Abstract This article makes the case that our digital devices create illusions of agency. There are times when users feel as if they in control fact merely responding to stimuli on screen predictable ways. After introduction, second section offers examples agency do not involve human–computer interaction order show such possible and terribly uncommon. The third fourth sections cover relevant wo...

Human-machine networks affect many aspects of our lives: from sharing experiences with family and friends, knowledge creation and distance learning, and managing utility bills or providing feedback on retail items, to more specialised networks providing decision support to human operators and the delivery of health care via a network of clinicians, family, friends, and both physical and virtual...

This article presents an agentic theory of human development, adaptation, and change. The evolutionary emergence of advanced symbolizing capacity enabled humans to transcend the dictates of their immediate environment and made them unique in their power to shape their life circumstances and the courses their lives take. In this conception, people are contributors to their life circumstances, no...

Humans regularly feel a sense of agency (SoA) over events where the causal link between action and outcome is extremely indirect. We have investigated how intermediate (here, a robotic hand) events that intervene between action and outcome may alter SoA, using intentional binding measures. The robotic hand either performed the same movement as the participant (active congruent), or performed a ...

Despite the thought-provoking theological and philosophical implications of the adage urging the healer to heal him/herself, medical anthropology has, with some notable exceptions, given relatively little attention to the problems of well-being experienced by healers themselves, as distinct from those of their patients. This paper focuses on the conflicts experienced by men and women who become...