Interoception

Scientific basis

Interoception relies on visceral and metabolic afferents that continuously inform the nervous system about the internal state of the body. These signals are integrated notably in the insula, where they contribute to physiological regulation (energy, internal balance) and to the way the state of the body is felt.

Research distinguishes several dimensions: the reception of signals, their conscious perception, the accuracy with which a person perceives them and the way they interpret them. These dimensions do not necessarily vary together.

Blue Portance / SBNFA™ reading

SBNFA™ distinguishes interoception, which informs about the internal state, from proprioception, which informs about position, movement and effort. Both are part of the information available to the nervous system to regulate the body.

In the Blue Portance reading, an alteration of certain interoceptive dimensions could be one of the elements to consider in neurosensory calibration phenomena.

Contribution to the analysis of sitting

Seating analysis does not measure interoception. It simply points out that the way a position is experienced does not depend only on support: the internal state (breathing, tension, fatigue) also plays a part.

Not to be confused with

Proprioception, the perception of the position, movement and effort of body segments; exteroception, the perception of the outside world (touch, vision, hearing); nociception, the detection of potentially damaging stimuli, which can use some closely related pathways without being the same as interoception.

Related terms

Nociception · Proprioception · Body schema

Sources and scope

• Craig (2002): interoception, the sense of the physiological condition of the body (Nature Reviews Neuroscience)
• Quigley et al. (2021): functions of interoception, from energy regulation to experience of the self (Trends in Neurosciences)