Frontiers in Psychology
January 1, 2014
Christina Merrick, Christine A. Godwin, Mark W. Geisler et al.
108 citations
Consciousness remains a scientific mystery, but contrasting conscious and unconscious processes offers clues. The olfactory system provides a unique window for this contrast due to its neuroanatomy, cognitive mechanisms, and neural dynamics like brain oscillations. This review argues that for an olfactory content to become conscious, it must engage a large-scale neural network involving broad information integration.
Behavioral sciences (Basel, Switzerland)
April 17, 2024
Alejandro Heredia Cedillo, Dennis Lambert, Ezequiel Morsella
Identifying consciousness in other creatures, whether animals or undiscovered exotic beings, is a major scientific challenge. The authors propose three necessary steps: first, define the specific kind of consciousness of interest; second, identify key differences in human brain processes associated with consciousness versus those that are not, using passive frame theory; third, generalize these human insights to other creatures. They emphasize understanding how evolution—a haphazard, tinkering process that can produce suboptimal and counterintuitive adaptations—shaped consciousness. The more that is understood about the differences between conscious and unconscious processing in humans, the easier it will be to identify consciousness elsewhere.
Consciousness and cognition
May 1, 2015
Christina Merrick, Melika Farnia, Tiffany K Jantz et al.
The stream of consciousness, often seen as free and whimsical, is actually more open to external influence than previously thought. An experimental manipulation successfully triggered not just one but two involuntary thoughts in participants: they were asked to avoid subvocalizing the names of visual objects and to avoid counting the number of letters in those object names. On many trials, participants experienced both types of involuntary thoughts, which arose from distinct high-level processes (naming and counting). This is the first demonstration of inducing two involuntary thoughts into the stream of consciousness, with stimulus word length systematically affecting the results. The findings have implications for attention, imagery, and action control.
Psychological reports
October 1, 2003
Ezequiel Morsella
The common assumption that phenomenal states have no function is uncorroborated and hinders research. Discovering the function of consciousness is a tractable problem, easier than the hard problem of its neural basis. A method contrasting the task demands of conscious and unconscious processes may reveal its function.