The case for the comparator model as an explanation of the sense of agency and its breakdowns

Carruthers, Glenn

doi:10.1016/j.concog.2010.08.005

Cited by 58 publications

(45 citation statements)

References 41 publications

(41 reference statements)

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“…This finding demonstrates that internal predictions (which are only issued in case of active movements) are not necessary to induce an experience of agency, but external cues (here: externally provided prior instructions) can substitute it. In fact, this particular finding is rather in line with a postdictive inferential account of agency.The comparator model account might explain some instances of the experience of agency, but needs various adjustments for many other instances (Carruthers, 2012; Vosgerau and Synofzik, 2012). For example, with respect to priming studies, “the amount of modification to the [comparator] model needed is becoming incredibly large and none of these modifications is predicted by the initial [comparator] model” (Carruthers, 2012, p. 43).…”

Section: Predictive and Postdictive Accounts Each Have Major Limitationssupporting

confidence: 57%

“…The comparator model account might explain some instances of the experience of agency, but needs various adjustments for many other instances (Carruthers, 2012; Vosgerau and Synofzik, 2012). For example, with respect to priming studies, “the amount of modification to the [comparator] model needed is becoming incredibly large and none of these modifications is predicted by the initial [comparator] model” (Carruthers, 2012, p. 43).…”

Section: Predictive and Postdictive Accounts Each Have Major Limitationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…For example, with respect to priming studies, “the amount of modification to the [comparator] model needed is becoming incredibly large and none of these modifications is predicted by the initial [comparator] model” (Carruthers, 2012, p. 43). Thus, it not only remains questionable whether it is indeed possible to integrate all different adjustments into a coherently adjusted comparator model; the comparator model does also not specify a number of problems, thus making various different adjustments possible and necessary, which cannot be extrapolated from the comparator model itself anymore (Vosgerau and Synofzik, 2012).…”

Section: Predictive and Postdictive Accounts Each Have Major Limitationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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The experience of agency: an interplay between prediction and postdiction

Synofzik¹,

Vosgerau²,

Voss³

2013

Front. Psychol.

232

214

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The experience of agency, i.e., the registration that I am the initiator of my actions, is a basic and constant underpinning of our interaction with the world. Whereas several accounts have underlined predictive processes as the central mechanism (e.g., the comparator model by C. Frith), others emphasized postdictive inferences (e.g., post-hoc inference account by D. Wegner). Based on increasing evidence that both predictive and postdictive processes contribute to the experience of agency, we here present a unifying but at the same time parsimonious approach that reconciles these accounts: predictive and postdictive processes are both integrated by the brain according to the principles of optimal cue integration. According to this framework, predictive and postdictive processes each serve as authorship cues that are continuously integrated and weighted depending on their availability and reliability in a given situation. Both sensorimotor and cognitive signals can serve as predictive cues (e.g., internal predictions based on an efferency copy of the motor command or cognitive anticipations based on priming). Similarly, other sensorimotor and cognitive cues can each serve as post-hoc cues (e.g., visual feedback of the action or the affective valence of the action outcome). Integration and weighting of these cues might not only differ between contexts and individuals, but also between different subject and disease groups. For example, schizophrenia patients with delusions of influence seem to rely less on (probably imprecise) predictive motor signals of the action and more on post-hoc action cues like e.g., visual feedback and, possibly, the affective valence of the action outcome. Thus, the framework of optimal cue integration offers a promising approach that directly stimulates a wide range of experimentally testable hypotheses on agency processing in different subject groups.

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Section: Predictive and Postdictive Accounts Each Have Major Limitationssupporting

confidence: 57%

Section: Predictive and Postdictive Accounts Each Have Major Limitationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Predictive and Postdictive Accounts Each Have Major Limitationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 1 more Smart Citation

The experience of agency: an interplay between prediction and postdiction

Synofzik¹,

Vosgerau²,

Voss³

2013

Front. Psychol.

232

214

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“…These two representations matching in this context means that they represent the same action. The comparator model has been considered a promising explanation of the sense of agency and is able to explain some important discoveries (for recent reviews of what and how see Carruthers, 2012). …”

Section: Standard Accounts Of the Sense Of Agencymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Without this sense, the patient has no experiential basis for a self-attribution of action- they do not feel as though they perform the action- and so actions are not self-attributed. For those interested in the details of why this occurs, there is some experimental evidence that these patients have an underlying deficit in forming or using predicted sensory feedback (Frith and Done, 1989; Blakemore et al, 2000; Carruthers, 2012). …”

Section: The Occasionality Problem and Unconscious Representations Ofmentioning

confidence: 99%

What makes us conscious of our own agency? And why the conscious versus unconscious representation distinction matters

Carruthers

2014

Front. Hum. Neurosci.

Self Cite

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Existing accounts of the sense of agency tend to focus on the proximal causal history of the feeling. That is, they explain the sense of agency by describing the cognitive mechanism that causes the sense of agency to be elicited. However, it is possible to elicit an unconscious representation of one’s own agency that plays a different role in a cognitive system. I use the “occasionality problem” to suggest that taking this distinction seriously has potential theoretical pay-offs for this reason. We are faced, then, with a need to distinguish instances of the representation of one’s own agency in which the subject is aware of their sense of own agency from instances in which they are not. This corresponds to a specific instance of what Dennett calls the “Hard Question”: once the representation is elicited, then what happens? In other words, how is a representation of one’s own agency used in a cognitive system when the subject is aware of it? How is this different from when the representation of own agency remains unconscious? This phrasing suggests a Functionalist answer to the Hard Question. I consider two single function hypotheses. First, perhaps the representation of own agency enters into the mechanisms of attention. This seems unlikely as, in general, attention is insufficient for awareness. Second, perhaps, a subject is aware of their sense of agency when it is available for verbal report. However, this seems inconsistent with evidence of a sense of agency in the great apes. Although these two single function views seem like dead ends, multifunction hypotheses such as the global workspace theory remain live options which we should consider. I close by considering a non-functionalist answer to the Hard Question: perhaps it is not a difference in the use to which the representation is put, but a difference in the nature of the representation itself. When it comes to the sense of agency, the Hard Question remains, but there are alternatives open to us.

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Philosophy of Mind and Cognitive Science since 1980

Schier¹,

Sutton²

2014

History of Philosophy in Australia and New Zealand

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The case for the comparator model as an explanation of the sense of agency and its breakdowns

Cited by 58 publications

References 41 publications

The experience of agency: an interplay between prediction and postdiction

The experience of agency: an interplay between prediction and postdiction

What makes us conscious of our own agency? And why the conscious versus unconscious representation distinction matters

Philosophy of Mind and Cognitive Science since 1980

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