moral identity and (dis)honest behaviour
No full textThe sense of owning a body (ownership) and controlling its actions (agency) are two main pillars of bodily self-consciousness (BSC). Although studies suggest that BSC signals and morality may be associated, whether such association has a positive or negative direction remains unclear. To investigate this issue, we conducted two pre-registered, online studies, in which a total of 1309 participants completed BSC- and morality-related questionnaires and undertook a task where they could cheat for monetary gain. We found that participants with high sense of ownership displayed high moral identity, which supports the notion that ownership is used to associate the self with positive characteristics. Moreover, high agency was associated with increased moral identity when sense of power is high. Results regarding deception are less clear, and might relate to the impact of COVID-19. Our results concerning moral identity may inspire policies that rely on changes of corporeal awareness to contrast immorality
The thermoception task: a thermal imaging-based procedure for measuring awareness of changes in peripheral body temperature
No full textAlthough thermal body signals provide crucial information about the state of an organism and changes in body temperature may be a sign of affective states (e.g., stress, pain, sexual arousal), research on thermal awareness is limited. Here we developed a task measuring awareness of changes in peripheral body temperature (thermal interoception) and compared it to the classical heartbeat counting task (cardiac interoception). With an infrared light bulb we delivered stimuli of different temperature intensities to the right hand of 31 healthy participants. Thermal interoceptive accuracy, i.e., the difference between participants' real and perceived change in hand temperature, showed good interindividual variability. We found that thermal interoception did not correlate with (and was generally higher than) cardiac interoception, suggesting that different interceptive channels provide separate contributions to awareness of bodily states. Moreover, the results hint at the great salience of thermal signals and the need for thermoregulation in day-to-day life. Finally, thermal interoceptive accuracy was associated with self-reported awareness of body temperature changes and with the ability to regulate distress by focusing on body sensations. Our task has the potential to significantly increase current knowledge about the role of interoception in cognition and behavior, particularly in social and emotional contexts
Social, affective, and non-motoric bodily cues to the Sense of Agency: A systematic review of the experience of control
No full text: While the Sense of Agency (SoA) - the experience of controlling actions - is linked to motoric processes, the effects of non-motoric cues remain uncertain. We performed a systematic review investigating whether SoA is modulated by social, affective, and non-motoric bodily cues like internal bodily signals (IBSs) and Sense of Ownership (SoO). We searched Scopus and Pubmed and checked additional sources (e.g., citation searching). We identified 160 articles investigating social (67), affective (71) and non-motoric bodily cues (28), and calculated the percentage of studies supporting SoA modulation. SoA is influenced by social cues (92.54%), like the presence of interactive agents, and their status. Concerning affective cues (88.73%), reward-related information and affective states modulate SoA, but the effects of outcome valence are inconsistent. Regarding bodily cues (78.57%), SoO informs SoA, but the impact of IBSs is unclear. Overall, we show that diverse non-motoric cues modulate SoA. We submit that the brain evaluates different non-motoric cues in partially distinct circuits, before comparing them in a fronto-parietal network grounding SoA modulation
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