Seminar

Explorer le sens du soi corporel avec EmBODY 

  Psychosis is associated with disorders of the sense of self, including disorders of the sense of bodily self. EmBODY tools may help to explore the sense of bodily self in relation with emotions, and its impairments in psychosis. Subjects paint body outlines to indicate where they feel body activation or deactivation while experiencing distinct emotions. Typical analyses consist in measuring activations and deactivations for each emotion. However, the pattern of body activations and deactivations is highly variable between individuals, and especially so for patients. We reconsidered the way to analyze EmBODY results. We tested the hypothesis that beyond inter-individual differences, a given individual paints the bodies in similar ways whatever the emotions. We applied this reasoning to results in patients with schizophrenia and in individuals at familial high risk of psychosis. I will present the results suggesting that the body pattern is indeed stable across emotions in neurotypicals, but less so in patients with schizophrenia and individuals at familial high risk of psychosis. I will suggest that our measure may be used to evaluate the fragility of the body representation.