The Misunderstood Higher-Order Approach to Consciousness
Richard Brown, Hakwan Lau, Joseph E LeDoux
PsyArXiv January 7, 2019 preprint DOI: 10.31234/osf.io/xpy8h (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Theoretical or philosophical paper |
|---|---|
| Key points | Argues that the higher-order theory of consciousness has been misunderstood by critics, that it assumes only minimal cognitive functions rather than overintellectualizing experience, and that it occupies an intermediate position between global workspace theory and early sensory views while better accounting for complex experiences like emotions and episodic memories. |
Abstract
Critics have often misunderstood the higher-order theory (HOT) of consciousness. Here we clarify its position on several issues, and distinguish it from other views such as the global workspace theory (GWT) and early sensory models, such as first-order local recurrency theory. The criticism that HOT overintellectualizes conscious experience is inaccurate because in reality the theory assumes minimal cognitive functions for consciousness; in this sense it is an intermediate position between GWT and early sensory views, and plausibly accounts for shortcomings of both. Further, compared to other existing theories, HOT can more readily account for complex everyday experiences, such as of emotions and episodic memories, and make HOT potentially useful as a framework for conceptualizing pathological mental states.
Citations in the library
Cited by 3
- An active inference model of conscious access: How cognitive action selection reconciles the results of report and no-report paradigms. Current Research in Neurobiology 2022
- On the minimal theory of consciousness implicit in active inference. Physics of Life Reviews March 1, 2026
- Integrated Information Theory, Pseudoscience, and Mainstream Theories of Consciousness: A Call for 'The Science We Need' PsyArXiv September 29, 2023
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