Whether you see your name, hear it, or look at yourself in the mirror—you instantly recognize it's you. This suggests that, beyond sensory-specific representations (like your name or face), the brain also holds a more abstract, cross-sensory sense of self. But can we separate these two types of self-representation?
We found that brain activity differed early on when participants saw their own name versus their face, but after about 300 milliseconds, the activity patterns became nearly identical. This suggests that the brain first processes the specific sensory input, then accesses a shared, abstract self-representation.
In a separate study, we saw similar activity in the medial prefrontal cortex when participants either read or heard their own names, pointing to this region as a key hub for the brain's abstract concept of self.
Together, these studies show that the brain builds a unified sense of self by first processing sensory details and then converging on a common, abstract self-representation.
Full texts:
Tacikowski, P., & Nowicka, A. (2010). Allocation of attention to self-name and self-face: An ERP study. Biological Psychology, 84, 318-324. (PDF)
Tacikowski, P., Brechmann, A., Nowicka, A. (2013). Cross-modal pattern of brain activations associated with the processing of self- and significant other’s name. Human Brain Mapping, 34:2069–2077. (PDF)
