Consciousness and Cognition

Previous research has shown that the eyes pupils are larger when imaging dark as compared to bright objects or scenes. Based on this, it has been claimed that pupil size is a sensitive marker of mental-imagery vividness. We investigated this claim in three experiments, conducted in two countries (Norway and The Netherlands; Ntotal = 115), in which participants read, listened, or freely imagined stories that evoked a sense of darkness or brightness. In addition, participants rated their imagery vividness after each story, as a measure of moment-to-moment fluctuations in imagery; and their imagery vividness in general, as a measure of individual differences in imagery. Overall, we found that darkness-evoking stories induced larger pupils than brightness-evoking stories, although this effect was highly variable and only statistically reliable for longer (> 1 min) audio stories. Importantly, we consistently found that this pupil-size difference (dark - bright) was largest for vividly imagined stories. Finally, we did not find any relationship between this pupil-size difference and individual differences in general in imagery. We conclude that the strength of pupil-size changes in response to imagined darkness or brightness reflects moment-to-moment fluctuations in imagery vividness within an individual rather than individual differences in imagery vividness as a personal trait.

Research on mental visual imagery typically relies on vividness ratings. However, vividness is ill-defined as it lacks an objective reference. Here, we present survey results that suggest vividness is nevertheless a robust measure. It explains individual differences of a broad range of subjective experiences, from the detail of mental imagery, the propensity to report having other internally generated visual experiences, and the vividness of visual dreams. Critically, simple vividness ratings can replace the protracted questionnaires commonly used for this purpose and reduce methodological issues with these instruments. We further find that vividness is closely linked with the experience of "seeing" mental images or projecting them into the external world. People who report seeing mental images with their eyes shut are also more likely to experience externally projected imagery. Nevertheless, many people report having mental depictions but without seeing. Overall, our results indicate we should redefine visual aphantasia to distinguish individuals with faint or unseen visual images from those completely lacking a pictorial representation.

Plant Awareness Disparity (PAD) refers to the inability of humans to notice plants and recognize their importance. Among the various factors (e.g., cultural) contributing to PAD, the less prominent visual cues of plants (e.g., color) might be one of the main features making them less noticeable to human perception. Here, we investigated whether PAD affects basic numerosity perception, which represents a fundamental cognitive ability that allows individuals to interpret and interact with their surroundings. Across three experiments, we compared how participants perceive the numerosity of plants (specifically trees), animals, and minerals. Participants completed two tasks: an estimation task, in which they reported the exact number of items in a single set and a comparison task, which required them to discriminate numerosity between two sets of items. In Experiment 1, both tasks employed colored images. We hypothesized that participants would underestimate the number of plant items in comparison to animals and minerals, given that plant stimuli typically attract less attention. In Experiment 2, black and white images were used to test whether the green color of plants contributes to PAD. In Experiment 3, all items were rotated of 180{degrees} to disrupt semantic recognition and assess whether PAD arises from higher-level cognitive processes. Results revealed a consistent underestimation of plants in Experiment 1 and 2, but this effect diminished in Experiment 3. The reduction of this effect suggests that semantic recognition processes may contribute to PAD. These results highlight how cognitive biases toward plants can influence basic perceptual judgments essential for everyday functioning.

The transformative effects of interpersonal synchrony on reshaping the relationship between the self and the group by fostering self-other blurring are well-documented. However, these findings largely rely on self-reported measures, leaving aspects of the self inaccessible to explicit measures unexplored. We combined the Implicit Association Task (IAT) with conventional explicit evaluations of self-other blurring to examine how experiences of synchronous movement may also swiftly shape implicit measures indicative of self-other blurring. In three online experiments participants experienced synchronous movement as opposed to no movement (Experiment 1) or unpredictable movement (Experiment 2) or asynchronous movement (Experiment 3) with virtually presented agents. Our data indicate that synchronous movement led to higher levels of self-other blurring on the Inclusion of Other in Self (IOS) scale and implicit self-concept evaluations on the IAT. Participants demonstrated a preference for associating self-related words with images of the synchronous group, while associating other-related words with images from the no-movement, unpredictable, and asynchronous movement groups. This suggests that experiencing synchronous movement with a group influences implicit semantic self-associations. These findings suggest that interpersonal synchrony may alter self-concept at both an embodied and semantic level, extending beyond conscious affiliation. Our combined methodology offers a deeper insight into the impact of synchronous experiences on self-constructs and social relationships.

The study of mindfulness proceeds from a number of perspectives. Two of the best-known academic conceptualizations of mindfulness are those identified with Kabat-Zinn and Langer. These conceptions, meditative and socio-cognitive, have been built from different foundations and have been argued to be quite distinct. However, Hart, Ivtzan and Hart 1 suggested that self-regulation of attention is a mediator between the two. To put this hypothesis to a test, a convenience sample of participants (n = 208) were asked to complete the Five Facet Mindfulness Questionnaire (FFMQ), Langer Mindfulness Scale (LMS), and the Self-Regulation Scale (SRS), a measure of the self-regulation of attention. These three dispositional measures were shown to be correlated. Self-regulation passes a statistical test for partial mediation of the relationship between the two measures of mindfulness. This suggests that reliance on the capacity to regulate attention in pursuit of a goal is shared by these two approaches to mindfulness. However, there is no clear conceptual basis for mediation in either particular direction. Further, the correlation between the LMS and FFMQ is highest for those with the highest SRS scores; we discuss the implications for conceptual distinctions within mindfulness.

Traditionally, consciousness studies focus on domain general cognitive processes rather than on specific information reaching subjective awareness. The present study (N = 45) used visual masking and whole-body images to investigate whether the specific emotional expression as well as gender of the stimuli and of the participants impact awareness. Our results show that participants awareness responses reflect differences in the specific emotion of the stimuli, that these differences are a function of the gender of the stimuli as well as the gender of the participants and that minimal awareness may be associated with emotion specific features of the body images. Overall, we observed that threatening expressions are more easily detected than fearful ones, especially by males presented with male stimuli. Our findings underscore the importance of affective factors for theories of consciousness and underscore the significance of gender differences in emotional processing, often overlooked in past face and body emotion recognition studies.

Allostatic self-efficacy (ASE) represents a computational theory of fatigue and depression. In brief, it postulates that (i) fatigue is a feeling state triggered by a metacognitive diagnosis of loss of control over bodily states (persistently elevated interoceptive surprise); and that (ii) generalisation of low self-efficacy beliefs beyond bodily control induces depression. Here, we convert ASE theory into a structural causal model (SCM). This allows for identification of empirically testable hypotheses regarding casual relationships between variables of interest. We use conditional independence tests on questionnaire data from healthy volunteers (N=60) to identify contradictions to the proposed SCM. Moreover, we estimate two causal effects proposed by ASE theory using three different methods. Our analyses suggest that, in healthy volunteers, the data are not fully compatible with the proposed SCM. We therefore refine the SCM and present an updated version for future research. Second, we confirm the predicted negative average causal effect from metacognition of allostatic control to fatigue across all three different methods of estimation. Our study represents an initial attempt to refine and formalise ASE theory using methods from causal inference. Our results confirm key predictions from the ASE theory but also suggest revisions which require empirical verification in future studies.

Research on emotional factors and mental health in higher education has gained traction. Much attention has focused on first-year students as a potentially at-risk group, though some studies suggest that all students might face similar risks. This study examines differences between junior and senior undergraduates in terms of mentalizing, emotion regulation (ER), and psychological mindedness. These constructs relate to understanding ones own and others mental states, potentially mediating the relationship between attachment and epistemic trust (ET). The current study includes 460 undergraduate students, most of whom are female (96%). Results show that senior students score higher on reappraisal, certainty, and interest/curiosity compared to junior students. However, these factors did not mediate the relationship between anxious attachment orientation and ET. Certainty and interest/curiosity mediated the relationship between avoidant attachment orientation and ET, suggesting similar mediation patterns for junior and senior students. On the other hand, suppression and uncertainty/confusion were critical mediators in the relationship between insecure (anxious and avoidant) attachment orientations and epistemic trust. These findings are discussed within the framework of attachment and mentalizing literature, along with relevant connections to educational studies.

Perfectionism as a personality trait can be seen as having both adaptive and maladaptive dimensions. Nevertheless, their relationships with psychological distress remain mixed in the current literature. Previous studies were also limited by the use of impure measurements and the failure to statistically control for the effects of the other dimension. By addressing these major limitations and exploring the mediating and moderating roles of self-esteem and self-compassion, the current study provides an in-depth examination of the relationships between bidimensional perfectionism and psychological distress. In a community sample of 503 adults, results supported a bidimensional view of perfectionism, with maladaptive perfectionism positively predicting psychological distress and adaptive perfectionism being unrelated to psychological distress. Self-esteem was found to mediate the relationships between both dimensions of perfectionism and psychological distress. Self-compassion was only found to moderate the relationship between maladaptive perfectionism and self-esteem. Whilst the maladaptive nature of maladaptive perfectionism was supported in this study, findings suggested that adaptive perfectionism remains a more complicated construct. Future studies should aim at clarifying the nature and psychological outcomes of adaptive perfectionism.

When measuring memory performance for emotional and neutral stimuli many studies are confounded by not controlling for differential semantic relatedness between stimulus sets. This could lead to the misattribution of the cause of an emotional enhancement of memory effect (EEM), because differential semantic relatedness also contributes to the EEM. Participants rated static visual emotional and neutral scenes on measures of arousal, valence, and semantic relatedness. These measures were used to create a novel stimulus set, which - in addition to demonstrating significant differences in measures of valence and arousal - also controlled for within-set semantic relatedness; thus resolving a crucial issue that has not previously been addressed in the use of visual emotional stimuli. As an added advantage, the stimulus set developed here are controlled for measures of objective visual complexity, also implicated as confounding to the investigation of memory. This article introduces a collection of emotional and neutral colour images which can be organised flexibly according to experimental requirements. These stimuli are made freely available for non-commercial use within the scientific community.

BackgroundPrior research has shown that belief in conspiracy theories (CTs) is associated with individual narcissism, encompassing both grandiosity and vulnerability. Initial evidence suggests that this link is mediated by mistrust and suspicion towards others, alongside rigid belief systems such as odd beliefs, fatalism, or delusions. ObjectiveWithin the Epistemic Trust (ET) framework, this study examined whether the narcissism-conspiracy link is accounted for by epistemic stances of mistrust and rigidity formed developmentally. MethodsA cross-sectional design was used, with self-report data from 417 UK-based adults from the non-clinical population. Pathological narcissism, assessed via the Pathological Narcissism Inventory (PNI), was modelled as the independent variable, and conspiracy mentality, assessed with the Conspiracy Mentality Questionnaire (CMQ), as the dependent variable. Epistemic mistrust (Epistemic Trust, Mistrust, and Credulity Questionnaire; ETMCQ) and epistemic rigidity (Epistemic Vice Scale; EVS) were tested as mediators. Structural equation modelling (SEM) with latent variables was conducted. ResultsSEM indicated that epistemic mistrust and rigidity fully mediated the effect of narcissism on conspiracy mentality, accounting for 20% of the variance. This mediation pattern held for overall narcissism as well as the grandiosity and vulnerability subdimensions. ConclusionsThe influence of subclinical narcissistic traits on conspiracy mentality appears to operate via mistrust and rigidity in epistemic stance. For narcissistic individuals, these may function as defensive strategies to shield their belief systems from external challenge by disengaging from social input. The findings highlight the importance of communication strategies, informed by the ET framework, that promote openness and cognitive flexibility in individuals with heightened narcissism who endorse conspiratorial beliefs.

Hallucinatory experiences, defined as perception in the absence of external stimuli, can occur in both pathological and non-pathological states and can be broadly phenomenologically divided into those of a simple and a complex nature. Non-pathological visual hallucinations can be induced experimentally using a variety of stimulation conditions. To assess whether these techniques drive a shared underlying hallucinatory mechanism, despite these differences, we compared two methods: flicker and perceptual deprivation (Ganzfeld). Specifically, we measured the frequency and complexity of the hallucinations produced by these techniques. We utilised button press, retrospective drawing, interviews, and questionnaires to quantify hallucinatory experience in 20 participants. With both experimental techniques, we found that simple hallucinations were more common than complex hallucinations. We also found that on average, flicker was more effective than Ganzfeld at eliciting a higher number of hallucinations, though Ganzfeld hallucinations were longer than flicker hallucinations. There was no interaction between experimental condition and hallucination complexity, suggesting that the increased bottom-up visual input in flicker increased both simple and complex hallucinations similarly. A correlation was observed between the total proportional time spent hallucinating in flicker and Ganzfeld, which was replicated in a retrospective questionnaire measure of experienced intensity, suggesting a shared hallucinatory mechanism between the two methodologies. We attribute these findings to a shared low-level core hallucinatory mechanism, such as excitability of visual cortex, which is amplified in flicker compared to Ganzfeld due to heightened bottom-up input.

Numerous studies have found an association between attachment-related anxiety and social anxiety. However, none have investigated the potential role of the internal working model of the self in explaining this relationship. The purposes of this study were to replicate the finding that attachment-related anxiety and social anxiety are associated, and to test whether the internal working model of the self mediated this relationship. The internal working model of the self was operationalised by measuring self-esteem. It was hypothesised that attachment-related anxiety, self-esteem, and social anxiety would be intercorrelated, and that self-esteem would mediate the relationship between attachment-related anxiety and social anxiety. A sample of 63 adults (79.4% female) was recruited through social media, University course groups, and snowball sampling. Participants completed an online survey that consisted of a reduced version of the anxiety subscale of the Experiences in Close Relationships-Revised Scale, the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale, and the Social Interaction Anxiety Scale. Ethical approval was given by the University of Edinburgh School of Health in Social Science Research Ethics Committee. Pearson correlation tests showed that attachment-related anxiety, self-esteem, and social anxiety were intercorrelated. A mediation analysis conducted using the PROCESS v4.0 macro for SPSS, found that the indirect effect of attachment-related anxiety on social anxiety through self-esteem was significant. This finding is congruent with a theoretical account linking attachment-related anxiety to social anxiety through the mediating role of the internal working model of the self.

Correctly evaluating others pain is a crucial prosocial ability, especially relevant for the healthcare system. In clinical settings, caregivers assess their patients pain under high workload and fatigue, often while dealing with competing information/tasks. However, the effect played by such cognitive strain in the appraisal of others pain remains unclear. Following embodied accounts that posit a shared representational code between self and others states, it could be hypothesized that the representation of peoples pain might be influenced by cognitive exertion similarly to first-hand experiences. Fifty participants underwent one of two demanding tasks, involving either working memory (Experiment 1: N-Back task) or cognitive interference (Experiment 2: Stroop task). After each task, participants were exposed to painful laser stimulations at three intensity levels (low, medium, high), or video-clips of patients experiencing three intensity levels of pain (low, medium, high). Participants rated the intensity of each pain event on a visual analogue scale. We found that the two tasks influenced rating of both ones own and others pain, by decreasing the sensitivity to medium and high events. This was observed either when comparing the demanding condition to a control (Stroop), or when modelling linearly the difficulty/performance of each depleting task (N-Back). We provide converging evidence that cognitive exertion affects the subsequent appraisal of ones own and likewise others pain. Healthcare personnel should be aware that high workload might alter their cognitive abilities. Perspectivethis research shows that cognitive effort aftereffects impact negatively the assessment of of medium/high pain in others, reminiscently to what was observed in first-hand experiences. Healthcare professionals should be aware that high workload and severe cognitive fatigue could affect their diagnostic skills.

Touch can give rise to different sensations including sensory, emotional and social aspects. Tactile pleasure typically associated with caress-like skin stroking of slow velocities (1-10 cm/s) has been hypothesised to relate to an unmyelinated, slow-conducting C-tactile afferent system (CT system), developed to distinguish affective touch from the noise of other tactile information on hairy skin (the so-called social touch hypothesis). However, to date, there is no psychometric examination of the discriminative and metacognitive processes that contribute to accurate awareness of pleasant touch stimuli. Over two studies (total N= 194), we combined for the first time CT stimulation with signal detection theory and metacognitive measurements to assess the social touch hypothesis on the role of the CT system in affective touch discrimination. Participants ability to accurately discriminate pleasantness of tactile stimuli of different velocities, as well as their response bias, was assessed using a force-choice task (high versus low pleasantness response) on two different skin sites: forearm (CT-skin) and palm (non-CT skin). We also examined whether such detection accuracy was related to the confidence in their decision (metacognitive sensitivity). Consistently with the social touch hypothesis, we found higher sensitivity d on the forearm versus the palm, indicating that people are better at discriminating between stimuli of high and low tactile pleasantness on a skin site that contains CT afferents. Strikingly, we also found more negative response bias on the forearm versus the palm, indicating a tendency to experience all stimuli on CT-skin as high-pleasant, with such effects depending on order, likely to be explained by prior touch exposure. Finally, we found that people have greater confidence in their ability to discriminate between affective touch stimuli on CT innervated skin than on non-CT skin, possibly relating to the domain specificity of CT touch hence suggesting a domain-specific, metacognitive hypothesis that can be explored in future studies as an extension of the social touch hypothesis.\n\nHighlightsO_LITouch mediated by C-tactile (CT) afferents on hairy skin elicits pleasant sensations\nC_LIO_LIWe combine for the first time CT stimulation with signal detection theory\nC_LIO_LIBetter accuracy to detect pleasantness of tactile stimuli at CT optimal speeds on CT skin\nC_LIO_LIHigher confidence in ability to accurately distinguish affective touch on CT skin\nC_LI

To some extent, humans can re-experience the sensations of past events and pre-experience the future. These capacities are inter-related. But there are substantial individual differences. At the extremes, small minorities of people report that they either cannot have imagined experiences at all, or that their imagined sensations are as real to them as their actual experiences of the physical world. We wanted to know if such individual differences are uniform across different types of imagined experience (e.g. vision, audio, taste and smell), or if people generally have idiosyncratic patterns of different types (vision, audio, taste and smell) of imagined experiences. We find that people report having idiosyncratic diets of different types of imagined sensation, characterised by differences in salience. One person might have more salient imagined visual than taste experiences, while another reports the reverse. Moreover, these propensities are consistent across peoples attempts to re-experience the past, and to pre-experience the future, and they predict peoples experience and usage of different types of imagined sensation in their everyday lives.

According to predictive processing theories, emotional inference involves simultaneously minimising discrepancies between predictions and sensory data relating to both ones own and others states, achievable by altering either ones own state (empathy) or perception of anothers state (egocentric bias) so they are more congruent. We tested a key hypothesis of these accounts, that predictions are weighted in inference according to their precision (inverse variance). If correct, more precise self-related predictions should bias perception of anothers emotional expression to a greater extent than less precise predictions. We manipulated predictions about upcoming own-pain (low or high magnitude) using cues that afforded either precise (a narrow range of possible magnitudes) or imprecise (a wide range) predictions. Participants judged pained facial expressions presented concurrently with own-pain to be more intense when own-pain was greater, and precise cues increased this biasing effect. Implications of conceptualising interpersonal influence in terms of predictive processing are discussed.

The softness of objects can be perceived through several senses. For instance, to judge the softness of our cats fur, we do not only look at it, we also run our fingers in idiosyncratic ways through its coat. Recently, we have shown that haptically perceived softness covaries with the compliance, viscosity, granularity, and furriness of materials (Dovencioglu et al.,2020). However, it is unknown whether vision can provide similar information about the various aspects of perceived softness. Here, we investigated this question in an experiment with three conditions: in the haptic condition, blindfolded participants explored materials with their hands, in the visual-static condition participants were presented with close-up photographs of the same materials, and in the visual-dynamic condition participants watched videos of the hand-material interactions that were recorded in the haptic condition. After haptically or visually exploring the materials participants rated them on various attributes. Our results show a high overall perceptual correspondence between the three experimental conditions. With a few exceptions, this correspondence tended to be strongest between haptic and visual-dynamic conditions. These results are discussed with respect to information potentially available through the senses, or through prior experience, when judging the softness of materials.

BackgroundVisual mental imagery or "seeing with the minds eye" is an everyday phenomenon. Visual mental imagery and visual perception share common neural-networks. Hence deficits that affect the visual perception may also affect visual mental imagery. AimWe aimed to study the effect of refractive blur on the vividness of mental imagery. MethodsSubjects were recruited from volunteers and divided into two groups; individuals with refractive errors-Ametropes(AM), and individuals without refractive errors - Emmetropes(EM). After filling in the Verbalizer-Visualizer-Questionnaire (VVQ), the subjects were asked to perform a mental imagery task with and without refractive blur. The participants were asked to generate a mental image of a specific object initially with eyes closed, eyes open and then with refractive blur in random order, and then judge the vividness of the mental image on a Likert scale ranging from 1 (low vividness) to 5 (good vividness). The EM participants had to wear a + 2D spectacles to produce refractive blur. ResultsA total of 162 participants were recruited to the study. Of these 73 were EM and 89 were AM. Of the AM, 30 had additional astigmatism. The mean VVQ score was 64.9(11.2). The mean refractive error was 1.8(1.3)D. Following the mental imagery task, at baseline with eyes closed, 138 (85.5%)subjects had vivid mental imagery close to visual perception(Likert scale:5). With the opening of the eyes, the vividness dropped by at least 1 point in the Likert scale in 139(85.8%). With the introduction of refractive blur, 153(94.4%) subjects had a drop in the vividness of the image by at least 1 point and 22(13.6%) subjects by at least 2 points. ConclusionIntroduction of refractory blur results in the reduction of the vividness of mental imagery.

Virtual Reality (VR) applications depend on eliciting spatial presence, the subjective experience of being physically located within a virtual environment. Although individual differences have long been theorised to contribute to this experience, their role in highly immersive VR systems remains contested. The present study investigated whether trait absorption predicts spatial presence and whether this relationship is mediated by attention allocation. Seventy participants (44 female, 26 male; M age = 22.90, SD = 4.88) completed a 6-minute VR session using a Meta Quest 3 Head-Mounted Display and validated self-report measures of trait absorption (Tellegen Absorption Scale), attention allocation, and spatial presence (MEC-Spatial Presence Questionnaire). Path analysis confirmed a significant, complete mediation pathway: trait absorption positively predicted attention allocation ({beta} = 0.27, p = .013), which in turn strongly predicted spatial presence ({beta} = 0.54, p < .001). The direct path from absorption to spatial presence was non-significant ({beta} = 0.11, p = .325), indicating complete mediation. The indirect effect was significant ({beta} = 0.15; 95% BCa CI [0.025, 0.291]). The model explained a sizeable 33.8% of the variance in spatial presence (Cohens f{superscript 2} = 0.51). Post-hoc dose-response analysis revealed that trait absorption acts as a cognitive amplifier: the strength of the attention-presence relationship tripled from low-absorption ({beta} = 0.33, R{superscript 2} = .15) to high-absorption individuals ({beta} = 1.00, R{superscript 2} = .56). These findings demonstrate that individual differences remain important in highly immersive VR by modulating the effectiveness of attentional focus, offering promising directions for tailoring VR interventions.