The manipulation part is what fascinates me. They didn't just correlate alpha wave frequency with ownership perception. They used transcranial stimulation to artificially speed up or slow down the waves, and the subjective experience changed accordingly.
That's a pretty direct causal link between a measurable brain state and something as fundamental as "where does my body end?"
What they seem to have identified isn't "the limits of you" so much as a timing parameter the brain uses to decide whether two sensory streams belong together
> participants had a robotic arm tap the index finger of their real and fake hands, either at the exact same time or with a delay of up to 500 milliseconds between each tap. (...) Those with faster alpha waves appeared to rule out fake hands even with a tiny gap in taps, while those with slower waves were more likely to feel the fake hand as their own, even if the taps were farther apart.
That's the limit of "you"? Sounds more like a sampling rate/processing speed of the sense of touch.
> With a third group of participants, they used a non-invasive technique called transcranial alternating current stimulation to speed up or slow down the frequency of a person's alpha waves. And sure enough, this seemed to correlate with how real a fake hand felt.
I know this is largely orthogonal to the article, and I know what “non-invasive” means and why it’s used in this sentence, but it made me chuckle - “this technique that changed the subject’s brain waves sufficient to literally impact their sense of self - but don’t worry! It’s non-invasive!”
I wonder how those with multiple identities (DID), would affect this measurement. I know there are direct biomarkers in folk with it having to do with the frontal cortex and amygdala, and some neuroimaging being able to note vast differences in processing: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9045405/
I wonder if having a feel for musical timing works similarly where a brain wave frequency determines how 'thight' your sense of timing is. Would be sick if you could improve that aspect of musicality with stimulation
I do wonder how far they would get with the phantom limb stuff. We know phantom limb stuff is encoded before birth so would alpha waves adjust something so fundamential?
In college I tried to participate in a rubber-hand-illusion while wearing an EEG, but the stimulation was done by the researcher manually and I never felt the illusion. This does show an interesting twist, using a robot arm for repeated and accurate stimulation.
This is interesting but i find it strange than there is no tests with a controls groups with closed eyes. Maybe some of the observed effects are visual only or psychological and not tactile at all.
The idea of "ownership of a body" made me think about a quote I heard a long time ago, while talking amongst musicians while waiting to get up and perform. It felt like some secret knowledge that I gained privilege to, while somewhat inebriated and it hasn't left me since.
> I _have_ a body, I _am_ a soul.
Maybe what they're identifying is the first half of that statement, how we interpret the former, through the presence of the latter.
although our internet is whitelist-blocked and I can only read the comments here, this reminds me of something my friend said some years ago, he said my car is the extension of my limbs and I can feel the limits of my car similar to my hands and feet
So, how far does the human electric field extend outside the body? May be only picovolts or in that range... But can we measure that? Does the field exist past our skin?
Can things like meditation modify that? Or how about stuff like OOBE's like what some folks call astral projection? What do those practices to to the body's electric field?
Wow, that’s really interesting! It seems like alpha waves are the ‘tick rate’ of this system, and some set number of ticks are required to update the body model?
Very interesting, and I suspect somewhat related to the phenomenon in high-performance sports and music where the player or athlete feels they have become one with the instrument or equipment. It happens after a certain level of expertise, and when everything is tuned just right, and often with the flow state.
The perception goes beyond feeling fine sensations in the interface to the instrument/equipment, but literally feeling like it is a part of your body. I've gotten it in both alpine ski racing and sportscar racing. When it is ON, moving a ski or wheel to a particular spot feels the same as when I'd put my foot on a particular rock where running in rough terrain, and often even more part of me than when kicking a soccer ball with my real foot. Both the sensitivity of the feel (feedback) and the precision with which I could execute was just an entire other level, and it is still weird to think of how it was often better feedback & precision than my own foot in a less-skilled situation.
Now run the same kinds of tests while listening to music, meditation, sleep, orgasm, psychoactive substances (including caffeine/alcohol/nicotine), during simulated stress event (hard slap in the face?), on different age groups, genders, races. Perhaps there are more than one version or definition of "You" that arises in certain circumstances.
Scientists identify brain waves that define the limits of 'you'
(sciencealert.com)312 points by mikhael 26 January 2026 | 96 comments
Comments
That's a pretty direct causal link between a measurable brain state and something as fundamental as "where does my body end?"
https://news.ki.se/how-brain-waves-shape-our-sense-of-self
That's the limit of "you"? Sounds more like a sampling rate/processing speed of the sense of touch.
> With a third group of participants, they used a non-invasive technique called transcranial alternating current stimulation to speed up or slow down the frequency of a person's alpha waves. And sure enough, this seemed to correlate with how real a fake hand felt.
I know this is largely orthogonal to the article, and I know what “non-invasive” means and why it’s used in this sentence, but it made me chuckle - “this technique that changed the subject’s brain waves sufficient to literally impact their sense of self - but don’t worry! It’s non-invasive!”
I wonder if the brain can experience if clothing, tools, bikes are part of the body?
> I _have_ a body, I _am_ a soul.
Maybe what they're identifying is the first half of that statement, how we interpret the former, through the presence of the latter.
You always hear about how something is an extension of the body to the best athletes.
Can things like meditation modify that? Or how about stuff like OOBE's like what some folks call astral projection? What do those practices to to the body's electric field?
The perception goes beyond feeling fine sensations in the interface to the instrument/equipment, but literally feeling like it is a part of your body. I've gotten it in both alpine ski racing and sportscar racing. When it is ON, moving a ski or wheel to a particular spot feels the same as when I'd put my foot on a particular rock where running in rough terrain, and often even more part of me than when kicking a soccer ball with my real foot. Both the sensitivity of the feel (feedback) and the precision with which I could execute was just an entire other level, and it is still weird to think of how it was often better feedback & precision than my own foot in a less-skilled situation.
https://duckduckgo.com/l/?uddg=https%3A%2F%2Fneurophysics.uc...
Now run the same kinds of tests while listening to music, meditation, sleep, orgasm, psychoactive substances (including caffeine/alcohol/nicotine), during simulated stress event (hard slap in the face?), on different age groups, genders, races. Perhaps there are more than one version or definition of "You" that arises in certain circumstances.