Psychological science
July 1, 2014
Zohar Z Bronfman, Noam Brezis, Hilla Jacobson et al.
140 citations
People can automatically perceive the color diversity of an unattended visual display without sacrificing their ability to report a cued letter. This finding suggests that detailed visual information, such as the variety of colors, is registered outside focal attention and does not consume working memory resources. The result supports the idea that visual experience may overflow what can be reported, offering a way to study phenomenal consciousness without relying solely on limited-capacity report.
Frontiers in psychology
January 1, 2023
Marius Usher, Niccolò Negro, Hilla Jacobson et al.
7 citations
The Unfolding Argument (UA) against causal structure theories of consciousness relies on unwarranted assumptions that express a behaviorist methodology, despite its proponents' claims. The same reasoning can be applied to functionalist approaches, proving too much and deeming a wide range of non-causal structure theories unscientific. The authors argue that the UA's philosophical assumptions are overly restrictive and fit poorly with common practice in cognitive neuroscience. They propose a more inclusive methodology for consciousness science that incorporates neural, behavioral, and phenomenological evidence from the first-person perspective. Theories of consciousness should be tested and evaluated on humans, not on systems considerably different from us, thus restricting the range of systems rather than the methodology.
Frontiers in human neuroscience
January 1, 2015
Tal Yatziv, Hilla Jacobson
3 citations
Perceptual differences between autistic and typically developing individuals do not stem from a deficiency in basic phenomenal consciousness—the raw, immediate experience of the world. Instead, the atypicality is cognitive and conceptual, affecting how perceptual objects are integrated with concepts. Drawing on three-level processing models, the paper argues that the second level of perceptual processing, which supports viewer-centered visual representations and early integration (the mark of phenomenal consciousness), is typical in autism. The third, more cognitive level, which integrates perceptual objects with concepts, is atypical. Thus, autistic individuals likely have similar basic perceptual experiences but differ in cognitive access to those experiences.