Brain
January 15, 2004
Olaf Blanke, Théodor Landis, Laurent Spinelli et al.
746 citations
Out-of-body experiences (OBE) and autoscopy (seeing one's body from outside) share common neurological mechanisms rooted in disrupted body perception. In six neurological patients, these experiences were linked to vestibular sensations (floating, flying, rotation), visual body-part illusions (shortening or moving limbs), and the sensation of seeing only part of one's body. Body position before the experience influenced both OBE and autoscopy. Brain damage or dysfunction localized to the temporo-parietal junction (TPJ) in five patients. The findings suggest OBE and autoscopy result from a failure to integrate proprioceptive, tactile, visual, and vestibular information about one's own body, combined with a vestibular dysfunction that disconnects personal space from extrapersonal space, caused by temporary TPJ dysfunction during impaired consciousness.
Journal of Neuroscience
January 19, 2005
Olaf Blanke, Christine Mohr, Christoph M. Michel et al.
573 citations
The temporoparietal junction (TPJ) is crucial for the conscious experience of the self as spatially united with the body. Using evoked potential mapping, the TPJ was selectively activated 330-400 milliseconds after stimulus onset when healthy volunteers imagined themselves in the position and visual perspective typical of out-of-body experiences (OBEs). Transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) over the TPJ at this time impaired mental transformation of one's own body but not of external objects. In an epileptic patient with OBEs originating from the TPJ, partial activation of the seizure focus occurred during mental transformations mimicking her OBE perceptions. These findings suggest that impaired processing at the TPJ may lead to pathological selves such as OBEs.
Cerebral cortex communications
January 1, 2022
Maëva Moyne, Guillaume Legendre, Luc Arnal et al.
The brain's ability to detect emotional signals persists during non-rapid eye movement (NREM) sleep. Using electroencephalography, neural responses to emotional voices differed from neutral voices both while awake and during NREM sleep. Emotional voices also triggered more EEG arousals (sleep perturbations) than neutral or control stimuli. The amplitude of sleep event-related potentials and the number of arousals after emotional voices increased linearly with how often participants recalled their dreams. Similar correlations with dream recall frequency appeared for beta and sigma brain oscillations, but not for theta. No such correlations were found for neutral or control stimuli. These findings suggest that emotion-specific neural reactivity during sleep, rather than general alertness, may contribute to encoding or retrieving dreams.
Epilepsy & behavior : E&B
March 1, 2011
Lukas Heydrich, Christophe Lopez, Margitta Seeck et al.
A 10-year-old patient with right temporoparietal epilepsy experienced both a partial own-body illusion (somatoparaphrenia) and a full own-body illusion (out-of-body experience) sequentially during a single epileptic seizure. This is the first documented case of out-of-body experiences in a child with focal epilepsy. The co-occurrence suggests that partial and full own-body illusions share functional and neuroanatomical properties, highlighting the right temporoparietal junction's role in bodily self-consciousness.
Epilepsy & behavior : E&B
February 1, 2010
Christophe Lopez, Lukas Heydrich, Margitta Seeck et al.
A 33-year-old man with a right frontal lobe oligodendroglioma experienced complex partial seizures involving a feeling of being projected outside his body, dissociation of mind and self from body (disembodiment), and vestibular vertigo. The case distinguishes these ictal symptoms from autoscopic phenomena such as out-of-body experiences, heautoscopy, and autoscopic hallucinations, and from vestibular phenomena of epileptic origin. The neural origins are discussed in relation to vestibular and multisensory cortical mechanisms of bodily self-consciousness in the temporoparietal and frontal cortex.