Abstract
The " 'I-am-me' experience", which was first investigated by the phenomenologist Spiegelberg (1964), is currently
studied by using non-phenomenological methods. I have outlined the phenomenological approach to investigating
this phenomenon. First, I have discussed analyzing past research on the I-am-me experience from the
phenomenological perspective. Then, I conducted a phenomenological analysis of a typical case of an I-am-me
experience based on Giorgi’s (2009) modified Husserlian approach and compared it to Kimura’s (1973) analysis of a
schizophrenia case. I also conducted a similar analysis of a typical case of a "solipsistic experience," once regarded as
a type of an I-am-me experience, and compared it to an autistic case. Based on the consideration of the Blankenburg's
"schizophrenic epochè", I have proposed the idea that the I-am-me experience and the solipsistic experience may
originate from a "developmental epochè". One may experience a disruption of the self-evidence of the self at certain
stages of normal personal development, especially in childhood, even though one is neither a philosopher undertaking a
phenomenological epochè, nor a patient suffering from a psychopathological epochè.
