This post is drafted as a by-product of research into Nash Rogers Equanimity - A new model for EQ and IQ. (examining Agency and Complexity) We are examining People, Perception, Place, Process, Purpose, Performance. Subject to research for publication soon.
WHAT IS SELF-AGENCY?
Wegner's three conditions—priority, exclusivity, and consistency—are key elements to understanding self-attribution of agency, which is the sense that we control our own actions.
Priority refers to our perception that we planned or thought about an action before it happened. Our sense of agency depends on the perceived timing of our intention and the resulting action. Studies show that when we cause an event, we perceive that our action and the outcome are closer in time than they really are, a phenomenon known as "intentional binding." This can happen even when the likelihood of the action's outcome is low.
Exclusivity implies we attribute actions to ourselves more strongly when there are no other potential causes. For instance, being subconsciously primed with words that suggest other causes can decrease our sense of self-agency.
Consistency means that our sense of self-agency is stronger when the result matches our intention. Even if we only thought about an action just before someone else does it, we may feel like we caused it. This sense of agency can apply to others' actions, influence our own actions, and even change when we're not aware of our thoughts or if we're subtly influenced by outside factors.
However, these aspects of self-agency may not exclusively come after the fact. Computational models of motor control propose that our sense of agency comes from our brain's ability to predict the sensory outcome of our actions and compare it with the actual outcome. When they match, we feel a sense of self-agency. If there's a high likelihood of an outcome given an action, leaving out the outcome can eliminate intentional binding.
Yet, there are ongoing debates to reconcile these predictive (motor control models) and postdictive (Wegner's conditions) accounts of agency. Some researchers argue that neither approach fully explains our sense of agency, while others suggest both factors play a role. This suggests our sense of agency may result from a complex interaction of our motor control predictions, conscious thought, and how well our actions match the expected outcomes, especially under uncertainty. In summary, our sense of self-agency depends on many factors, and scientists are still working to understand how these factors interact.
The order of thought, action, and event in the context of the sense of agency has been a topic of ongoing debate in psychology and cognitive neuroscience. Here are the two main views:
PREDICTIVE (OR FORWARD MODEL) VIEW: In this view, the order is typically "thought - action - event." That is, we first form an intention or plan to act. This creates an internal representation or "prediction" of the sensory feedback we expect from the action (a process called an "efference copy"). We then perform the action, and an event occurs as a result. If the sensory feedback from this event matches our prediction, we attribute the action to ourselves and feel a sense of agency.
POSTDICTIVE (OR INFERENTIAL) VIEW: This view proposes an order more like "action - event - thought." In other words, we perform an action, an event occurs, and then we form a belief or judgement about the cause of that event. This belief forms based on how closely the event matches our intention (consistency), how unique the action was in causing the event (exclusivity), and whether we had formed an intention before the action occurred (priority). Based on these conditions, proposed by Daniel Wegner, we then attribute the action to ourselves (or not) and feel a sense of agency (or not).
It's important to note that these views aren't mutually exclusive. Many researchers now believe that both predictive and postdictive processes likely contribute to our sense of agency, potentially at different times and under different circumstances. It's also possible that the actual sequence of thought, action, and event can vary depending on the situation, with our brains constantly updating our sense of agency based on incoming information.
#SelfAgency #PersonalControl #Psychology #MentalHealth #Empowerment #PersonalDevelopment #MindfulLiving #SelfImprovement #SelfAwareness #MindBrainConnection
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