Consciousness and Cognition - The Consciousness Library

When does the feeling of time passing faster or slower emerge? The role of interoceptive awareness.

Consciousness and Cognition August 5, 2026 S. Droit-Volet, F. Monier, N. Martinelli

The question raised in this study was: when and why does the feeling of a change in the passage of time arise? Participants were instructed to press a button as soon as they perceived a change in the speed of the passage of time. After each detection, they indicated whether they felt that time was "speeding up" and "slowing down", and rated the intensity of this feeling. They also rated their...

DOI: 10.1016/j.concog.2026.104102

Experiences of self-continuity and self-discontinuity in dreams and its relation with the body and affectivity.

Consciousness and Cognition July 20, 2026 Marina Trakas, Ryan Daley

Research on the continuity and discontinuity between the waking and dreaming minds has largely focused on similarities and differences in waking and dream content. The present study expands this debate by examining another dimension: the relationship between the dream self and the waking self at the phenomenal level. Specifically, it investigates how bodily and affective dimensions of dream...

DOI: 10.1016/j.concog.2026.104096 Full text Lucid dreaming Phenomenology Affectivity Body +4

Task-induced transient depersonalization- and derealization-like experiences: a comparative examination of mirror gazing and fixed attention tasks

Consciousness and Cognition July 3, 2026 Shun Sasaki, Tokiko Harada, Hideki Ohira

Depersonalization (DP) and derealization (DR) are dissociative experiences involving altered bodily self-experience and diminished felt reality of the external world. Although various paradigms have been used to induce transient DP-/DR-like experiences experimentally, their relative induction profiles remain unclear. The present study compared Mirror Gazing Task (MGT) with a closely matched...

DOI: 10.1016/j.concog.2026.104090 Transient computer programming Cognition Task project management Visual attention +4

Could we perceive the world differently than we do? Neuroscience-based emergentism and the biological function of consciousness

Consciousness and Cognition June 14, 2026 Cyriel M A Pennartz, Micha Engeser

Whether consciousness serves a biological and psychological function is a topic of intense interest. We reexamine this issue by first focussing on an objection against consciousness having a function raised amongst others by Jaegwon Kim. His argument targets a form of non-reductive physicalism stating that consciousness has causative power beyond that of the physical substrate. In contrast, we...

DOI: 10.1016/j.concog.2026.104077 Consciousness Function biology Perception Cognition +3

Consciousness intuitions are illusory.

Consciousness and Cognition June 5, 2026 Iris Berent

Philosophical discussions of the "hard problem" often invoke "problem intuitions", as consciousness intuitions and consciousness are believed to be "closely connected" (Chalmers, 2018). Here, I challenge this assumption. In two experiments, I demonstrate that consciousness intuitions are illusory-they shift across different "problem intuitions", akin to perceptual illusions. When presented with...

DOI: 10.1016/j.concog.2026.104078 Full text Consciousness Dualism

Report-modulated prefrontal activity and consistent posterior representations during conscious visual perception.

Consciousness and Cognition June 1, 2026 Liang He, Zhige Zhang, Yuetan Wang et al.

Understanding whether prefrontal cortex is necessary for conscious experience remains central to ongoing debates between global workspace and recurrent processing theories of consciousness. To dissociate neural processes underlying perceptual awareness from those related to report and access, we combined report and no-report visual masking paradigms with magnetoencephalography (MEG) to...

DOI: 10.1016/j.concog.2026.104075 Full text Attention Conscious perception Magnetoencephalography Visual awareness

Laughter gains access to awareness at the threshold of consciousness.

Consciousness and Cognition June 1, 2026 Ivonne A Castiblanco Jimenez, Tommaso Ciorli, Martina Froio et al.

Emotional stimuli can influence behavior across varying levels of conscious awareness, yet the extent to which different social signals gain access to awareness remains unclear. Although unconscious processing has been extensively investigated for threat-related expressions, less is known about the awareness dynamics of socio-emotional signals such as laughter. The present study examined...

DOI: 10.1016/j.concog.2026.104063 Full text Conscious awareness Continuous flash suppression Emotional facial expressions Laughter +3

Experiences of absorption and smooth performance during flow are linked to different aspects of creative thinking.

Consciousness and Cognition June 1, 2026 Mika Koivisto

Flow, an experience of deep immersion and smooth, effortless performance, is frequently linked to creativity. However, its specific relationship with the core cognitive mechanisms of creative ideation remains unclear. This study (n = 400) investigated how the smooth and immersive dimensions of flow relate to divergent thinking, measured using the Alternate Uses Task (AUT), and how they relate...

DOI: 10.1016/j.concog.2026.104060 Full text Aut Creativity Divergent thinking Flow +2

Diverging results with converging operations: Implications for the study of consciousness and cognition.

Consciousness and Cognition May 1, 2026 Joseph Glicksohn

Converging operations allow one to home in on a construct, be this an altered state of consciousness (ASC), or trait and/or state impulsivity. Unfortunately (or, perhaps fortunately), measures that should provide converging operations for such a construct sometimes present with diverging results. Three cases are considered here: trait impulsivity, which should be positively correlated with...

DOI: 10.1016/j.concog.2026.104049 Full text Absorption Converging operations Impulsivity Self-report

EEG microstates reveal distinct network dynamics in lucid and non-lucid REM sleep

Consciousness and Cognition April 13, 2026 Xinlin Wang, Emma Peters, Johannes Strelen et al.

Abstract During lucid dreaming, the dreamer is aware that they are dreaming. In past years, numerous studies have explored the characteristics of lucid dreams, which link lucid dreams to vivid visual perception, positive emotions, and wake-like metacognition and executive functions. To determine brain network activity associated with the conscious experience during lucid dreaming, we analyzed...

DOI: 10.1016/j.concog.2026.104047 Lucid dream Electroencephalography Sleep system call Dynamics music +1

Three propositions about conscious experience and their implications for theories of consciousness.

Consciousness and Cognition March 1, 2026 Peter A White

The aim of this paper is to make and defend three simple propositions about what can and cannot be conscious in the human brain and to elucidate their implications for research and theory on consciousness. The first proposition is that the fact that some information is conscious should be, but often is not, distinguished from the information itself. The second proposition is that, treating the...

DOI: 10.1016/j.concog.2026.103994 Full text Access consciousness Conscious experience Phenomenal consciousness

Trait-like stability of selfhood triumvirate and its constituent aspects: A qEEG intra-individual test-retest reliability study.

Consciousness and Cognition March 1, 2026 Alexander A Fingelkurts, Andrew A Fingelkurts

This study investigated the intraindividual stability and reliability of the three core aspects of the Selfhood triumvirate ('Self', 'Me', and 'I') as well as their mutual relationship (the Selfhood triumvirate configuration/pattern) by measuring the within-subjects reproducibility of functional integrity within three operational modules (OMs) of the brain's self-referential network (SRN), each...

DOI: 10.1016/j.concog.2026.104004 Full text Intraindividual test–retest reliability Neurophenomenology Quantitative electroencephalogram qeeg Self-me-i +2

Facilitating unusual bodily experiences and out-of-body experiences across wakefulness and sleep: A high-density EEG and neurophenomenology study

Consciousness and Cognition February 11, 2026 Teresa Campillo-Ferrer, Antonella Iadarola, Ramona Cordani et al.

Unusual bodily experiences (UBEs) are illusory bodily perceptions that are not coherent with typical wakeful experiences, including flying or floating sensations, body distortions, and out-of-body experiences. This study examines UBEs in a controlled sleep laboratory using meditation and light stimulation to facilitate their occurrence. A total of N = 35 healthy participants underwent...

DOI: 10.1016/j.concog.2026.104002 Meditation Lucid dream Wakefulness Electroencephalography +9

The phenomenal binding problem for neural networks.

Consciousness and Cognition February 3, 2026 Chris Percy, Gautam Agarwal

Our aim is to explore neural network mechanisms for phenomenal binding, i.e. combining micro-units of information into the macro-scale conscious experience common in human phenomenology. Such experiential complexity is a key feature that aspiring theories of phenomenal consciousness must account for. We motivate phenomenal binding in a way that aids translation to computational neuroscience,...

DOI: 10.1016/j.concog.2026.104003 Full text Connectionism Functional binding Neural networks Phenomenal binding +1

Deeper into dissociative Amnesia: A perspective from Higher-Order theories of consciousness

Consciousness and Cognition January 21, 2026 Ella Maria Tytgat, Maria Panagiotou

Memory is a fundamental brain function relying on complex neurological mechanisms that involve the processes of experiencing, encoding, consolidating and retrieving. A disorder primarily characterized by the loss of (autobiographical) memory owing to stressful or traumatic events is dissociative amnesia, the underlying mechanisms of which are poorly understood and further research is warranted....

DOI: 10.1016/j.concog.2026.103998

Operationalizing near‑death experiences: Stability of the NDE Rasch hierarchy over two decades.

Consciousness and Cognition January 18, 2026 Marieta Pehlivanova, Rense Lange, Bruce Greyson et al.

This study presents the first comprehensive psychometric comparison of Greyson's (1983) 16-item Near-Death Experience Scale (NDE Scale) and Martial et al.'s (2020) 20-item Near-Death Experience Content Scale (NDE-C) using Rasch modeling and differential item functioning (or response bias) analyses. A total of 705 self-identified "near-death experiencers" (64% women) completed both measures,...

DOI: 10.1016/j.concog.2025.103979 Full text Phenomenology Construct validity Measurement invariance Near-death experience nde +3

Comparing the characteristics of hallucinations and mental imagery: a large cross-sectional study in the general population.

Consciousness and Cognition 2026 Guillaume Pepin, Hélène Lœvenbruck, Alan Chauvin et al.

Hallucinations (HAs), the perceptual experiences that occur without external stimuli, are classically associated with psychiatric disorders, but also occur in the general population. Involuntary mental imagery (IMI), the spontaneous occurrence of visual or auditory mental content, shares several features with HAs. The continuum hypothesis suggests that these phenomena exist on a spectrum...

DOI: 10.1016/j.concog.2025.103974 Full text Phenomenology Continuum of experience Hallucinations Inner experience +2

The nature of mind scale (NOMS): Validation of an eight-dimensional scale assessing beliefs about the relationship between mind and matter.

Consciousness and Cognition 2026 Matthias Forstmann, Pascal Burgmer

We developed and validated the Nature of Mind Scale (NOMS), a 24-item measure assessing lay beliefs about eight distinct philosophical positions on the mind-body relationship. Given the limitations of existing measures and the theoretical diversity of mind-body positions, our goal was to develop a comprehensive yet practical scale that could capture the full range of philosophical stances...

DOI: 10.1016/j.concog.2025.103961 Full text Philosophy of mind Consciousness Experimental philosophy Mind-body dualism +3

The kaleidoscope of bizarreness: The analysis of first-person-reports shows the relationship between dreaming and mind wandering to be complex.

Consciousness and Cognition 2026 Manuela Kirberg, Jennifer Windt

Spontaneous thoughts and experiences, including mind wandering and dreaming, make up a significant proportion of our conscious mental lives. An influential proposal posits that dreaming and mind wandering exist on a continuum of spontaneous thought, in which dreaming is intensified compared to mind wandering. Yet the precise relationship between dreaming and mind wandering is only beginning to...

DOI: 10.1016/j.concog.2025.103965 Full text Dreaming Bizarreness Content analysis First-person reports +2

Mindfulness meditation can improve time-based prospective memory performance in restricted monitoring situation.

Consciousness and Cognition 2026 Mingyuan Wang, Yunfei Guo

The successful execution of time-based prospective memory (TBPM) tasks demands self-initiation attentional resources. Mindfulness meditation can enhance attention, which may promote TBPM performance. This study investigates whether mindfulness meditation can facilitate TBPM via the improvement of attentional resources and whether such facilitation is modulated by time-monitoring conditions. The...

DOI: 10.1016/j.concog.2025.103975 Full text Attention Mindfulness meditation Restricted monitoring Time monitoring +1

Synesthesia is associated with distinctive patterns in dream content.

Consciousness and Cognition 2026 Kyle Napierkowski, Emily Cook

Dreams offer insight into how individual differences shape conscious experience in the absence of external input or task demands. This study examines whether synesthesia is linked to distinct patterns in dream content, suggesting underlying differences in cognitive architecture. Leveraging the statistical power of large-scale, naturalistic data, we analyzed 2,337 dream reports from Reddit,...

DOI: 10.1016/j.concog.2025.103959 Full text Computational linguistics Continuity hypothesis Dream analysis Individual differences +2

Action without agent, but with awareness? meditation and the modulation of agency induced sensory suppression.

Consciousness and Cognition 2026 Yoav Schweitzer, Aviva Berkovich-Ohana, Yair Dor-Ziderman et al.

The human brain constructs a boundary between self and world by distinguishing self-generated sensory events from external ones. For events that are self-initiated, the brain attenuates its response, what is known as the sensory suppression effect. This effect is regarded as a proxy of the sense of agency, i.e., our feeling of being subjective agents controlling our actions and ensuing events...

DOI: 10.1016/j.concog.2025.103960 Full text

The interplay of psychedelic use and meditation in shaping psychological well-being

Consciousness and Cognition December 15, 2025 Andreas Krabbe, Pilleriin Sikka, Jussi Jylkkä

Psychedelic substances and meditation can elicit personally meaningful experiences that support well-being, yet their relative and combined contributions remain unclear. Meditation typically produces gradual improvements through sustained practice, whereas psychedelics may induce acute shifts. To examine these dynamics, we re-analysed data from two cross-sectional online surveys using multiple...

DOI: 10.1016/j.concog.2025.103977 Parapsychology Mental health Consciousness Cognition +3

The Hitchhiker's guide to hallucination research.

Consciousness and Cognition November 1, 2025 Inés Abalo-Rodríguez, Ana P. Pinheiro

Hallucination research is a fast‑growing, inherently interdisciplinary field bridging psychology, neuroscience, psychiatry, and philosophy. This article maps out key conceptual and methodological issues underlying the study of hallucinations. We begin by unpacking core theoretical issues - how hallucinations differ from other perceptual alterations, whether they form a single construct or...

DOI: 10.1016/j.concog.2025.103941 Full text Phenomenology Experimental tasks Hallucinations Interdisciplinarity +2

The roles of recollection and familiarity in the positive association between dream lucidity and reality monitoring: Evidence from ERPs and EEG.

Consciousness and Cognition November 1, 2025 Moo-Rung Loo, Shih-Kuen Cheng

Dream lucidity, the ability to recognize and reflect on one's dream state, has been linked to heightened memory monitoring. Although individuals with high trait lucidity often rate imagined and perceived events as similarly vivid, they nonetheless perform better in distinguishing memory sources. This study examined whether this advantage reflects greater subjective specificity, the retrieval of...

DOI: 10.1016/j.concog.2025.103947 Full text Dream lucidity Erps Reality monitoring Recollection

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