Consciousness and cognition
April 1, 2020
Jona Förster, Mika Koivisto, Antti Revonsuo
176 citations
The earliest and most reliable brain signal linked to visual phenomenal consciousness is the visual awareness negativity (VAN), a negative voltage deflection occurring around 200-300 milliseconds after a stimulus appears over posterior scalp regions. A later positive component, the late positivity (LP), which appears over frontal areas around 300-500 milliseconds, likely reflects later cognitive processes such as reflective or access consciousness rather than phenomenal awareness itself. This conclusion is supported by a review of event-related potential and magnetoencephalography studies published since 2010 that directly compared brain responses to consciously perceived versus unseen stimuli. The evidence strengthens VAN's role as the primary neural correlate of phenomenal consciousness and further undermines LP as a marker of phenomenal awareness.
Consciousness and cognition
August 1, 2019
Michael Lifshitz, Michiel van Elk, T M Luhrmann
162 citations
A general tendency called 'absorption'—the capacity to become deeply immersed in sensory and imaginative experiences—underlies a broad proclivity for spiritual experiences. People high in absorption readily sense supernatural presences, receive messages from God, and feel self-transcendence, awe, and wonder. High scorers on the Tellegen Absorption Scale report vivid experiences such as hearing God's voice during prayer, intense mystical states from psychedelics or placebo brain-stimulation, and strong feelings of presence and transcendence when encountering natural beauty, virtual reality, or music. Absorption appears to intensify inner and outer sensory experience, blending prior expectation with novel engagement, making imagined things feel more real.
Consciousness and cognition
December 1, 2015
Yochai Ataria, Yair Dor-Ziderman, Aviva Berkovich-Ohana
158 citations
Based on detailed self-reports from a long-term mindfulness practitioner with about 20,000 hours of meditation experience, the sense of boundaries (SB) can shift through three stages: default, dissolving, and disappearing. During these shifts, seven overlapping categories change, including senses of internal versus external, time, location, self, agency, ownership, and the first-person perspective. Two categories—the touching/touched structure and bodily feelings—persist even when the SB disappears entirely. The findings suggest that the sense of boundaries is not a single, fixed experience but a composite of multiple, separable dimensions that can be altered through meditative practice.
Consciousness and cognition
June 1, 2013
Louis Sass, Elizabeth Pienkos, Barnaby Nelson et al.
144 citations
Anomalous self-experiences are central to schizophrenia and other psychiatric disorders. This analysis compared such experiences in schizophrenia-spectrum disorders, as cataloged in the EASE, with those described in severe depersonalization. Numerous affinities were found, showing that pure forms of diminished self-affection (depersonalization) can involve experiences resembling those of schizophrenia. However, important discrepancies emerged, suggesting that more automatic or deficiency-like factors—probably involving self/world or self/other confusion and erosion of first-person perspective—are more distinctive of schizophrenia-spectrum disorders.
Consciousness and cognition
July 1, 2016
Josef Parnas, Mads Gram Henriksen
128 citations
Mysticism and schizophrenia, though distinct categories, share important phenomenological similarities that have been largely overlooked. This paper explores structural analogies between key features of mysticism and major clinical-phenomenological aspects of schizophrenia spectrum disorders, including attitudes, the nature of experience, and the experience of an 'other' reality. These features revolve around basic dimensions of consciousness and appear to involve a specific alteration of the structure of consciousness itself. This finding has implications for understanding consciousness and its psychopathological distortions.
Consciousness and cognition
September 1, 2007
Claire Petitmengin, Vincent Navarro, Michel Le van Quyen
123 citations
A dynamic approach to epileptic seizure anticipation, combining neuro-dynamic analysis of brain activity with pheno-dynamic analysis of subjective experience, can guide and determine each other. This method consolidates the foundations for a cognitive, non-pharmacological therapy for epilepsy. The neuro-phenomenological co-determination demonstrated through this example offers new insight into the gap between subjective experience and neurophysiological activity.
Consciousness and cognition
December 1, 2002
David M Rosenthal
118 citations
Ned Block's widely used distinction between phenomenal consciousness (raw subjective experience) and access consciousness (information available for reasoning and action) is flawed because it smuggles in unargued theoretical assumptions. The distinction between phenomenal and reflexive consciousness also suffers from this problem. While mental states with qualitative character differ from those without, being conscious is the same property for both. Block's notion of access consciousness does not capture what we intuitively mean by a mental state's being conscious. More critically, his concept of phenomenal consciousness is ambiguous between two distinct mental properties, which begs important theoretical questions. Once these are distinguished, qualitative consciousness can be explained by a model like the higher-order-thought hypothesis.
Consciousness and cognition
May 1, 2021
Anna Ciaunica, Axel Constant, Hubert Preissl et al.
99 citations
Perceptual experiences are shaped by prior events, as argued by Predictive Processing and Active Inference frameworks. This paper examines how such experiences begin before birth, within the womb. A key but often neglected point is that humans develop inside another human body, a universal experience. The authors focus on the emergence of minimal selfhood in utero as a process of co-embodiment and co-homeostasis, emphasizing their interdependence. They conclude by discussing implications for debates on conscious experience, the minimal self, and social cognition.
Consciousness and cognition
March 1, 2019
Charlotte Martial, Héléna Cassol, Vanessa Charland-Verville et al.
98 citations
Near-death experiences (NDEs) share consistent features across cultures, suggesting a common neurobiological basis. Analyzing semantic similarity between about 15,000 reports from 165 psychoactive substances and 625 NDE narratives, the NMDA receptor antagonist ketamine produced reports most similar to NDEs, followed by Salvia divinorum and serotonergic psychedelics like DMT. The similarity was driven by concepts of self and environmental consciousness, as well as therapeutic, ceremonial, and religious aspects of drug use. Ketamine may serve as a safe experimental model for NDE phenomenology, and endogenous NMDA antagonists might be released near death.
Consciousness and cognition
March 1, 2012
Alexander A Fingelkurts, Andrew A Fingelkurts, Sergio Bagnato et al.
91 citations
Resting electroencephalogram (EEG) microstates—brief, recurring patterns of brain activity—relate to levels of consciousness in brain-damaged patients and healthy individuals. A reduced number of microstate types was associated with altered consciousness, and unawareness corresponded to a lack of diversity in alpha-rhythmic microstates. Delta-, theta-, and slow-alpha-rhythmic microstates were more probable and longer during unawareness, whereas fast-alpha-rhythmic microstates were linked to consciousness. The findings suggest resting EEG can reveal neural correlates of consciousness, with potential implications for clinical care and medical-legal decisions for patients with disorders of consciousness.
Consciousness and cognition
September 1, 2019
Mads Gram Henriksen, Josef Parnas, Dan Zahavi
82 citations
In consciousness research, the authors defend experiential minimalism, the view that for-me-ness (or minimal selfhood) is a necessary, universal feature of all conscious experience. They refute claims that thought insertion in schizophrenia is a counterexample showing experiences without for-me-ness. Instead, they argue that thought insertion involves a disturbed, not absent, for-me-ness. The authors highlight unaddressed methodological and psychopathological problems in philosophical discussions of thought insertion and offer a novel account of how for-me-ness is disturbed in schizophrenia spectrum disorders, potentially contributing to the formation of thought insertion.
Consciousness and cognition
January 1, 2016
Chris Letheby
68 citations
The concept of 'epistemic innocence' holds that some flawed cognitive processes can still provide valuable knowledge otherwise unavailable. This idea is applied to psychedelic drugs, often dismissed as epistemically harmful due to their label 'hallucinogens'. The argument is that certain psychedelic states can be epistemically innocent, offering unique epistemic benefits despite their suboptimal nature. This conclusion has implications for psychedelic therapy policy and also refines the concept of epistemic innocence itself.
Consciousness and cognition
February 1, 2016
Arien Mack, Muge Erol, Jason Clarke et al.
58 citations
More than half of participants failed to notice when a letter matrix was completely absent or distorted, a phenomenon called inattentional blindness. These findings provide strong evidence that iconic memory requires attention and that conscious perception does as well, contradicting the idea that iconic memory has a phenomenal experience component independent of attention.
Consciousness and cognition
October 1, 2020
Richard Heersmink
56 citations
The boundaries of selves are fluid, shifting across biological, artifactual, and sociocultural structures. This analysis distinguishes minimal self, person, and narrative self, then surveys how philosophers, psychologists, and cognitive scientists argue that embodiment, cognition, emotion, consciousness, and moral character can be extended, with implications for self-boundaries. It reviews criticisms of the extended self and focuses on the link between the extended mind and extended self, which has received the most attention, while also discussing accounts developed independently. The article concludes by drawing out conceptual, methodological, and normative implications and suggesting directions for future research.
Consciousness and cognition
January 1, 2015
Amanda E Berman, Larry Stevens
55 citations
Meditation's benefits are well documented, but its underlying mechanisms remain unclear due to a lack of unified taxonomy and confusion between practice methods and resulting states. This study aimed to identify Nondual Awareness—a theoretically universal culminating meditative state distinct from the method or practice state. Participants meditated in the lab while EEG patterns were recorded. During reported nondual events, EEG power was significantly higher in slower wave frequencies (delta, theta, alpha). These events were neurologically distinct from meditation sessions overall, which showed significant elevation in the gamma range.
Consciousness and cognition
June 1, 2010
Antonino Raffone, Martina Pantani
51 citations
A unifying global workspace model proposes that phenomenal and access consciousness arise from distinct yet interacting brain loops involving recurrent neural interactions. Feedback signaling onto sensory cortical maps is critical for phenomenal consciousness, while two forms of top-down attention—attention for perception and attention for access—play differential roles for phenomenal and access consciousness. The model was implemented as a neural network that simulated single and multiple visual object processing and the attentional blink.
Consciousness and cognition
September 1, 2001
J G Taylor
49 citations
A missing ingredient called 'perspectivalness' is proposed as necessary for consciousness to arise from neural activity, alongside temporal duration and information content. This component guides the formation of a 'Central Representation' present in all mammals and extended in humans to support both phenomenal and self-consciousness. Experimental evidence links perspectivalness to buffer working memory sites in the inferior parietal lobes, which act as attentional coordinators on spatial maps. The article reviews difficulties among existing approaches to consciousness and discusses open questions.
Consciousness and cognition
November 1, 2019
Anco Peeters, Miguel Segundo-Ortin
48 citations
The memory palace technique is powerful for remembering but poorly understood and difficult to use. Virtual reality devices have been proposed as a solution but have not yet delivered. An embodied, enactive approach to memory better explains why the technique works than traditional information-processing accounts. The authors offer design recommendations for a virtual memory palace, addressing both the theoretical gap and practical challenges.
Consciousness and cognition
June 1, 2012
Keith Frankish
47 citations
The paper argues that the concept of 'diet qualia'—a watered-down version of classic qualia that strips away their intrinsic, ineffable, and subjective properties—has no distinctive content. Classic qualia are traditionally understood as intrinsic, ineffable, and subjective features of experience. The author contends that once these properties are removed, nothing phenomenal remains to be explained. Therefore, if one rejects classic qualia realism, the only thing left to explain is our disposition to judge that experiences have classic qualia—what the author calls 'zero' qualia. The paper concludes that diet qualia should be abandoned, following Dennett's suggestion to 'quine' them.
Consciousness and cognition
February 1, 2019
Oussama Abdoun, Jelle Zorn, Stefano Poletti et al.
44 citations
A meditation training protocol helped novices accurately describe their mental states during two types of meditation: focused attention and open monitoring. After several weeks of daily practice, participants' self-reported ratings of their experience (i) differed between the two meditation states, (ii) reflected how much they had practiced and how tired they felt, and (iii) matched changes in their reaction times during a task. These patterns were better explained by features of daily practice than by a tendency to give socially desirable answers. The results suggest that novice practitioners can reliably report their inner experience, supporting further study of this training approach.
Consciousness and cognition
October 1, 2017
Peter Carruthers, Bénédicte Veillet
43 citations
The paper revisits the debate about cognitive phenomenology, elaborating and defending a proposal that the test for irreducible phenomenology is the presence of explanatory gaps. It argues that the debate should be aligned between non-conceptual and conceptual or propositional phenomenology, rather than between sensory and cognitive phenomenology. The authors defend three varieties of non-sensory, non-conceptual phenomenology: valence, a sense of approximate number, and a sense of elapsed time.
Consciousness and cognition
May 1, 2014
Han-Gue Jo, Marc Wittmann, Tilmann Lhündrup Borghardt et al.
43 citations
A neurophenomenological study with a single expert meditator shows that a larger readiness potential (RP) is linked to more frequent self-initiated movements during negative deflections of slow cortical potentials (SCP). These negative deflections occur alongside an inner impulse reported by the meditator, which may lead to a voluntary act. This proof-of-principle demonstrates that combining first-person introspective data with neural signal analysis can advance understanding of the neural basis of voluntary acts, challenging interpretations of the classic Libet experiment.
Consciousness and cognition
August 1, 2017
Jaan Aru, Talis Bachmann
42 citations
Conscious experience depends on attention and expectation, but some argue it can occur without attention. Experiments on iconic memory (IM) are often cited as evidence for attention-independent consciousness. A prior study found that when attention is diverted from an IM letter display, people fail to notice missing letters. This work replicates and extends that finding by measuring subjective visibility and testing post-cue effects. Results show that participants who do not realize letters are absent perceive illusory letters, indicating phenomenal consciousness persists even without attention. Expectation generates illusory content that overwrites valid IM content, suggesting this experimental paradigm cannot reliably assess iconic memory content.
Consciousness and cognition
September 1, 2013
Louis Sass, Elizabeth Pienkos, Barnaby Nelson
42 citations
Comparing anomalous self-experiences common in schizophrenia with those of normal individuals in an intensely introspective orientation reveals significant similarities but also important differences. Affinities include feelings of passivity, fading of self or world, and alienation from thoughts, feelings, or the lived-body. Differences involve confusion between self and world and severe dislocation or erosion of first-person perspective, qualities unique to schizophrenia. The comparison places putatively schizophrenic self-disorders in a broader context, evaluates hypotheses about core processes in schizophrenia, and orients investigation of pathogenetic pathways and psychotherapeutic interventions.
Consciousness and cognition
November 1, 2020
Andrew A Fingelkurts, Alexander A Fingelkurts, Tarja Kallio-Tamminen
41 citations
Altering the sense of self through mental manipulation in experienced meditators causes corresponding changes in the brain's self-referential network (SRN). Participants induced states of increased or decreased witnessing agency, body-emotional agency, or narrative agency while EEG recorded their brain activity. The results strengthen evidence for a direct causal link between three specific aspects of subjective selfhood and three corresponding modules of the SRN. A new integrative model of dynamic interrelations among these SRN modules is proposed.