Sense of body ownership in patients affected by functional motor symptoms (conversion disorder)

Patients with functional neurological symptoms are commonly seen in neurological practice. Nevertheless their aetiopathology remains unclear. We have recently shown that patients affected by functional motor symptoms (FMS) present lower interoceptive awareness and higher alexithymia levels than healthy controls. Nevertheless sense of body ownership has never been studied in FMS patients. The aim of the present study was to systematically investigate the sense of body ownership, with the rubber hand illusion (RHI) paradigm, in patients with FMS and healthy controls.

We included in the study 16 patients with FMS and 18 healthy controls (HC). Patients and HC were asked to complete the Toronto Alexithymia Scale (TAS-20) and the self-consciousness scale (self-objectification questionnaire). All participants underwent the RHI paradigm: illusionary experience was measured by self-report and by proprioceptive alteration.

A Mann-Whitney U test performed revealed that FMS (median=2.11) participants embodied the rubber hand to the same extent than HC participants (median=2.0, Z = -0.86, p>0.05, r = -0.15). The same test revealed no significant difference in the Proprioceptive Drift experience between FMS (median=0.0) and HC participants (median = -0.5, Z = -0.96, p>0.05, r = -0.16).

Our study revealed that sense of body ownership is not impaired in patients affected by FMS. This, together with the results from our previous experiment (studying the interoceptive awareness), supports the hypothesis that interoceptive awareness and sense of body ownership may be dissociated in patients with FMS.