Animals can change their locomotion patterns in response to changes in their body properties. Clarifying the underlying control mechanism will help develop highly adaptive bio-inspired robots. To address this issue, this study focuses on undulatory locomotion of animals having one-dimensional body structure. They propagate bodily waves to attain propulsive force effectively during undulatory locomotion, yet the direction of the wave propagation depends on the friction property between the body and the environment. To understand the essential mechanism underlying the friction-dependent wave propagation, here we propose a decentralized control mechanism by focusing on “Tegotae”, a Japanese concept describing how well a perceived reaction matches an expectation. Specifically, Tegotae function, which quantifies Tegotae, is defined based on tangential and normal component of the friction force, and the control scheme is designed such that the Tegotae function is increased at each local controller.