TY - JOUR
T1 - Heart Is Deceitful Above All Things
T2 - Threat Expectancy Induces the Illusory Perception of Increased Heartrate
AU - Parrotta, Eleonora
AU - Bach, Patric
AU - Perrucci, Mauro Gianni
AU - Costantini, Marcello
AU - Ferri, Francesca
N1 - The work was funded by Leverhulme Trust grant RPG-2019-248 to PB, and PhD studentship was awarded to EP from the Universities of Plymouth and Aberdeen. This work was also supported by the “Departments of Excellence 2023–2027” initiative of the Italian Ministry of University and Research for the Department of Neuroscience, Imaging and Clinical Sciences (DNISC) of the University of Chieti-Pescara, and by the “Search for Excellence” initiative of the University of Chieti-Pescar to FF. The research was also supported by EU - NextGenerationEU - MUR-Fondo Promozione e Sviluppo - DM 737/2021; Project: INTRIGUE, Interoception and Fatigue: predicting and treating pathological and transient fatigue to MC.
PY - 2024/4
Y1 - 2024/4
N2 - It has been suggested that our perception of the internal milieu, or the body's internal state, is shaped by our beliefs and previous knowledge about the body's expected state, rather than being solely based on actual interoceptive experiences. This study investigated whether heartbeat perception could be illusorily distorted towards prior subjective beliefs, such that threat expectations suffice to induce a misperception of heartbeat frequency. Participants were instructed to focus on their cardiac activity and report their heartbeat, either tapping along to it (Experiment 1) or silently counting (Experiment 2) while ECG was recorded. While completing this task, different cues provided valid predictive information about the intensity of an upcoming cutaneous stimulation (high- vs. low- pain). Results showed that participants expected a heart rate increase over the anticipation of high- vs. low-pain stimuli and that this belief was perceptually instantiated, as suggested by their interoceptive reports. Importantly, the perceived increase was not mirrored by the real heart rate. Perceptual modulations were absent when participants executed the same task but with an exteroceptive stimulus (Experiment 3). The findings reveal, for the first time, an interoceptive illusion of increased heartbeats elicited by threat expectancy and shed new light on interoceptive processes through the lenses of Bayesian predictive processes, providing tantalizing insights into how such illusory phenomena may intersect with the recognition and regulation of people’s internal states.
AB - It has been suggested that our perception of the internal milieu, or the body's internal state, is shaped by our beliefs and previous knowledge about the body's expected state, rather than being solely based on actual interoceptive experiences. This study investigated whether heartbeat perception could be illusorily distorted towards prior subjective beliefs, such that threat expectations suffice to induce a misperception of heartbeat frequency. Participants were instructed to focus on their cardiac activity and report their heartbeat, either tapping along to it (Experiment 1) or silently counting (Experiment 2) while ECG was recorded. While completing this task, different cues provided valid predictive information about the intensity of an upcoming cutaneous stimulation (high- vs. low- pain). Results showed that participants expected a heart rate increase over the anticipation of high- vs. low-pain stimuli and that this belief was perceptually instantiated, as suggested by their interoceptive reports. Importantly, the perceived increase was not mirrored by the real heart rate. Perceptual modulations were absent when participants executed the same task but with an exteroceptive stimulus (Experiment 3). The findings reveal, for the first time, an interoceptive illusion of increased heartbeats elicited by threat expectancy and shed new light on interoceptive processes through the lenses of Bayesian predictive processes, providing tantalizing insights into how such illusory phenomena may intersect with the recognition and regulation of people’s internal states.
U2 - 10.1016/j.cognition.2024.105719
DO - 10.1016/j.cognition.2024.105719
M3 - Article
C2 - 38278039
SN - 0010-0277
JO - Cognition
JF - Cognition
M1 - 105719
ER -