title: "Atypical touch perception in MTS may derive from an abnormally plastic self-representation".
abstract: Mirror Touch Synesthetes (MTSs) feel touch while they observe others being touched. According to the authors, two complementary theoretical frameworks, the Threshold Theory and the Self-Other Theory, explain Mirror Touch Synesthesia (MTS). Based on the behavioral evidence that in MTSs the mere observation of touch is sufficient to elicit self-other merging (i.e., self-representation changes), a condition that in non-MTSs just elicits self-other sharing (i.e., mirroring activity without self-other blurring), and on the rTPJ anatomical alterations in MTS, we argue that MTS may derive from an abnormally plastic self-representation and atypical multisensory integrative mechanisms.
authors.affiliation: a Dipartimento di Psicologia , Sapienza Università degli Studi di Roma , Rome , Italy.
authors.forename: Ilaria
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Bufalari
authors.forename: Giuseppina
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Porciello
authors.forename: Salvatore Maria
authors.initials: SM
authors.lastname: Aglioti
mesh_terms: D006801:Humans; D007088:Illusions / Q000502:physiology*; D010468:Perceptual Disorders / Q000503:physiopathology*; D055698:Touch Perception / Q000502:physiology*