Exploring the visual (un)conscious

Breitmeyer, Bruno G.; Kiefer, Markus; Niedeggen, Michael

doi:10.1016/j.concog.2015.04.021

Cited by 4 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 81 publications

(78 reference statements)

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“…We propose that, depending on the specific stimulation context and blinding method, the percept could emerge either in an all-or-none or in a more graded fashion. Despite some differences (for a discussion see, Breitmeyer et al, 2015 ), many current models converge on the assumption that visual awareness requires recurrent processing of the stimulus within multiple brain systems, thereby consolidating its representation ( Enns and Di Lollo, 2000 ; Dehaene and Naccache, 2001 ; Lamme, 2003 ; Kiefer et al, 2011 ). Consolidation through recurrent processing can be characterized as reaching an attractor state within neural networks ( Herzog et al, 2016 ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Emergence of Visual Awareness: Temporal Dynamics in Relation to Task and Mask Type

Kiefer

Kammer

2017

Front. Psychol.

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One aspect of consciousness phenomena, the temporal emergence of visual awareness, has been subject of a controversial debate. How can visual awareness, that is the experiential quality of visual stimuli, be characterized best? Is there a sharp discontinuous or dichotomous transition between unaware and fully aware states, or does awareness emerge gradually encompassing intermediate states? Previous studies yielded conflicting results and supported both dichotomous and gradual views. It is well conceivable that these conflicting results are more than noise, but reflect the dynamic nature of the temporal emergence of visual awareness. Using a psychophysical approach, the present research tested whether the emergence of visual awareness is context-dependent with a temporal two-alternative forced choice task. During backward masking of word targets, it was assessed whether the relative temporal sequence of stimulus thresholds is modulated by the task (stimulus presence, letter case, lexical decision, and semantic category) and by mask type. Four masks with different similarity to the target features were created. Psychophysical functions were then fitted to the accuracy data in the different task conditions as a function of the stimulus mask SOA in order to determine the inflection point (conscious threshold of each feature) and slope of the psychophysical function (transition from unaware to aware within each feature). Depending on feature-mask similarity, thresholds in the different tasks were highly dispersed suggesting a graded transition from unawareness to awareness or had less differentiated thresholds indicating that clusters of features probed by the tasks quite simultaneously contribute to the percept. The latter observation, although not compatible with the notion of a sharp all-or-none transition between unaware and aware states, suggests a less gradual or more discontinuous emergence of awareness. Analyses of slopes of the fitted psychophysical functions also indicated that the emergence of awareness of single features is variable and might be influenced by the continuity of the feature dimensions. The present work thus suggests that the emergence of awareness is neither purely gradual nor dichotomous, but highly dynamic depending on the task and mask type.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Emergence of Visual Awareness: Temporal Dynamics in Relation to Task and Mask Type

Kiefer

Kammer

2017

Front. Psychol.

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“…Attention is not, however, sufficient for consciousness, as has been demonstrated through many experiments that have manipulated both voluntary (endogenous) and external, reflexive (exogenous) attention and produced a change in performance and/or reaction time without conscious perception ( Hsieh et al, 2011 ; Kentridge et al, 2008 ; Zhang et al, 2012 ). For overviews, see Breitmeyer (2015) and Breitmeyer et al (2015) .…”

Section: Consciousness As a Memory Systemmentioning

confidence: 99%

Consciousness as a Memory System

Budson

Richman

Kensinger

2022

Cognitive and Behavioral Neurology

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We suggest that there is confusion between why consciousness developed and what additional functions, through continued evolution, it has co-opted. Consider episodic memory. If we believe that episodic memory evolved solely to accurately represent past events, it seems like a terrible system-prone to forgetting and false memories. However, if we believe that episodic memory developed to flexibly and creatively combine and rearrange memories of prior events in order to plan for the future, then it is quite a good system. We argue that consciousness originally developed as part of the episodic memory system-quite likely the part needed to accomplish that flexible recombining of information. We posit further that consciousness was subsequently co-opted to produce other functions that are not directly relevant to memory per se, such as problemsolving, abstract thinking, and language. We suggest that this theory is compatible with many phenomena, such as the slow speed and the after-the-fact order of consciousness, that cannot be explained well by other theories. We believe that our theory may have profound implications for understanding intentional action and consciousness in general. Moreover, we suggest that episodic memory and its associated memory systems of sensory, working, and semantic memory as a whole ought to be considered together as the conscious memory system in that they, together, give rise to the phenomenon of consciousness. Lastly, we suggest that the cerebral cortex is the part of the brain that makes consciousness possible, and that every cortical region contributes to this conscious memory system.

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“…G. Breitmeyer & Ogmen, 2000) and 3) interocular suppression approaches, which includes CFS (Tsuchiya & Koch, 2005). As it is likely that these three classes of methods achieve unconscious processing with different mechanisms (Breitmeyer, 2015;Breitmeyer et al, 2015;Kim & Blake, 2005), we directly considered the adopted blinding technique as an explanatory variable in the metaanalytic model.…”

Section: Meta-regression Moderatorsmentioning

confidence: 99%