title: The Rubber Hand Illusion in a patient with hand disownership.
abstract: A 78-year-old patient with a right hemispheric sensorimotor ischemic stroke suffered from problems in ownership of her left arm (somatoparaphrenia). After recovering from motor weakness, however, body ownership problems remained present. To assess whether disturbed feelings of ownership coincided with an enhanced or diminished susceptibility for gaining ownership over a foreign hand, we applied the 'Rubber Hand Illusion' (RHI) to the ipsi- and contralesional hand. The RHI was significantly stronger for the contralesional left arm than for the right arm. In addition, solely visual exposure to the left rubber hand was sufficient to elicit strong feelings of ownership over the rubber hand. These findings suggest that disturbances in the feeling of body ownership allow a foreign hand to be incorporated more easily.
authors.affiliation: Department of Experimental Psychology, Helmholtz Institute, Utrecht University, The Netherlands. h.e.vanstralen@uu.nl
authors.forename: Haike E
authors.initials: HE
authors.lastname: van Stralen
authors.affiliation: Department of Experimental Psychology, Helmholtz Institute, Utrecht University, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: Martine J E
authors.initials: MJ
authors.lastname: van Zandvoort
authors.affiliation: Department of Neurology, Rudolf Magnus Institute of Neuroscience, University Medical Center Utrecht, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: L Jaap
authors.initials: LJ
authors.lastname: Kappelle
authors.affiliation: Department of Neurology, Rudolf Magnus Institute of Neuroscience, University Medical Center Utrecht, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: H Chris
authors.initials: HC
authors.lastname: Dijkerman
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D000377:Agnosia / Q000523:psychology; D001828:Body Image / Q000523:psychology*; D005260:Female; D007839:Functional Laterality / Q000502:physiology; D006225:Hand; D006801:Humans; D007088:Illusions / Q000523:psychology*; D020521:Stroke / Q000523:psychology*; D014796:Visual Perception / Q000502:physiology*