Now is the time: operationalizing generative neurophenomenology through interpersonal methods.
Anne Monnier, Lena Adel, Guillaume Dumas
Neuroscience of Consciousness 2025 DOI: 10.1093/nc/niaf052 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Theoretical or philosophical paper Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Topics | Philosophy of mind |
| Keywords | Complex systems Computational psychiatry Dynamics of consciousness Enaction Intersubjectivity Multi-brain neuroscience Multiscale modelling Neurophenomenology |
| Citations | 1 |
| Key points | Argues that the scientific community is now ready to adopt a generative neurophenomenology that emphasizes intersubjective and social facets of lived experience, and proposes combining existing methods to update the program. |
Abstract
Lived experience is shaped by intersubjective, social, cultural, and historical dimensions. For the past 30 years, neurophenomenology has adopted an embodied perspective of the mind by integrating first-person experiential and third-person neurobehavioural perspectives. Neurophenomenology reveals mutual constraints between both, as they co-constitute a person's lived experience. This article emphasizes the intersubjective and social facets of lived experience as core to generative neurophenomenology, envisioned in the 1990s by Francisco Varela, and argues that the scientific community is now ready to adopt this approach. For this endeavour, we clarify three meanings of 'generative' as it applies distinctly to generative phenomenology, generative passages, and generative models. Then, we propose to combine existing methods to update neurophenomenology program: first, by transitioning from individual to multiple people phenomenology methods that include intersubjectivity experience; second, by expanding traditional neuroscience to include measures of multimodal interpersonal synchrony; and third, by leveraging multiple computational tools to integrate different viewpoints, thereby enriching our understanding of lived experience. We also underscore the potential of diverse mathematical formalisms to capture aspects of human experience, all while underscoring that using computational approaches to model neurophenomenology does not entail endorsing computationalism as a grounding hypothesis of human experience. Finally, we illustrate the clinical relevance of this paradigm through two case studies in psychiatry-(1) with interactive dyads in autism and (2) with multiple members in family therapy sessions-demonstrating its translational potential.
Comparable studies
Other theoretical and historical papers on philosophy of mind, most cited first.
| Study | Year | Design | Participants |
|---|---|---|---|
| Psychosis as a state of aberrant salience: a framework linking biology, phenomenology, and pharmacology in schizophrenia. | 2003 | Theoretical or philosophical paper | |
| From dopamine to salience to psychosis--linking biology, pharmacology and phenomenology of psychosis. | 2005 | Theoretical or philosophical paper | |
| How do the brain's time and space mediate consciousness and its different dimensions? Temporo-spatial theory of consciousness (TTC). | 2017 | Theoretical or philosophical paper | |
| The phenomenology of deep brain stimulation-induced changes in OCD: an enactive affordance-based model. | 2013 | Theoretical or philosophical paper | |
| Looking for the Self: Phenomenology, Neurophysiology and Philosophical Significance of Drug-induced Ego Dissolution | 2017 | Theoretical or philosophical paper |
Citations in the library
Cites 29
- The Oxford Handbook of 4E Cognition Oxford University Press eBooks September 13, 2018
- Theories of consciousness. Nature Reviews Neuroscience July 1, 2022
- Neural correlates of the DMT experience assessed with multivariate EEG. Scientific Reports November 19, 2019
- What Geometric Visual Hallucinations Tell Us about the Visual Cortex Neural Computation March 1, 2002
- Reconceiving representation-hungry cognition: an ecological-enactive proposal Adaptive Behavior May 23, 2018
and 24 more in the library