The Two-Axis Model of Self-Awareness: Sense of Agency and Metacognitive Presence Diverge in Antiphase Under Prediction Error
Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research) July 13, 2026 Evgeniy Buev
The sense of agency (SoA) and the sense of metacognitive presence (SoP) are typically considered to be aligned: both high in normal experience and both low in dissociation. This paper proposes that they actually diverge in opposite directions depending on prediction error (PE). When PE is high, SoA decreases (the action feels involuntary) while SoP increases (the person feels alert and present). When PE is low, as in automaticity or flow, SoA remains high but unreflected, while SoP drops toward zero. This model reframes self-awareness as an artifact of error monitoring rather than of attention, explaining why self-consciousness vanishes during flow despite high attention. The hypothesis is novel and falsifiable, and a minimal experimental protocol is proposed.