Levels of consciousness
Reflective,
primary, core, extended, recursive, and minimal consciousness—
what
do all these new concepts mean?
Alain MORIN
As
Bernard Baars notes in his 2002 SCR news story (LINK), scientific
interest in consciousness is expanding at a very rapid rate. A quick glance at
the SCR archive and the articles it contains reveals that a great variety of
topics are being addressed in relation to consciousness. I identify just a few
here: conscious states and their neuroanatomical substrates, dreams and the
unconscious, automaticity, self-awareness,
visual perception, psychedelic experiences, daydreaming, emotions, attentional
processes, volition, memory, meditation, and language.
One such issue increasingly gaining attention is the
notion of “levels of consciousness”. Actually, it has been around for quite
some time now—just think of Sigmund Freud and the unconscious, preconscious and conscious, or William James and the
physical, mental and spiritual selves. But recently there has been a major
revival of this problem in the scientific literature. New terminology and
models describing levels of consciousness are being swiftly introduced, causing
confusion more than anything else. The term “consciousness” itself is already
difficult to define (see SCR LINK)—then add to
this notions such as “meta-”, “reflective”, “core”, “extended”, “minimal”, or
“recursive” consciousness, and the situation becomes rather desperate. (Perhaps
I’m over-reacting and things are not getting that complicated? If you think so,
please follow this LINK and try a little quiz. I think this demonstration will
convince you that my distress is justified!)
Sigmund Freud William James
One reason there is so much
chaos is that some theorists formulate their models without making reference to
existing views. This redundantly adds artificial complexity to an already
complicated problem. Someone needs to sit down and carefully examine some of
these new views. Well, this is precisely what I have done in a paper recently
submitted for publication (LINK). In this article
I present and compare some current models of levels of consciousness to extract
points of convergence and divergence. Let me share what I found with you.
Theoretical framework
We first have to come up with
a basic theoretical background that will be used as a common
point of reference to compare and contrast the
various views I intend to analyze. In other words, without a guideline it would prove extremely difficult—if not
impossible—to identify what the recent proposals about levels of consciousness
have in common and what is unique to them. I suggest we use a framework that is
very popular in experimental social psychology and personality. This model has
been guiding empirical research in these areas for more than three decades. I
call it the “social/personality” model; it
rests on a classic distinction established first by the sociologist Herbert
Mead in the thirties, and then by two researchers in the seventies at the
Herbert Mead
Before we look at
consciousness and self-awareness, let’s talk about “unconsciousness”. Obviously
you first need to be awake to direct attention outward or inward. If you are
not wakeful, you are “unconscious”. So “unconsciousness” is the term used to
designate the state in which there is no processing
of information, either from the environment or the self. You are unconscious
when you sleep or when, because of brain injury, you are in a coma. But when
you are alert, you process information in the environment and you adaptively
respond to stimuli. This is “consciousness”: you directly experience
perceptions, sensations, thoughts, etc., but—and this is important—you are not yet aware that these mental events
are taking place. You are totally immersed in experience—an unreflective actor
in the environment. In this perspective, all animals possess “consciousness”.
We humans also spend a large amount of time in a state of consciousness,
interacting with objects and persons, talking, walking, or coherently thinking,
without monitoring these behaviors. Note
here that even though the social/personality view of consciousness emphasizes
an awareness of external stimuli, and not the self, a minimal consciousness of
self is needed for the organism to relate to the environment. In other words,
you must have at least a diffuse, implicit awareness of
your body to navigate in the environment. Kai
Vogeley and Gereon Fink, at the
Figure 1—The social/personality model of
levels of consciousness
“Self-awareness” represents the capacity to
become the object of your own attention. This happens
when you focus attention not on the external
environment (consciousness), but on your internal milieu. You become a
reflective observer processing self-information.
That’s when you become aware that you are awake and experiencing specific
mental events, emitting behaviors, and possessing unique characteristics. In a
state of self-awareness you could say things such as “I feel happy,” “I’ve been
watching TV all afternoon,” or “I am a likable person”. Here I need to
introduce another classic distinction that has been proposed in 1975 by Allan Fenigstein
and his team at the
|
Private self-aspects |
Public self-aspects |
Others |
|
•
Thoughts •
Beliefs •
Goals /
aspirations •
Self-memories •
Emotions •
Interests •
Physiological
feelings •
Standards •
Values /
opinions •
Attitudes •
Perceptions •
Intentions / motives •
Sensations •
Personality traits |
•
Sexuality •
Positive
& negative characteristics •
Behaviors
/ actions •
Abilities
/ skills •
Body •
Appearance •
Others’
opinion •
Social
life & intimate relationships |
•
Studies •
Future •
Family
& children •
Health •
Professional work •
Financial
situation •
Intellect •
Happiness |
Table 1—Various
self-aspects that can become
the object of attention when self-aware
Self-awareness constitutes
a broad process that includes a host of self-related activities. Some are integral parts of being self-aware; for
example, remembering your own past (retrieval of autobiographical material),
identifying self-characteristics (who you are—self-description), assessing your
qualities and shortcomings (self-evaluation), and talking to yourself when
doing all this (inner speech—see SCR LINK). Some other
abilities are consequences, or
by-products, of self-reflection; for instance, recognizing yourself in a mirror
(self-recognition), feeling sorry for someone else (because you know how it
feels to suffer—Theory-of-Mind), being happy—or not!—with who you are
(self-esteem), and controlling your own destiny (self-regulation).
One last level of
consciousness is “meta-self-awareness”: being aware that you are self-aware.
Clearly this represents a logical extension of the previous stage. Here you
would not simply say “I feel happy” (self-awareness); instead, you could utter
“I’m aware of the fact that I’m happy”, or “I’m currently analyzing my
emotional state of feeling happy”. A simple analogy might help differentiate
self-awareness from meta-self-awareness. Let’s suppose that you are looking at
yourself in a mirror. You position yourself very close to the mirror and you
examine a small pimple on your face. That would be self-awareness: you are
focusing attention on the self, processing (public) self-information, and being
aware of that specific self-dimension (“I have a
pimple on my nose!”). Now let’s imagine that you move backward and look at the
total reflection in the mirror. You can see yourself looking at yourself in the
mirror—you become aware that you are engaged in self-observation (“I see myself
looking at that pimple on my nose”). That would be meta-self-awareness. I
submit that once you reach this ultimate level of consciousness you understand
that you stay the same person across time
(self-history), that you are the author of your thoughts and actions
(self-agency), and that you are distinct from the environment (self-coherence).
In addition, since by definition (meta-) self-awareness means “awareness of
self”, you now know that you exist.
As a result you also become keenly aware of the fact that some day you will die
(death awareness).
Schooler and farthing
Now that the
social/personality model of levels of consciousness has been carefully
outlined, we can contrast it to recent proposals. I start with two views that
are highly consistent with the model. Please refer to Figure 2 below.
Jonathan Schooler, at the
Jonathan Schooler
Figure
2—Schooler and Farthing’s views in relation to the social/personality model
(Note:
C = consciousness; S = Schooler; F = Farthing)
Bill Farthing, at the
Genuine
consciousness represents another level in Farthing’s system, called “primary consciousness”. It basically means “consciousness” in
Schooler’s model. There your attention is focused outward and you directly experience percepts,
feelings, thoughts, and memories. You see, smell, walk, talk—but this is not
self-awareness, because you are not yet fully conscious that these events are
happening. In other words, you still are an agent immersed in sensations and
perceptions non-reflectively felt. Farthing also introduces an intermediate
level between “non-conscious mind” (lower consciousness) and “primary
consciousness” (consciousness). It is called “peripheral consciousness”, where
mental contents are on the edge of entering primary consciousness. The highest
level, where you generate thoughts about your own conscious experiences, is
labelled “reflective consciousness”. For example, you could say (to yourself)
“I see this road sign”, or “I know that I have romantic feeling toward
Brigitte/Jim”. This level represents the equivalent of private self-awareness,
because the focus of attention is your subjective experience, as opposed to
public self-characteristics. So far it seems that “meta-consciousness”
(Schooler) and “reflective consciousness” (Farthing) are very closely related.
Neisser; Newen & Vogeley
One way to look at the
question of levels of consciousness is to take into account what type of self-information organisms have
access to—the nature and complexity of the data. Various forms of
self-representations exist, and some are more sophisticated than others. The assumption
here is that processing fairly rudimentary types of self-information is done at
a lower level of consciousness, and that accessing refined forms of
self-information occurs at a higher level. One popular distinction in the
literature opposes perceptual to conceptual self-representations. Perceptual (or
sensory) information refers to aspects of yourself that you directly experience
(your body, for example) or that you can readily perceive via environmental
stimuli (again, your body, but seen in a mirror, for instance). If we go back
the division offered between private and public self-aspects, I suggest that
perceptual self-information mainly consists of public self-aspects. Conceptual
(or symbolic) self-information designates dimensions of yourself that are not available to immediate perceptual
experience and that somehow have to be mentally represented for you to access
them. Examples of conceptual self-information are thoughts, attitudes, values,
and opinions. I propose that conceptual self-information largely refers to
private self-aspects.
Now, the fact that conceptual self-information needs to be
abstractly represented—that is, processed, transformed—suggests cognitive work
performed at a higher level of consciousness. Thus, if you regularly examine
more private self-information (left row in Table 1) than public
self-information (middle row in Table 1), we could say that you possess a
higher level of self-awareness. If instead you tend to focus more on public
self-dimensions (middle row) than private self-aspects (left row), the reverse
would be true—you would be at a lower level of self-awareness.
Ulrich Neisser, at the
A second level of
consciousness is labeled “interpersonal self”. This next self emerges out of the interactions it
engages in with other people in the environment. At the previous level the
organism learned about its body by relating to the physical world. At this
second stage the organism discovers more about itself and others by interacting
with the social world. The plain fact that your actions mesh with those of
others indicates that you possess an interpersonal self. For
example, most of the time you probably wait for another person to finish a
sentence before you start talking. This means that you have an awareness
of your engagement in that social interaction. The interpersonal self still
relies on perceptual self-information to gain self-knowledge; since the
information it acquires at this stage is social in nature, I suggest that the
interpersonal self is roughly equivalent to public self-awareness.
Neisser
then posits the “extended self” (third level). This one is more difficult to
fit into the social/personality model. As I understand it, the extended self
can reflect on itself over time—it can generate thoughts about itself in the
past and in the future. For example, you could think about the last time you went
to the theatre, or you could plan what to do next weekend. So we have genuine
self-awareness here, but Neisser does not specify if the person assesses mental
states and personal characteristics (private self-awareness), or visible
features (public self-awareness)—or both. The emphasis is really on time
perspective. Self-information at the next two levels is conceptual in nature.
The “private self” (fourth level) can process private self-information such as
thoughts, feelings, and intentions; this fourth level obviously refers to
private self-awareness. And the “self-concept” (fifth level) is made up of
abstract and symbolic representations of yourself. At
that last level you think about you roles, identity, traits, personal
characteristics, and personal history (autobiography). This ultimate level of
consciousness represents a full-blown private & public self-awareness,
where you most probably can also engage in meta-self-awareness.
Figure
3—Neisser, and Newen & Vogeley’s views in relation
to the social/personality
model
(Note:
C = consciousness; N = Neisser; NV = Newen & Vogeley)
Albert Newen and Kai
Vogeley, at the
The lowest level is
labelled “phenomenal self-acquaintance”, where you non-conceptually represent
your body. This first degree is similar to Neisser’s “ecological self”. A
second level is called “conceptual self-consciousness”, where you conceptually
represent yourself, including your mental states. I suggest that “conceptual
self-consciousness” can be compared to self-awareness of the private type.
Another higher level is termed “meta-representational self-consciousness”.
There you construct a mental model of yourself, using, among other material,
your self-memories. This level is more sophisticated than the previous one for
two reasons. First, you integrate
self-information acquired through private (and possibly public) self-awareness
into a coherent framework (a mental
model). This obviously requires more cognitive effort at a higher level of
consciousness. Second, Newen and Vogeley specify that meta-representational
self-consciousness also involves
creating a mental model of other people.
Building a mental representation of what is going on in others’ mind is called
“Theory Of Mind”, or TOM. Now that you have access to
your own mental states, you can infer the existence of similar experiences in
others and develop a mental model of other people’s inner lives. The highest
level in Newen and Vogeley’s proposal is “iterative meta-representational
self-consciousness”. At that last level you construct mental models of others’
models about yourself. I know—this is not evident, so let me rephrase that. You
now try to imagine what other persons think of you, you attempt to construct a
model of the models other people have developed about yourself. Said
differently, you create a TOM about others’ TOM of yourself. Needless to say,
this definitely represents a sophisticated kind of self-awareness that entails
complex conceptual self-representations. Both notions of “meta-representational
self-consciousness” and “iterative meta-representational self-consciousness”
are difficult to fit into the social/personality framework. I venture to
suggest that because of its very large scope, the last level most probably
encompasses meta-self-awareness.
Albert Newen Kai Yogeley
Zelazo, Stuss et al., & Damasio
With
his notion of “extended self”, Neisser introduces the idea that possessing a temporal perspective of the self could
be important. Indeed, the next three views that I discuss in this section all
stress the crucial ability to reflect on ourselves over time. Figure 4 below presents various levels of self-awareness proposed by Philip Zelazo, David Stuss and his colleagues, and Antonio Damasio.
Philip Zelazo, at the
Philip Zelazo
The lowest level is “minimal consciousness”;
it emerges during the first year of life. Minimal
consciousness essentially
represents consciousness, where the infant unreflectively perceives stimuli in
the present. At that level, past events cannot be recalled, and future
anticipated states cannot be mentally represented. It’s literally living in the
“here and now”. The second stage, which develops between 9 and 12 months, is
“recursive consciousness”. Minimal consciousness refers to itself by combining
its contents at one moment with the contents at another time. Here Zelazo
emphasizes the importance of language: without the ability to label our mental experiences, recursion
could not take place. Here’s an example. Let’s suppose that your 12-month-old
niece Justine looks at a lion and says “Lion”. Zelazo suggests that by verbally
identifying the lion, Justine associates her perceptual experience with a
description of it from memory. When there is simultaneous access to the
perception (the actual lion) and the label (“Lion”), the perception becomes an
object of conscious experience. At this stage Justine not only undergoes mental
events such as seeing an animal (minimal consciousness)—she also becomes aware of them. With respect to time, in recursive
consciousness past experiences and future-oriented states now can be
represented, but these are not connected to what Justine is experiencing in the
present. She is still incapable of perceiving herself now, here.
This
perception of oneself in the present occurs at the third level, called
“self-consciousness”. Between 18 months to 2 years of age, the child engages in
additional reflection on the contents of recursive consciousness. At this level
Justine can relate a description of an experience (e.g., “That is a giraffe”)
not only to the experience described (seeing the animal) but to another
description (e.g., “Yesterday I went to the zoo”). Justine can think about
descriptions of past or future events in relation to her present situation. For
example, she could say “Today I’m home with Mommy but yesterday I was at the
zoo”. So Justine is fully conscious of now (“Today I’m home with Mommy”) and
can link this experience to another one in the past (“yesterday I went to the
zoo”) or to a future episode (“Tomorrow I will play with my friends”). This
third level of consciousness does not fit well into the social/personality
model. It nonetheless represents a higher level of self-awareness because the
child gains the subjective experience of self-continuity in time.
Zelazo
presents two additional degrees of consciousness that can also be considered as
higher types of self-awareness. These are “reflective consciousness1” (3 years of age) and “reflective
consciousness2” (4 to 5 years of age).
Essentially, Justine takes an increasingly temporally decentered perspective.
She can put herself in spatial and temporal perspective and psychologically distance herself from herself. With this
comes the realization that not only does she experiences things in the past,
present, and future—she also possesses a personal history that differs from the history of the world.
In other words, Justine might say “This is what happened to me last summer, but
not to my friend John”. This in turn leads Justine to understand herself as
displaying both continuity and change in time. As for “self-consciousness”, it
is difficult to establish clear links between the concepts of “reflective
consciousness1-2” and the
social/personality model of levels of consciousness. This suggests that
Zelazo’s view introduces nuances that are original and non-reducible
to any other model. I would propose however that these last two forms of
self-awareness are associated with highest forms of private and public
self-awareness, and with meta-self-awareness.
Figure
4—Zelazo, Stuss et al., and Damasio’s views
in relation to the
social/personality model
(Note:
C = consciousness; Z = Zelazo; SPA = Stuss et al.; D = Damasio)
Whereas
Zelano’s LOC model is developmental in essence, the next two views originate
from neurobiology. Donald Stuss and his
colleagues (also at the
The
last level is named “self-awareness”. At that ultimate stage you now create not
only a world-model—you build a self-model
as well. This requires planning, judging, and self-monitoring. Stuss and
colleagues also specify that you now place information in a temporal
perspective and actively remember your past and anticipate the future. Since
the “self-awareness” level is based on an access to autobiographical
information and the construction of a self-concept (self-model), most probably
made up of private and public self-information, I suggest that it refers to
“self-awareness” in the social/personality structure. This
level closely resembles the concept of “”meta-representational
self-consciousness” posited by Newen and Vogeley. The emphasis on
personal history at that level indicates that a perception of self in time
constitutes an important factor in self-awareness.
David Stuss
This
last remark is consistent with Antonio Damasio’s proposal as well. Damasio is a
neurologist at the University of Iowa. He proposes the existence of two levels
of consciousness: “core” and “extended” consciousness. “Core consciousness”
presupposes wakefulness and consists in an implicit
sense of self here and now. I suggest that “core consciousness” be located
right in between consciousness and self-awareness as defined throughout this review. On one hand
core consciousness means that you are aware of your environment and experience
mental events (consciousness). On the other hand, it also implies that you
possess diffuse information about yourself (self-awareness). “Core
consciousness” is somewhat similar to “phenomenal
self-acquaintance” (Newen & Vogeley) and the “ecological self” (Neisser).
“Extended consciousness” represents a more elaborate sense of self and
identity. It includes information about your past and anticipated future, as
well as you personality traits and other similar private and public
self-dimensions. Damasio’s “extended consciousness” can be linked to Neisser’s
“self-concept”. It represents a refined form of self-awareness that includes an awareness that one is self-aware—meta-self-awareness.
Antonio Damasio
Conclusion
In this review I compared
seven recent models of levels of consciousness. This just represents a sample
of what’s out there in the scientific literature. We have seen that perception of self in time and complexity of self-representations
constitute two important dimensions of consciousness. There are other important
aspects to consciousness—in my submitted paper I discuss frequency of
self-observation, quantity of
self-information, and accuracy of self-knowledge.
My goal has been to reduce the growing confusion associated with the
proliferation of new models and terms describing various levels of
consciousness and self-awareness. My analysis, summarized in Table 2 below,
strongly suggests that many new concepts are closely related. For example, primary and minimal consciousness, as well as sensorimotor
awareness, all mean consciousness as defined as
being awake and focusing attention on the environment. This situation creates
unwanted redundancy. However, some other notions
introduce fine nuances between levels of consciousness that should not be
overlooked. For instance, both iterative meta-representational
self-consciousness and extended consciousness are located right in between
self-awareness and meta-self-awareness on the social/personality model, but
each notion possesses a distinct flavour. Iterative meta-representational
self-consciousness emphasizes TOM, whereas extended consciousness stresses
perception of self in time.
|
Levels |
Definition |
Related
concepts |
|
Meta-self-awareness |
Being aware that one is self-aware. |
·
Extended
self ·
Iterative
meta-representational self-consciousness |
|
Self-awareness |
Focusing attention on self; processing
private & public self-information. |
·
Meta-representational
self-consciouness ·
Extended
& private self ·
Conceptual
self-consciousness ·
Self-concept ·
Reflective,
reflective 1-2, recursive, self & meta-consciousness |
|
Consciousness |
Focusing attention on the environment;
processing incoming external stimuli. |
·
Non-conscious
mind ·
Ecological
& interpersonal self ·
Phenomenal
self-acquaintance ·
Sensorimotor
awareness ·
Core,
peripheral, primary & minimal consciousness |
|
Unconsciousness |
Being non-responsive to self &
environment. |
·
Non-consciousness ·
Arousal |
Table 2—Summary of
the analysis presented in the present review
Conceptualizing
consciousness in terms of degrees can be very useful. It can help us clarify
theoretical issues that have been intensely debated in the scientific
literature. For example, some believe that language is essential to
consciousness while others rather think that we can be conscious without
speech. Of course these two extreme views are unrealistic. We must not ask if
language is necessary for consciousness. What we should ask instead is: at what
level (or levels) of consciousness is
language required? The researchers whose models have been reviewed here would
likely agree that primary
consciousness (Farthing), sensorimotor awareness (Stuss
et al.), and minimal consciousness (Zelazo) for instance, do not entail
language. However, extended
consciousness (Damasio), recursive consciousness (Zelazo), reflective
consciousness (Farthing), and meta-consciousness (Schooler) most probably need
language to emerge.
Alain Morin, Ph.D
Behavioral Sciences,
Email: amorin@mtroyal.ab.ca
Webpage: http://www2.mtroyal.ab.ca/~amorin/
SELECTED
REFERENCES
Damasio, A.R. (1999). The Feeling of What Happens: Body and Emotion
in the Making of Consciousness. Harcourt Brace:
Duval, S., &
Wicklund, R.A. (1972). A theory of objective self awareness.
Farthing, G.W. (1992). The psychology of consciousness.
Neisser, U. (1997). The roots of self-knowledge: perceiving self, it,
and thou. In J.G.
Snodgrass & R.L. Thompson (Eds.), The
self across psychology: Self-recognition, self-awareness, and the self-concept
(pp.
18-33).
Newen, A., & Vogeley, K. (2003). Self-representation:
Searching for a neural signature of
self-consciousness. Consciousness and Cognition, 12, 529–543.
(Albert’s website: LINK;
Kai’s website: LINK.)
Schooler, J.W. (2002). Re-representing consciousness: Dissociations between
experience and meta-consciousness. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 6
(8), 339-344. (Jonathan’s website: LINK.)
Stuss, D.T., Picton, T.W., &
Alexander, M.P. (2001). Consciousness, self-awareness and the frontal lobes. In
Salloway, S., Malloy, P., & Duffy, J. (Eds.), The
frontal lobes and neuropsychiatric illness (pp 101-109). Washington (DC):
American Psychiatric Press. (Donald’s website: LINK.)
Zelazo,
P.D., & Sommerville, J. (2001). Levels of consciousness of the self in time. In Self in time: Developmental issues (C. Moore & K.
Lemmon, Eds), pp. 229-252, Erlbaum. (Philip’s website: LINK.)