Interface Focus
April 14, 2023
Georg Northoff, Philipp Klar, Magnus Bein et al.
30 citations
Consciousness has a structure with foreground contents and a background environment, a relation that depends on the brain's interaction with the body and external world. The temporo-spatial theory proposes that the brain aligns its neuronal activity to environmental stimuli across three layers: a background layer with longer timescales creating shared brain similarities across subjects, an intermediate layer with medium timescales matching environmental inputs to intrinsic neuronal rhythms, and a foreground layer with shorter timescales entraining to stimulus timing. These layers correspond to phenomenal layers: a shared contextual background, a layer mediating content relationships, and fast-changing specific contents. This alignment may bridge physical, dynamic, neuronal, and phenomenal mechanisms of consciousness.
Human Brain Mapping
July 29, 2022
Hang Zhang, Shiyou Yang, Yang Qiao et al.
27 citations
Spontaneous low-frequency fluctuations in sustained attention, which cause cognitive and behavioral lapses, originate in the default-mode network (DMN). Analysis of two independent fMRI and behavior datasets shows that neural fluctuations in the DMN mediate behavioral reaction-time fluctuations during sustained attention. The DMN's increased amplitude of fluctuation correlates with behavioral fluctuation specifically in the 0.01-0.1 Hz frequency range, not at lower or higher frequencies. This pattern appears during both auditory and visual sustained attention and replicates across datasets. These findings reveal the DMN as a neural source of attention fluctuation, extending the former view that the DMN is simply deactivated during cognitive tasks.
Neuroimage
August 15, 2024
Bianca Ventura, Yasir Çatal, Angelika Wolman et al.
22 citations
Meditation practices with a wider attentional focus, such as Shoonya meditation, are associated with longer intrinsic neural timescales (INTs) in the brain, measured as the autocorrelation window (ACW) of EEG signals, compared to practices with a narrower focus like Mantra or Vipassana meditation. The study compared three groups of highly proficient practitioners from different traditions and a meditation-naïve control group. The results indicate a correspondence between the width of attentional scope and the duration of neural temporal windows, suggesting that subjective attentional width relates to objective neural activity patterns.
Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews
June 1, 2025
Georg Northoff, Bianca Ventura
21 citations
The brain-mind connection remains a central challenge because subjective experience is first-person while neural activity is observed from a third-person perspective. Neurophenomenology offers a systematic method to link these domains, but does not explain how they relate independently of methodology. Spatiotemporal Neuroscience proposes that neural activity and subjective experience share analogous spatiotemporal dynamics as a common feature. This paper shows how the two frameworks can be integrated on theoretical grounds, illustrated by examples of self, meditation, and depression. The integration provides complementary insights, deepens understanding of the brain-mind connection, and suggests new methodological approaches for empirical investigation.
Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews
May 1, 2023
Georg Northoff, Andrea Scalabrini, Stuart Fogel
13 citations
Dreams occupy a bizarre and poorly understood state of consciousness. The Topographic-dynamic Re-organization model (TRoD) proposes that dreaming involves a shift toward increased activity and connectivity in the default-mode network (DMN) alongside reduced activity in the central executive network, except during lucid dreaming. Dynamically, dreams shift toward slower brain frequencies and longer timescales, placing them between wakefulness and NREM stage 2 or slow-wave sleep. This re-organization produces abnormal spatiotemporal processing of internal and external inputs, moving from temporal segregation to integration. The resulting integration yields bizarre, self-centric mental content and hallucinatory-like states, suggesting that topography and temporal dynamics may serve as a common currency linking brain activity to dream experience.
Phenomenology and the Cognitive Sciences
February 26, 2024
Georg Northoff, Steven S. Gouveia
12 citations
Artificial intelligence does not exhibit basic subjectivity, the foundational feature required for consciousness or self. Subjectivity, defined by perspectiveness and mineness of experience, ontologically traces to a point of view. Adopting a non-reductive neurophilosophical approach, the point of view comprises a neuroecological layer mediated by timescales of world and brain, and a higher-order mental layer. Empirical data on the sense of self support this layered view. Current AI lacks these timescales and a point of view with perspectiveness and mineness. Thus, models like ChatGPT and similar technologies do not possess basic subjectivity, making consciousness or self impossible in their current state.
Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience
December 23, 2024
Aldrich Chan, Philip D. Harvey, R Hernandez-Cardenache et al.
9 citations
Traumatic responses outside a PTSD diagnosis are linked to changes in default mode network (DMN) functioning. In a study of 27 participants (16 trauma-exposed, 11 non-trauma-exposed), with 15 completing neuroimaging, the trauma-exposed group showed reduced self-referential processing, social cognition, autobiographical recall, and prospection, alongside increased mind-wandering. Correlations between cognitive findings and brain volume were observed, but volumetric differences between groups were insignificant. This suggests that preserved DMN structural integrity may support resilience, and that reduced hippocampal volume may be a pre-existing vulnerability to PTSD rather than a consequence, with DMN-related cognitive reductions being functionally mediated.
Psychopathology
June 30, 2025
Stephan Lechner, Karl Erik Sandsten, Dusan Hirjak et al.
7 citations
Altered experiences of time and space are linked to general symptoms and basic self-disorders in people with schizophrenia spectrum disorder. Self-disturbance acts as a key mediator through which fundamental time-space disruptions influence perceptual changes as well as negative, positive, and general symptoms. Data were collected at three medical expert centers using semi-structured phenomenological interviews and analyzed with network and mediation methods.
Der Nervenarzt
September 1, 2023
Dusan Hirjak, Jonas Daub, Geva A Brandt et al.
6 citations
Patients with schizophrenia often experience fragmented time and distorted spatial perception, such as abnormal interpersonal distance and orientation, which can detach them from reality and complicate therapy. Despite this, these experiences remain understudied due to a lack of standardized measurement tools. Based on spatiotemporal psychopathology (STPP), a clinical rating scale called the Scale for Space and Time Experience in Psychosis (STEP) was developed. The German version of STEP assesses 14 spatial and 11 temporal phenomena across 25 items. It demonstrates high internal consistency (Cronbach's alpha = 0.94) and significant correlation with the Positive and Negative Syndrome Scale (PANSS; p < 0.001), offering a valuable instrument for German-speaking countries.
bioRxiv Preprint Server
August 29, 2024
Saketh Malipeddi, Arun Sasidharan, Rahul Venugopal et al.
4 citations
preprint
Advanced meditators from the Isha Yoga tradition show shorter intrinsic neural timescales (INTs) during breath-watching, indicating deidentification with mental contents, and no significant differences in INTs between tasks, indicating non-dual awareness. Shorter INTs correlate with self-reported equanimity. The brain's intrinsic neural timescales may serve as a neural marker of equanimity.
Brain Communications
January 1, 2024
Yasir Çatal, Georg Northoff
3 citations
A commentary on a study about brain dynamics that predict response to psilocybin for treatment-resistant depression. The original study by Vohryzek and colleagues investigated how brain activity patterns before and during psilocybin treatment might identify which patients with treatment-resistant depression are likely to benefit. The commentary discusses the implications of these findings for understanding how psychedelics work in the brain and for developing personalized treatment approaches.
bioRxiv Preprint Server
February 11, 2025
Saketh Malipeddi, Arun Sasidharan, Rahul Venugopal et al.
2 citations
preprint
Meditation alters brain activity, particularly in alpha and theta frequency bands, but most research has focused on average power changes from rest to meditation rather than how quickly these changes emerge. This gap means little is known about the time-to-onset and temporal dynamics of neural shifts during meditation practice.
September 2, 2025
Zefan Zheng, Robert Chis-Ciure, Peter Thestrup Waade et al.
1 citation
preprint
Consciousness science is fragmented, with theories operating orthogonally and accumulating anomalies. The principle of recurrency—functional and architectural feedback loops—offers a unifying scaffold. All theories tacitly invoke feedback loops and can be re-expressed along a single axis of recursion. Four nested levels (cellular, local inter-areal, global, and lateral) map onto state, phenomenal content, manipulative access, and experiential similarity, tying evolved anatomy to phenomenon. The phenomenal-versus-access distinction dissolves into a graded cascade where deeper recursion expands reportable variables. Recurrence is evolutionarily favored, rebutting feed-forward objections, while brain-body loops ground selfhood. Clinically, targeting recurrent pathways promises new biomarkers and alleviation in disorders of consciousness.
bioRxiv (Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory)
June 26, 2025
Prakash Shrimali, Arun Sasidharan, Saketh Malipeddi et al.
1 citation
preprint
Meditation involves training attention inward, but the brain activity that distinguishes meditative from non-meditative states across different traditions is not well understood. Analyzing high-density EEG data from 170 participants—121 advanced meditators and 49 controls—across Vipassana, Brahma Kumaris Raja Yoga, Heartfulness, and Isha Yoga traditions, researchers used random forest classifiers to distinguish meditative from non-meditative states with 91% accuracy. Nonlinear features contributed most, indicating a core neurodynamic profile. Classification was higher in advanced meditators (92%) than controls (85%), with different feature importance: nonlinear and aperiodic features dominated in meditators, while oscillatory and timescale features dominated in controls. Each tradition showed distinct neurodynamic profiles, suggesting multiple pathways lead to meditative states.
Communications Biology
June 12, 2026
Saketh Malipeddi, Arun Sasidharan, Bianca Ventura et al.
Advanced meditators from the Isha Yoga tradition report stronger non-dual experiences—where the boundary between self and environment dissolves—during breath-watching meditation compared to novices and meditation-naïve controls. Using EEG-based intrinsic neural timescales (INT), researchers found that across all participants, INTs are longer during internal attention (breath-watching) than during an external cognitive task. However, advanced meditators show similar INT durations between internal and external attention, and this reduced difference correlates with stronger reported non-dual experiences. The findings suggest that similar intrinsic neural timescale durations across internal and external attention may be a neural signature of non-duality.
bioRxiv Preprint Server
May 27, 2026
Praerna Chowdhury, Ramajayam Govindaraj, Arun Sasidharan et al.
preprint
Meditation-related EEG patterns are often studied by comparing meditators to passive rest or by experience level, but such designs rarely test reliability or include active controls. This study used a multi-session within-subject design with experienced Brahmakumaris Rajayoga meditators to identify reliable, state-dependent EEG dynamics. The approach addressed prior limitations, providing more valid neurophysiological markers of meditative state.
Translational Psychiatry
November 21, 2025
Andrea Francesco Carluccio, Georg Northoff
Auditory verbal hallucinations (AVH) in psychosis and schizophrenia involve changes in brain connectivity and organization, but how these relate to the structure of subjective experience is unclear. This review proposes two neurophenomenological hypotheses. First, disruptions in connections between sensory, bodily, and language brain regions may cause temporal fragmentation in perception and thought, leading to hyperreflexivity—abnormal attention to isolated objects. Second, a reduced distinction between unimodal and transmodal brain regions may blur the boundary between outer social and inner mental spaces, causing confusion between interpersonal and intrapersonal experience. These hypotheses link brain changes directly to the structure of experience in AVH.
Philosophical transactions. Series A, Mathematical, physical, and engineering sciences
May 14, 2026
Georg Northoff, Yasir Çatal, Samira Abbasi
Computing can learn from physics by conceiving time in terms of dynamics—changing patterns of activity over time. The brain's intrinsic neural dynamics, specifically its spontaneous activity, scale-free activity, and variability, enable it to actively participate in the world's physical time through processes like entrainment, where neural activity follows external rhythms such as music. This active participation shapes experience and consciousness. Current computing devices, whether classical or natural, lack spontaneous activity and an 'inner time' that can actively influence processing. Consequently, they cannot actively encode input dynamics or participate in the world's physical time, leaving them 'locked out of time and world' and unable to acquire tacit knowledge or behave flexibly in a changing world.
Neuroscience of Consciousness
January 1, 2026
Bianca Ventura, Andrea Buccellato, Saketh Malipeddi et al.
Vipassana and Shoonya meditation produce distinct alpha-band brain dynamics, with differences more apparent in temporal variability than in average activity. Vipassana, involving systematic body scanning, showed lower variability and more regular temporal patterns in both peak frequency and power of alpha oscillations. Shoonya, a non-directed attention practice, exhibited higher variability and irregularity in these measures. The findings suggest that dynamic features of brain activity, such as variability and temporal irregularity, may distinguish contemplative practices better than static averages, and could reflect a shared property of brain and experience.
Computers in biology and medicine
October 1, 2025
Andrea Buccellato, Di Zang, Yasir Çatal et al.
The brain's spontaneous activity has intrinsic durations—Intrinsic Neural Timescales (INTs)—that are hierarchically organized, with shorter durations in sensory regions and longer ones in association areas. This study shows that the topographic organization of INTs is not fixed but dynamically changes over time. Healthy individuals exhibit transitions between different INT states that are moderately predictable and show memory effects. In people with disorders of consciousness, these transitions become less predictable and show reduced memory effects, suggesting that the temporal richness of INT state transitions is important for maintaining normal consciousness.
Physics of Life Reviews
July 1, 2025
Georg Northoff, Federico Zilio, Jianfeng Zhang
The contents of consciousness are shaped primarily through a non-additive pre-post-stimulus interaction that is temporal-dynamic and spatial-topographic in nature. This interaction accounts for the intrinsically subjective nature of conscious experience, which must be distinguished from the more objective modulation by cognitive, sensory, affective, and motor functions. The argument addresses neural features such as alpha power, phase dynamics, trial-to-trial variability, and fractal scale-free dynamics, and relates the approach to other theories like Dendritic Integration Theory, Global Neuronal Workspace Theory, and Integrated Information Theory.
Physics of Life Reviews
July 1, 2024
Georg Northoff, Federico Zilio, Jianfeng Zhang
Conscious perception depends not only on brain activity after a stimulus appears but also on the brain's ongoing, spontaneous activity before the stimulus. Reviewing recent findings, the authors show that pre-stimulus alpha power (a measure of brain oscillations) influences how vividly or confidently people experience a stimulus, while trial-to-trial variability in alpha activity before and after the stimulus shapes conscious content. The key proposal is that pre- and post-stimulus activity interact in a non-additive, not merely additive, way within the alpha frequency band, and this interaction operates across multiple levels from neurophysiology to phenomenology. This perspective aligns with the Temporo-spatial theory of consciousness, emphasizing that understanding consciousness requires examining brain activity across wider timescales.
Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews
June 1, 2024
Robert Chis-Ciure, Lucia Melloni, Georg Northoff
A novel framework called the Measure Centrality Index (MCI) enables systematic comparison of consciousness theories by assessing how important a given empirical measure is for each theory. Applying the MCI to Global Neuronal Workspace Theory, Integrated Information Theory, and Temporospatial Theory of Consciousness shows that direct comparisons are meaningful for measures such as Lempel-Ziv Complexity, Autocorrelation Window, and possibly Mutual Information, but problematic for anatomical and physiological neural correlates of consciousness because these measures carry different weight across theories. The approach addresses isolated theory evolution and confirmatory bias in consciousness science.
Schizophrenia Research
January 1, 2024
Georg Northoff, Dusan Hirjak
Catatonia involves complex symptoms that combine motor, affective, and behavioral phenomena and occurs across multiple psychiatric diagnoses, revealing the limits of current affective and cognitive psychopathological approaches. Spatiotemporal Psychopathology (STPP) is developed further here, based on recent clinical and neuroscience findings. STPP has two core features: an experience-based approach that accounts for symptoms through first-person experience of time-space, and an integrated brain-mind approach where the brain's neural topography and dynamic (inner time and space) are shared with the mind's mental topography and dynamic (time-space experience) as their common currency. These features account for catatonia's symptom complexity and trans-diagnostic nature, making it a paradigmatic example for a more comprehensive psychopathological approach.
Life (Basel, Switzerland)
June 24, 2021
Peter Walla, Georg Northoff, Cornelia Herbert
The self is not a single, fixed entity but a dynamic structure with multiple aspects that unfold over time. While earlier brain-imaging studies assumed a singular self, recent electrophysiological research provides preliminary evidence for a serial sequence of self-referential processes. The authors propose a Multiple Aspects Self Theory (MAST) distinguishing a primitive, non-personal self (Me1) from an elaborate, personal self (Me2), based on their temporal sequence. This framework aims to guide future studies on the neural dynamics of self-referential processing and its connection to consciousness.