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An increasing amount of recent research has focused on the multisensory and neural bases of the bodily self. This pre‐reflective form of self is considered as multifaceted, incorporating phenomenal components, such as self location, body ownership, first‐person perspective, agency, and the perceptual body image. Direct electrical brain stimulation (EBS) during presurgical evaluation of epilepsy and brain tumor resection is a unique method to causally relate specific brain areas to the various phenomenal components of the bodily self. We conducted a systematic review of the literature describing altered phenomenal experience of the bodily self evoked by EBS. We included 42 articles and analyzed self reports from 221 patients. Three‐dimensional density maps of EBS revealed that stimulation in the middle cingulum, inferior parietal lobule, supplementary motor area, posterior insula, hippocampal complex/amygdala, and precuneus most consistently altered one or several components of the bodily self. In addition, we found that only EBS in the parietal cortex induced disturbances of all five components of the bodily self considered in this review article. These findings inform current neuroscientific models of the bodily self. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Exteroceptive and interoceptive signals shape and sustain the bodily self‐awareness. The existence of a set of brain areas, supporting the integration of information coming from the inside and the outside of the body in building the sense of bodily self‐awareness has been postulated, yet the evidence remains limited, a matter of discussion never assessed quantitatively. With the aim of unrevealing where in the brain interoceptive and exteroceptive signals may converge, we performed a meta‐analysis on imaging studies of the sense of body ownership, modulated by external visuotactile stimulation, and studies on interoception, which involves the self‐awareness for internal bodily sensations. Using a multilevel kernel density analysis, we found that processing of stimuli of the two domains converges primarily in the supramarginal gyrus bilaterally. Furthermore, we found a right‐lateralized set of areas, including the precentral and postcentral, and superior temporal gyri. We discuss these results and propose this set of areas as ideal candidates to match multiple body‐related signals contributing to the creation of a multidimensional representation of the bodily self. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]