Pre-reflective Self Research Articles

Mapping the pre-reflective experience of “self” to the brain - An ERP study

The neural underpinnings of selfhood encompass pre-reflective and reflective self-experience. The former refers to a basic, immediate experience of being a self, while the latter involves cognition and introspection. Although neural correlates of reflective self-experience have been studied, the pre-reflective remains underinvestigated.This research aims to bridge this gap by comparatively investigating ERP correlates of reading first- vs. third-person pronouns – approximating pre-reflective self-experience – and self- vs. other-related adjectives – approximating reflective self-experience – in 30 healthy participants.We found differential neural engagement between pre-reflective and reflective self-experience at 254–310 ms post-stimulus onset. Source estimation suggested that our sensor-level results could be plausibly explained by the involvement of cortical midline structures and default mode network in the general sense of self but selective recruitment of anterior cingulate and top-down dorsal attention network in the pre-reflective self. These findings offer a deeper understanding of the experiential self, especially pre-reflective, providing a foundation for investigating self-disorders.

Pre-personal Consciousness and the Pre-reflective Self

Pre-personal Consciousness and the Pre-reflective Self

Pre-Molecular Assessment of Self-Processes in Neurotypical Subjects Using a Single Cognitive Behavioral Intervention Evoking Autobiographical Memory.

In the last 20 years, several contributions have been published on what concerns the conceptual and empirical connections between self-processes. However, only a limited number of publications addressed the viability of those processes to characterize mental health in neurotypical subjects with a normative pattern of neurodevelopment. Furthermore, even fewer experiments focused explicitly on the complexity of studying neurotypical phenomenal data. On the one hand, this normative pattern is commonly associated with mental health and a multifaceted self-concept and well-being. On the other hand, well-being is often related to a healthy cognitive life. However, how such intricate and complex relation between self-processes is established in neurotypical subjects requires further evidence. The novelty of this work is thus studying the first-person experience, which is correlated with the mental events aroused by a cognitive behavioral intervention. The prior methodology that led to the complete characterization of a neurotypical sample was already published by the authors, although the materials, the methods, the sample screening, and the sample size study required further explanation and exploration. This paper’s innovation is hence the phenomenological assessment of subjects’ self-regulation, which is used for mental health profiling, providing the basis for subsequent molecular typing. For that matter, a convenience sample of 128 (19–25-year-old) neurotypical young adults, healthy university students at the University of Lisbon, non-medicated and with no serious, uncontrolled, or chronic diseases, are characterized according to their cognitive functioning and self-concept. The procedure comprised (i) a mental status examination (psychological assessment) and (ii) a psychological intervention, i.e., a single cognitive behavioral intervention (intervention protocol). The psychological assessment was a standardized and structured clinical interview, which comprised the use of 4 psychological scales complementary to the classical Mental Status Examination (MSE). The intervention protocol applied a combined exercise of psychophysical training and autobiographical-self memory-recalling. The results permitted identifying and isolating four different subgroups (self awareness, self consciousness, reflective self, and pre-reflective self) in neurotypical subjects with discrete self-processes. The outcome of this study is screening four different aspects of self-reflection and the isolation between various forms of self-directed attention and their interconnections in these four mental health strata. The practical implication of this study is to fulfill an a priori pre-molecular assessment of self-regulation with separate cognitive characteristics. The reliability of these mental strata, their distinct neurophysiology, and discrete molecular fingerprint will be tested in a future publication by in silico characterization, total protein profiling, and simultaneous immunodetection of the neuropeptide and neuroimmune response of the same participants.

Two modes of givenness of pre-reflective self-consciousness

The purpose of this paper is threefold: First, I shall first attempt to criticize Zahavi's notion of the “experiential self” as the latter is presented and developed in his book Self and Other (2014). I will argue that Zahavi's “experiential self” is so thin that its connection with the pre-reflective dimension of selfhood at the distinctively human, conceptual, “space of reasons” level becomes problematic. Second, I shall suggest that an alternative account of self-consciousness first developed by Kant and refined by Sellars, which I shall call the “Kant-Sellars” thesis about self-consciousness, which stresses the distinction between sentient and sapient self-consciousness, can help us do justice to the insights contained in Zahavi's account of experiential self, while at the same time avoiding its more problematic features. Finally, I shall offer a brief response to the objection that by dropping the phenomenological “bridge” between the normative and empirical-material dimensions of the pre-reflective self, the above “Kant-Sellars” account of self-consciousness leaves us with an essentially bifurcated conception of pre-reflective self-consciousness. I will suggest that what unites those two dimensions of the pre-reflective self can be best described not as a phenomenological unity but rather as a “dialectical” normative-functional unity, whose ultimate raison d’être is practical in nature.

Factors Associated With Psychosocial Functioning and Outcome of Individuals With Recent-Onset Schizophrenia and at Ultra-High Risk for Psychosis.

Background: Patients with schizophrenia have impairments in social functioning and are readmitted to healthcare institutions frequently. Individuals at ultra-high risk (UHR) for psychosis already present poor social functioning; among those individuals, the conversion rate from the putative prodromal phase to overt psychosis is 20%–30% within 1–2 years. Here, we analyzed the factor structure of self-related variables and neuro- and socio-cognitive function, and investigated whether these factors were associated with psychosocial function and prognostic outcome in individuals with recent-onset schizophrenia (ROSPR) or at UHR for psychosis. Methods: We evaluated 60 individuals at UHR for psychosis, 47 individuals with ROSPR, and 71 healthy controls using a comprehensive neurocognitive test battery and self-reported attribution scales, self-esteem, resilience, aberrant subjective experiences of schizotypy (physical anhedonia, social anhedonia, magical ideation, and perceptual aberration), and basic symptoms. We assessed psychosocial function with the Quality of Life Scale (QLS). Results: Factor analysis of all subjects revealed a four-factor structure comprising social-cognitive bias, reflective self, neurocognition, and pre-reflective self factors. Multiple regression analysis at baseline revealed that the factor structure predicted QLS. In the UHR group, social-cognitive bias, reflective self, neurocognition, and negative symptoms were significant determinants, explaining 38.0% of total QLS score variance. In the ROSPR group, reflective self and negative symptoms were significant determinants, explaining 54.4% of total QLS score variance. During follow-up, 13 individuals at UHR for psychosis developed psychosis (cumulative prevalence: 31.2% ± 7.6% at 6 years), with neurocognition score at baseline remaining a significant predictor of conversion [χ2(1) = 4.009, p = 0.045; hazard ratio 0.56, 95% confidence interval 0.31–0.99, p = 0.048]. Five patients with schizophrenia were (re)admitted during follow-up (cumulative prevalence: 16.1% ± 7.1% at 6 years); no factor was found to predict (re)admission. Conclusion: Factor analysis revealed an intrinsic four-factor structure of social-cognitive bias, reflective self, neurocognition, and pre-reflective self. The four factors were associated with social functioning at baseline and prodrome-to-psychosis conversion during follow-up, indicating the clinical significance of the four-factor structure. These findings provide a framework for understanding schizophrenia.

Pre-Reflective Self-Awareness in Psychotic Disorders

Disorders of the self figure prominently in psychotic experiences. Subjects de­scribe that “alien” thoughts are inserted in their mind by foreign powers, can sometimes hear their thoughts aloud or describe complex voices interacting with each other. Such experiences can be conceptualized in the framework of a Philosophical Anthropology, which suggests that human experience is characterized by centric and excentric positionality: subjects experience their environment centered around their enlived body and at the same time can reflect upon their place in a shared lifeworld from an excentric point of view. Pre-reflective self awareness has been suggested to ensure that subjects can identify their own thoughts or actions as belonging to themselves, even when they reflect upon them from an excentric point of view. This pre-reflective self awareness appears to be impaired during psychotic experiences, when subjects no longer identify thoughts in their own stream of consciousness as belonging to themselves and instead attribute them to an outside agent. Among several potential causes, it is suggested that such impairments can be due to discrimi­natory or traumatic experiences, which affect the enlived (centric) position of a person and make her feel encircled and deeply threatened by aversive powers. As a consequence, the afflicted individual may fundamentally distance herself from her current centric position in a hostile environment, at the price of experiencing her own thoughts or actions as alien. Philosophical Anthropology may thus help to explain how social exclusion, discrimination and traumatization can promote psychotic experiences and why social support is of primary importance for any treatment of psychosis.

Reflecting on Pre-Reflective Self-Consciousness

Most philosophers in the phenomenological tradition hold that in addition to the explicit self-consciousness we might get in reflection, there is also a pre-reflective self-consciousness. Despite its popularity, it can be a little difficult to get a grasp on this notion. It can seem impossibly thin—such that it really amounts to little more than a restatement of the notion of consciousness—or problematically robust—such that it seems to conflict with the apparent transparency of consciousness. This paper argues for a notion of pre-reflective self consciousness that avoids these extremes. It is argued that though pre-reflective self-consciousness exists and is an important part of conscious ex­perience, it is not an intrinsic feature of first-order consciousness. Instead, it is constituted by an agent’s background awareness of her ability to reflect and thereby self-ascribe her experiences.

The Pre-reflective Situational Self

It is often held that to have a conscious experience presupposes having some form of implicit self-awareness. The most dominant phenomenological view usually claims that we essentially perceive experiences as our own. This is the so called “mineness” character, or dimension of experience. According to this view, mineness is not only essential to conscious experience, it also grounds the idea that pre-reflective self-awareness constitutes a minimal self. In this paper, we show that there are reasons to doubt this constituting role of mineness. We argue that there are alternative possibilities and that the necessity for an adequate theory of the self within psychopathology gives us good reasons to believe that we need a thicker notion of the pre-reflective self. To this end, we develop such a notion: the Pre-Reflective Situational Self. To do so, we will first show how alternative conceptions of pre-reflective self-awareness point to philosophical problems with the standard phenomenological view. We claim that this is mainly due to fact that within the phenomenological account the mineness aspect is implicitly playing several roles. Consequently, we argue that a thin interpretation of pre-reflective self-awareness—based on a thin notion of mineness—cannot do its needed job within, at least within psychopathology. This leads us to believe that a thicker conception of pre-reflective self is needed. We, therefore, develop the notion of the pre-reflective situational self by analyzing the dynamical nature of the relation between self-awareness and the world, specifically through our interactive inhabitation of the social world.

Fragile Self and Malevolent Others: Biased Attribution Styles in Individuals at Ultra-High Risk for Psychosis.

ObjectiveBiased attribution styles of assigning hostile intention to innocent others and placing the blame were found in schizophrenia. Attribution styles in individuals at ultra-high risk (UHR) for psychosis, however, have been less studied especially for its association with various psychological factors. We investigated whether UHR individuals show increased hostility perception and blaming bias and explored the associations of these biased styles of attribution with the factor structure of multifaceted self-related psychological variables and neurocognitive performances. MethodsFifty-four UHR individuals and 80 healthy controls were assessed by evaluating resilience, self-perception, self-esteem, and aberrant subjective experiences of schizotypy (physical anhedonia, social anhedonia, magical ideation, and perceptual aberration), basic symptoms, and carrying out a comprehensive neurocognitive test battery. Attribution styles were assessed using the Ambiguous Intentions Hostility Questionnaire. ResultsUHR individuals, compared with normal controls, showed increased hostility perception and blaming bias. Factor analysis of self-related psychological variables and neurocognitive performances in the entire subject population showed a three-factor solution, which was designated as reflective self, pre-reflective self, and neurocognition. Multiple regression analysis in UHR individuals revealed that hostility perception bias was associated with reflective self and composite blame bias was associated with reflective and pre-reflective self. ConclusionThis study supports the emergence of attribution biases in the putative ‘prodromal’ phase of schizophrenia. The associations of biased attribution styles with multifaceted self-related psychological constructs suggest that psychosocial interventions for biased attribution styles in UHR individuals should focus not only on reflective self but also pre-reflective self-related psychological constructs.

Epistemic authority: a theory of trust, authority, and autonomy in belief

Introduction Chapter 1 The rejection of epistemic authority 1. Authority, equality, and self-reliance in the epistemic realm 2. The epistemological case for epistemic self-reliance 2.1 Mistrust of taking beliefs from others 2.2 Self-reliance and the nature of knowledge: Plato and Locke 2.3 Self-reliance and Cartesian doubt 3. The case from ethics: self-reliance and autonomy 4. Authority and autonomy in the intellectual domain 5. The value of reflective self-consciousness Chapter 2 Epistemic self-trust 1. The natural authority of the self 2. The natural desire for truth and the pre-reflective self 3. The desire for truth and the reflective self 4. Self-trust and the alternatives 5. The conscientious believer and the nature of reasons Chapter 3 Epistemic trust in others 1. Epistemic egoism 2. The need for trust in others 2.1. Why epistemic egoism is unreasonable 2.2. Epistemic egocentrism 3. Trust in others and the two kinds of reasons 3.1 The distinction between deliberative and theoretical reasons 3.2 The two kinds of reasons and parity between self and others 4. Epistemic universalism and common consent arguments Chapter 4 Trust in emotions 1. The rational inescapability of emotional self-trust 2. Trustworthy and untrustworthy emotions 3. Admiration and trust in exemplars 4. Trust in the emotions of others 5. Expanding the range of trust Chapter 5 Trust and epistemic authority 1. Authority in the realm of belief 2. The contours of epistemic authority: the principles of Joseph Raz 3. Pre-emption and evidence 4. The value of truth vs. the value of self-reliance Chapter 6 The authority of testimony 1. Conscientious testimony 2. Testimony and deliberative vs. theoretical reasons 3. Principles of the authority of testimony 4. Testimony as evidence and the authority of testimony 5. The parallel between epistemic and practical authority Chapter 7 Epistemic authority in communities 1. Epistemic authority and the limits of the political model 2. Authority in small communities 2.1 Justifying authority in small communities 2.2 Justifying epistemic authority in small communities 3. Communal epistemic authority 4. The epistemology of imperfection Chapter 8 Moral authority 1. The prima facie case for moral epistemic authority 2. Skepticism about moral authority 2.1 Skepticism about moral truth 2.2 Moral egalitarianism 2.3 Autonomy 3. Moral authority and the limits of testimony 3.1 Emotion and moral belief 3.2 Moral authority and understanding 4. Communal moral authority and conscience Chapter 9 Religious authority 1. Religious epistemic egoism 2. Religious epistemic universalism 3. Believing divine testimony 3.1 Faith and believing persons 3.2 Models of revelation 4. Conscientious belief and religious authority Chapter 10 Trust and disagreement 1. The antinomy of reasonable disagreement 2. Disagreement and deliberative vs. theoretical reasons 3. Self-trust and resolving disagreement 4. Communal epistemic egoism and disagreement between communities Chapter 11 Autonomy 1. The autonomous self 1.1 The norm of conscientious self-reflection 1.2 Autonomy from the inside and the outside 2. Attacks on the possibility of autonomy: Debunking self-trust 3. Epistemic authority from the outside 4. Self-fulfillment Bibliography Index

Pre-reflective and reflective self-reference: A spatiotemporal EEG analysis

Functional imaging studies consistently support the role of the medial prefrontal cortex to be a part of a functional network of reflective self-awareness. The current study introduces a new linguistic task which (1) directly compares self-reference and other-reference, and (2) separates pre-reflective from reflective aspects of self-awareness. Twenty-six healthy volunteers evaluated trait adjectives in reference to the self or a close friend while a continuous 30-channel EEG was recorded. Low-resolution brain electromagnetic tomography (LORETA) was used for statistical brain imaging. As expected, the direct comparison of self-reference to other-reference revealed the MPFC to be significant and strongly more active during the self-reference condition. Pre-reflective aspects of self seem to be implemented to a greater degree in the ventral, reflective aspects of the self in dorsal parts of the MPFC. In the pre-reflective self condition, brain areas that receive homeostatic afferents from somatic and visceral sensation of the body such as the insula and the somatosensory cortex were strongly activated as early as 134 ms after stimulus onset. The right inferior parietal lobe seems to be involved in self-referential processing in general.

On the neurodynamics of the creation of consciousness

Consciousness is expected to have a specific temporal dynamics. The COrollary Discharge of Attention Movement (CODAM) model of consciousness is deduced from an engineering approach to attention and motor attention. This model is briefly described, as is support arising from brain dynamics, especially that for the attentional blink. The understanding of known temporal dynamics in the brain associated with the emergence of consciousness is then developed from CODAM, and specifically related to the N2 ERP brain signal. How the pre-reflective self, as content-free, interacts with the content of experience is discussed in terms of the possibility that such experience arises from some proto-self generated by body signals; experiments are described which indicate that no pre-reflective self based on body signals is observable. Only a content-free pre-reflective self is consistent with this data, as CODAM suggests. How such a pre-reflective self can be further fused to give temporal continuity of a sense of self is considered in terms of various mechanisms which could be present for preserving the sense of self. The observation of the N2 signal in hippocampal encoding is proposed as providing a justification for the encoding of the N2-P3 sequence of brain signals. This would correspond to episodic encoding of the sequence of experiences of the pre-reflective self; this will thereby provide the necessary control signals in time so that 'I' is experienced as part of the retrieval of such memories.