Whose mind is it anyway? A systematic review and exploration on agency in cognitive augmentation

Technologies for human augmentation aim to enhance sensory, motor, and cognitive abilities. Despite the growing interest in cognitive augmentation, the sense of agency and the feeling of control over one’s actions and outcomes remained underexplored. We conducted a systematic literature review, screening 434 human–computer Interaction articles, and identified 27 papers examining agency in cognitive augmentation. Our analysis revealed a lack of objective methods to measure the sense of agency. We analyzed Electroencephalography (EEG) data of a dataset from 27 participants performing a Columbia Card Task with and without perceived AI assistance to address this research gap. We observed changes in EEG data for alpha and low-beta power, demonstrating EEG as a measure of perceived cognitive agency. These findings demonstrate how EEG can quantify perceived agency, presenting a method to evaluate the impact of cognitive augmentation technologies on the sense of agency. This study not only provides a novel neurophysiological approach for assessing the impact of cognitive augmentation technologies on agency but also leads the way to designing interfaces that create user awareness regarding their sense of agency.