• Question: • An experiment at the university of Portsmouth revealed that children become self-aware about 18-24 months in their life. But what creates this sudden sense of self-awareness? What creates this sense of “I”?

    Asked by gavins to Fiona, Joanna, Michelle, William on 23 Jun 2010 in Categories: .
    • Photo: Fiona Randall

      Fiona Randall answered on 23 Jun 2010:

      We are the only animals that are self-aware. That means that we look in the mirror and know we see our reflection. Other animals look in the mirror and think they are seeing another animal. Crazy isn’t it!

    • Photo: William Davies

      William Davies answered on 23 Jun 2010:

      That’s one of the biggest questions in neuroscience gavins! No-one really knows yet – it is possible that at this age most brain cells have made their connections, and the brain is suddenly ‘fully operational’. By studying disorders such as autism where a person’s sense of self, and their sense of other people’s experiences and thoughts, are disrupted we might be able to work out exactly what’s going on in typically developing people

    • Photo: Joanna Brooks

      Joanna Brooks answered on 23 Jun 2010:

      Hello gavins! It’s a good question and one that scientists ask all the time. A famous psychologist called John Locke argued that self-awareness is much the same thing as being ‘conscious’ and is what makes us human.

      The sense of I could be genetic. An argument for this is that some people have no sense of ‘I’ at all like people with the neurological disorder of ‘autism’ for example – people with autism have impaired social interaction and are often described as ‘living in their own world’.

      Is the sense of ‘I’ limited to humans? Apparently a good test of this is putting your pet in front of the mirror – animals apparently are not self-aware and do not recognise themselves!

      BTW did you do the quiz to find out what sex your brain is?
      http://www.bbc.co.uk/science/humanbody/sex/add_user.shtml

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