How does the non-conscious become conscious?

LeDoux, Joseph E.

doi:10.1016/j.cub.2020.01.033

Cited by 25 publications

(33 citation statements)

References 20 publications

(44 reference statements)

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“…2). This model focuses specifically on visual consciousness, but recent variants of higher-order theories have implicated the DLPFC and frontopolar cortex in emotional consciousness as well (LeDoux and Brown, 2017;LeDoux, 2020a). Furthermore, such models have recently been expanded to accommodate other sensory modalities by incorporating the ventrolateral PFC (VLPFC) (Jack and Shallice, 2001;Brown et al, 2019).…”

Section: Changes In Conscious Experience Elicited By Ies Of Human Pfcmentioning

confidence: 99%

Does the Prefrontal Cortex Play an Essential Role in Consciousness? Insights from Intracranial Electrical Stimulation of the Human Brain

2021

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A central debate in philosophy and neuroscience pertains to whether PFC activity plays an essential role in the neural basis of consciousness. Neuroimaging and electrophysiology studies have revealed that the contents of conscious perceptual experience can be successfully decoded from PFC activity, but these findings might be confounded by postperceptual cognitive processes, such as thinking, reasoning, and decision-making, that are not necessary for consciousness. To clarify the involvement of the PFC in consciousness, we present a synthesis of research that has used intracranial electrical stimulation (iES) for the causal modulation of neural activity in the human PFC. This research provides compelling evidence that iES of only certain prefrontal regions (i.e., orbitofrontal cortex and anterior cingulate cortex) reliably perturbs conscious experience. Conversely, stimulation of anterolateral prefrontal sites, often considered crucial in higher-order and global workspace theories of consciousness, seldom elicits any reportable alterations in consciousness. Furthermore, the wide variety of iES-elicited effects in the PFC (e.g., emotions, thoughts, and olfactory and visual hallucinations) exhibits no clear relation to the immediate environment. Therefore, there is no evidence for the kinds of alterations in ongoing perceptual experience that would be predicted by higher-order or global workspace theories. Nevertheless, effects in the orbitofrontal and anterior cingulate cortices suggest a specific role for these PFC subregions in supporting emotional aspects of conscious experience. Overall, this evidence presents a challenge for higher-order and global workspace theories, which commonly point to the PFC as the basis for conscious perception based on correlative and possibly confounded information.

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Section: Changes In Conscious Experience Elicited By Ies Of Human Pfcmentioning

confidence: 99%

Does the Prefrontal Cortex Play an Essential Role in Consciousness? Insights from Intracranial Electrical Stimulation of the Human Brain

2021

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“…The narratives weaved by the left hemisphere were viewed as interpretations of situations and were proposed to be an important mechanism used by humans to maintain a sense of mental unity in the face of neural diversity (115)(116)(117)(118)(119). The narration/interpretation process was later proposed to depend on cognitive functions of prefrontal cortex related to working memory and to be consistent with cognitive theories of consciousness (78,121,122,126).…”

Section: Human Neuropsychological Research Brought Consciousness Intomentioning

confidence: 83%

A little history goes a long way toward understanding why we study consciousness the way we do today

LeDoux

Michel

Lau

2020

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

Self Cite

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Consciousness is currently a thriving area of research in psychology and neuroscience. While this is often attributed to events that took place in the early 1990s, consciousness studies today are a continuation of research that started in the late 19th century and that continued throughout the 20th century. From the beginning, the effort built on studies of animals to reveal basic principles of brain organization and function, and of human patients to gain clues about consciousness itself. Particularly important and our focus here is research in the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s involving three groups of patients-amnesia, split brain, and blindsight. Across all three groups, a similar pattern of results was found-the patients could respond appropriately to stimuli that they denied seeing (or in the case of amnesiacs, having seen before). These studies paved the way for the current wave of research on consciousness. The field is, in fact, still grappling with the implications of the findings showing that the ability to consciously know and report the identity of a visual stimulus can be dissociated in the brain from the mechanisms that underlie the ability to behave in a meaningful way to the same stimulus. consciousness | unconscious | amnesia | blindsight | split brain

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“…The efficacy of REMS in the present study may have been too limited to surface on the level of emotion ratings later in the morning. In contrast, the altered brain activity in the amygdala could indicate that even small changes in REM sleep can influence brain systems implicated in regulating responses to affectively salient stimuli 35,72 , while they are too small to penetrate the level of subjective experiences, which are reportedly processed further downstream 71,78 . Yet, what speaks against this explanation are findings by Wiesner and colleagues 30 or Morgenthaler and colleagues 79 who applied even more rigorous REM sleep deprivation, achieving a mean REM sleep percentage of around one percent of TST, but nevertheless could not find REM sleep related behavioral effects during emotion recognition tasks.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Selective suppression of rapid eye movement sleep increases next-day negative affect and amygdala responses to social exclusion

Glosemeyer

Diekelmann²,

Cassel

et al. 2020

Sci Rep

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Healthy sleep, positive general affect, and the ability to regulate emotional experiences are fundamental for well-being. In contrast, various mental disorders are associated with altered rapid eye movement (REM) sleep, negative affect, and diminished emotion regulation abilities. However, the neural processes mediating the relationship between these different phenomena are still not fully understood. In the present study of 42 healthy volunteers, we investigated the effects of selective REM sleep suppression (REMS) on general affect, as well as on feelings of social exclusion, cognitive reappraisal (CRA) of emotions, and their neural underpinnings. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging we show that, on the morning following sleep suppression, REMS increases general negative affect, enhances amygdala responses and alters its functional connectivity with anterior cingulate cortex during passively experienced experimental social exclusion. However, we did not find effects of REMS on subjective emotional ratings in response to social exclusion, their regulation using CRA, nor on functional amygdala connectivity while participants employed CRA. Our study supports the notion that REM sleep is important for affective processes, but emphasizes the need for future research to systematically investigate how REMS impacts different domains of affective experience and their neural correlates, in both healthy and (sub-)clinical populations.

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How does the non-conscious become conscious?

Cited by 25 publications

References 20 publications

Does the Prefrontal Cortex Play an Essential Role in Consciousness? Insights from Intracranial Electrical Stimulation of the Human Brain

Does the Prefrontal Cortex Play an Essential Role in Consciousness? Insights from Intracranial Electrical Stimulation of the Human Brain

A little history goes a long way toward understanding why we study consciousness the way we do today

Selective suppression of rapid eye movement sleep increases next-day negative affect and amygdala responses to social exclusion

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