The developing bodily self: How posture constrains body representation in childhood

Gottwald, J.; Keenaghan, S.; Zampieri, E.; Tosodduk, H.; Bremner, A.J.; Cowie, D.

doi:10.1111/cdev.13425

The developing bodily self: How posture constrains body representation in childhood

Gottwald, J.; Keenaghan, S.; Zampieri, E.; Tosodduk, H.; Bremner, A.J.; Cowie, D.

Authors

J. Gottwald

S. Keenaghan

E. Zampieri

H. Tosodduk

A.J. Bremner

Professor Dorothy Cowie dorothy.cowie@durham.ac.uk
Professor

Abstract

Adults’ body representation is constrained by multisensory information and knowledge of the body such as its possible postures. This study (N = 180) tested for similar constraints in children. Using the rubber hand illusion with adults and 6- to 7-year olds, we measured proprioceptive drift (an index of hand localization) and ratings of felt hand ownership. The fake hand was either congruent or incongruent with the participant’s own. Across ages, congruency of posture and visual–tactile congruency yielded greater drift toward the fake hand. Ownership ratings were higher with congruent visual–tactile information, but unaffected by posture. Posture constrains body representation similarly in children and adults, suggesting that children have sensitive, robust mechanisms for maintaining a sense of bodily self.

Citation

Gottwald, J., Keenaghan, S., Zampieri, E., Tosodduk, H., Bremner, A., & Cowie, D. (2020). The developing bodily self: How posture constrains body representation in childhood. Child Development, 92(1), 351-366. https://doi.org/10.1111/cdev.13425

Journal Article Type	Article
Online Publication Date	Aug 7, 2020
Publication Date	Jan 1, 2020
Deposit Date	May 14, 2020
Publicly Available Date	Aug 19, 2020
Journal	Child Development
Print ISSN	0009-3920
Electronic ISSN	1467-8624
Publisher	Wiley
Peer Reviewed	Peer Reviewed
Volume	92
Issue	1
Pages	351-366
DOI	https://doi.org/10.1111/cdev.13425

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Copyright Statement
Advance online version © 2020 The Authors. Child Development published by Wiley Periodicals LLC on behalf of Society for Research in Child Development. This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.