From armchair to wheelchair: How patients with a locked-in syndrome integrate bodily changes in experienced identity

► In this study we propose an empirical approach to the sense of self in real patients. ► We investigate how bodily changes are integrated in patients' experienced identity. ► Locked-in patients suffer a full-body paralysis with preserved cognitive functions. ► They report a phenomenological sense of self correlated with body representation. ► Predictions from the armchair fail to match patients' reports from the wheelchair.