The sense of agency refers to the feeling of controlling one’s actions and their effects on the external environment. Here, we tested how the physiological process of aging affects the agency experience by taking advantage of a validated ecological experimental paradigm and exploring the different dimensions of agency. We tested 60 young and older adults during active and passive movements, causing, after a variable time delay, an external sensorial event. We collected overt agency judgments (i.e., explicit agency dimension), and we measured the perceived compression of the time interval between the active/passive movements and outcomes (to quantify the intentional binding phenomenon, an implicit index of agency). Our results indicate that the sense of agency significantly changes across the adult life span, with older participants exhibiting a reduced sense of agency, both at the explicit and implicit level. Crucially, the temporal dimension of the action outcome did not affect their agency experience. We suggest that elderly adults are more reliant on internal predictions, making them less sensitive to cognitive biases and external manipulations. We discuss these results in the domain of neurocognitive models of motor control, with reference to how aging affects the weighting process of predictive and sensory signals for efficient sensorimotor integration.

Mariano, M., Kuster, N., Tartufoli, M., Zapparoli, L. (2024). How aging shapes our sense of agency. PSYCHONOMIC BULLETIN & REVIEW [10.3758/s13423-023-02449-1].

How aging shapes our sense of agency

Mariano, M
Primo
;
Zapparoli, L
Ultimo
2024

Abstract

The sense of agency refers to the feeling of controlling one’s actions and their effects on the external environment. Here, we tested how the physiological process of aging affects the agency experience by taking advantage of a validated ecological experimental paradigm and exploring the different dimensions of agency. We tested 60 young and older adults during active and passive movements, causing, after a variable time delay, an external sensorial event. We collected overt agency judgments (i.e., explicit agency dimension), and we measured the perceived compression of the time interval between the active/passive movements and outcomes (to quantify the intentional binding phenomenon, an implicit index of agency). Our results indicate that the sense of agency significantly changes across the adult life span, with older participants exhibiting a reduced sense of agency, both at the explicit and implicit level. Crucially, the temporal dimension of the action outcome did not affect their agency experience. We suggest that elderly adults are more reliant on internal predictions, making them less sensitive to cognitive biases and external manipulations. We discuss these results in the domain of neurocognitive models of motor control, with reference to how aging affects the weighting process of predictive and sensory signals for efficient sensorimotor integration.
Articolo in rivista - Articolo scientifico
Aging; Intentional binding; Judgment of agency; Self-awareness; Sense of agency;
English
19-gen-2024
2024
open
Mariano, M., Kuster, N., Tartufoli, M., Zapparoli, L. (2024). How aging shapes our sense of agency. PSYCHONOMIC BULLETIN & REVIEW [10.3758/s13423-023-02449-1].
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Utilizza questo identificativo per citare o creare un link a questo documento: https://hdl.handle.net/10281/462782
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