The notion of a disorder of the self as being a core feature of schizophrenia has existed since the early days of schizophrenia research, but recent work has clarified and specified the type of self-disturbance that may be at play (Chung, 2007; Parnas, 2000; Parnas and Sass, 2001). In order to understand the type of selfdisturbance being referred to in recent phenomenological writings, it is necessary to distinguish between several ‘‘levels’’ or types of selfhood. Parnas (2003) identifies three levels of selfhood from a phenomenological perspective (see Table 1). First, there is a prereflective level, which refers to a first-person givenness of experience—the (implicit) awareness that this is ‘‘my’’ experience. This is sometimes referred to as the ‘‘basic’’ or ‘‘minimal’’ self or as ‘‘ipseity’’ (ipse is Latin for ‘‘self’’ or ‘‘itself’’)(Sass and Parnas, 2003; Zahavi, 2005; Zahavi and Parnas, 1998). It might be described as the self-presence of the self-as-subject. Second, at a more complex level, we can speak of a reflective self-awareness. This is a relatively more explicit awareness of the self as an invariant and persisting subject of experience and action—‘‘my sense of myself as the same person through time’’, for example. This level of selfhood presupposes the basic sense of self, because to have a sense of temporal unity, for instance, assumes the knowledge that moment-to-moment experience is mine in the first place. Finally, there is the social or narrative self. This refers to individual characteristics such as personality, habits, style, and so on (e.g., ‘‘I am a flexible sort of person, often accommodating to other people’s needs. This may be related to being a middle child, etc.’’).
References
Nelson, B., A. Fornito, B. J. Harrison, M. Yucel, L. A. Sass, A. R. Yung, A. Thompson, S. J. Wood, C. Pantelis, and P. D. McGorry. 2009. “A disturbed sense of self in the psychosis prodrome: linking phenomenology and neurobiology.” Neuroscience and biobehavioral reviews 33 (6): 807–17. doi:10.1016/j.neubiorev.2009.01.002.