The mirror paradigm: Assessing the embodied self in the context of abuse.

Ensink, Karin; Berthelot, Nicolas; Biberdzic, Marko; Normandin, Lina

doi:10.1037/pap0000018

Cited by 13 publications

(8 citation statements)

References 52 publications

(78 reference statements)

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“…Five studies used BIs to investigate psychological and cognitive responses in clinical populations (Ensink et al, 2016;Falconer et al, 2016;Jalal et al, 2020;Rabellino et al, 2018;Seinfeld et al, 2018). Jalal and co-authors used the RHI paradigm to investigate a "multisensory stimulation therapy" for patients with an obsessive-compulsive disorder, which consisted in contaminating a rubber hand through fake feces after 5 minute of synchronous or asynchronous VTS.…”

Section: Results In Clinical Populationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Falconer and co-authors (2016), investigated whether the effects of self-identification with full virtual bodies (child or adult) could be exploited to increase selfcompassion in patients with depression, and found significant reductions in depression severity and self-criticism, as well as to a significant increase in self-compassion, from baseline to 4-week follow-up (Falconer et al, 2016). In the study from Karin and colleagues (2016), the authors tested the mirror paradigm (reflection of the self in a mirror) from Kernenberg & Normandin (2002, unpublished document), consisting in asking a series of questions that further activate attention to the positive and negative aspects of self as well as aspects that may be dissociated in front of a mirror, in children with history of sexual abuse, and in children without any trauma, and found that embodied self-experiences of children with histories of sexual abuse were significantly more negative than those of non-abused controls (Ensink et al, 2016).…”

Section: Results In Clinical Populationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Body illusions for mental health: a systematic review

Matamala-Gomez¹,

Maselli²,

Malighetti³

et al. 2020

Preprint

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Body illusions (BIs) refer to altered perceptual states where the perception of the self-body significantly deviates from the configuration of the physical body, for example, in aspects like perceived size, shape, posture, location, and sense of ownership. Different established experimental paradigms allow to temporarily induce such altered perceptual states in a predictable and systematic manner. There is evidence demonstrating the use of BIs in clinical neuroscience, however, to our knowledge, this is the first systematic review evaluating the effectiveness of BIs in healthy and clinical populations. This systematic review examined the use of BIs in the healthy and clinical populations, and review how BIs can be adopted to enhance mental health in different mental illness conditions. The systematic review was conducted following the PRISMA guidelines. Of the 8086 studies identified, 189 studies were included for full-text analyses. Seventy-seven studies used BIs in clinical populations. Most of the studies using BIs with clinical populations used body illusions toward a body part, modulating the external aspects of body representation. Even though clinical studies showed the positive effects of BIs to improve mental illness conditions, future technologies using BIs targeting both the external (exteroceptive) and the internal (interoceptive) aspects of body representations can further improve the efficacy of this approach.

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Section: Results In Clinical Populationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Results In Clinical Populationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Body illusions for mental health: a systematic review

Matamala-Gomez¹,

Maselli²,

Malighetti³

et al. 2020

Preprint

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

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“…From a psychological position, a great deal of research has focused more on the observable aspects of body image in AN, while research on the psychological, affective experience of the body and how this relates to a person’s fundamental representations of self is still limited. This scarcity is related both to the inherent complexity of trying to capture what it is like to have a body—a feeling which is both fundamental but at the same time elusive and hard to express [ 19 ], and also related to a lack of experimental measures focused on trying to access the more deep-seated dimensions of embodied processes, which are not necessarily accessible to awareness or reliably measured by self-report [ 4 , 20 ]. One approach to assessing the affective experience of embodiment is through an innovative assessment, the Mirror Interview (MI) [ 21 ], which appears to be a promising clinical and research measure focusing both on how the body is represented and expressed.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…This process, it is postulated, taps into the affective aspects of the individual’s sense of embodiment, or the feeling of what it is like to have a body, as this is expressed both verbally and non-verbally. The coding system is designed to assess both the verbal and non-verbal expressions of this experience and makes it possible to obtain an objective assessment of an individual’s affective reaction regarding their experience of their embodied selves [ 20 ].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…A set of pilot studies using the MI have found associations between RF, mother’s attachment representations and their toddler daughters’ body representations [ 52 ], between maternal attachment representations and their middle childhood daughters’ body representations [ 53 ], and between parent representations on the MI and amount of disordered eating [ 54 ]. The MI has also been used to assess the impact of sexual abuse on children’s embodied self-experience [ 20 ]. Furthermore, the MI has been found to be able to significantly distinguish between healthy adolescents and those with personality disorder [ 55 , 56 ].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Disturbances in the experiences of embodiment related to attachment, mentalization and self-objectification in anorexia nervosa

Katznelson

Daniel²,

Poulsen

et al. 2021

J Eat Disord

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Background Body image disturbance is central to both the understanding and treatment of anorexia nervosa (AN); however, the underlying psychological processes involved are still not well understood. One way towards a better understanding of these mechanisms may be to explore the sense of embodiment in these patients in an attempt at integrating the role of the body in our understanding of the development of self in AN. It is hypothesized that difficulties in affective experiences of embodiment is related to insecure attachment, deficits in mentalization and self-objectification. Methods Sixteen inpatients with AN were interviewed with the Mirror Interview (MI). In the interview, the individual is asked a set of questions related to thoughts and feelings about the body while standing in front of a full-length mirror. Furthermore, all patients were assessed with the Adult Attachment Interview, which was coded for both attachment and mentalization (operationalized by the Reflective Functioning scale; RF). Self-objectification was measured with the Objectified Body Consciousness Scale (OBCS). Results Results from a multiple regression analysis showed that Global MI scores were significantly associated with Coherence of mind as an indicator of attachment, RF and scores on the OBCS. Conclusions The study suggests that affective experiences of embodiment in patients with AN are associated with negative attachment representations, mentalizing impairments and objectified body consciousness. Plain English Summary Body image disturbance is a key diagnostic feature in anorexia nervosa but the underlying psychological processes are poorly understood. Recently, there has been a growing interest in how disturbances in the more psychological experience of the body (embodiment) in anorexia nervosa is related to both attachment, how individuals make sense of both themselves and others and the degree to which they tend to experience ourselves from the outside. In this pilot study, this was assessed with an innovative interview, the Mirror Interview, where the individual is asked a set of question while standing in front of a full length mirror. Results showed that difficulties in embodied experiences in patients with anorexia nervosa were related to more fundamental representations of self and self-objectification. This has potential implications for both the understanding and treatment of anorexia nervosa, as disturbances in body image may be seen as an underlying factor in the development of an eating disorder.

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Attachment and body representations in adolescents with personality disorder

Buhl‐Nielsen,

Steele,

Steele

2024

J Clin Psychol

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BackgroundAttachment theory has served as an influential framework for understanding psychopathology, partly due to reliable assessment methodology. The influence of insecure attachment on attitudes toward the body and the impact this might have for the development of psychopathology is however less well elucidated.MethodA total of 123 adolescents (35 with borderline personality disorder or BPD, 25 with other personality disorders [OPD] and 63 comprising a normative control group) were interviewed with the Adult Attachment Interview (AAI) and the Mirror Interview (MI). The MI questions respondents about how they feel about their bodies, as they look in the mirror.ResultsThe AAIs from the Borderline group were predominantly insecure‐preoccupied and unresolved. These adolescents had significantly lower levels of a positive and integrated sense of self and body than the other groups. Regression results revealed a high loving relationship with fathers, low involving anger with father, high coherence of mind, slight derogation of mother & low levels of unresolved loss uniquely and additively predicted 55% of variance in the summary score assigned to MI responses, that is, the summary score for a Positive and Integrated Body Representation (PIBR).ConclusionUnfavorable attachment experiences and current states of mind regarding attachment may give rise to problems with establishing PIBRs, and thus play a role in the development of psychopathology, especially BPD.

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The mirror paradigm: Assessing the embodied self in the context of abuse.

Cited by 13 publications

References 52 publications

Body illusions for mental health: a systematic review

Body illusions for mental health: a systematic review

Disturbances in the experiences of embodiment related to attachment, mentalization and self-objectification in anorexia nervosa

Attachment and body representations in adolescents with personality disorder

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