ArticleCurrent research in neurobiology2022
An active inference model of conscious access: How cognitive action selection reconciles the results of report and no-report paradigms.
Article in Current research in neurobiology, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 9 papers.
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Who cites it
9 citing papers in PubMed.
- The role of affective states in computational psychiatry.The international journal of neuropsychopharmacology · 2025Review
- The role of active inference in conscious awareness.PloS one · 2025Article
- Conscious active inference I: A quantum model naturally implements the path integral needed for real-time planning and control.Computational and structural biotechnology journal · 2025Review
- Anterior insular activity signals perceptual conflicts induced by temporal and spatial context.Neuroscience of consciousness · 2025Article
- Methodological issues in consciousness research: theory comparison, the role of empirical evidence, and a replication crisis.Frontiers in psychology · 2025Article
- How do inner screens enable imaginative experience? Applying the free-energy principle directly to the study of conscious experience.Neuroscience of consciousness · 2025Article
- Transdiagnostic failure to adapt interoceptive precision estimates across affective, substance use, and eating disorders: A replication and extension of previous results.Biological psychology · 2024Article
- A step-by-step tutorial on active inference and its application to empirical data.Journal of mathematical psychology · 2022Article
- From Generative Models to Generative Passages: A Computational Approach to (Neuro) Phenomenology.Review of philosophy and psychology · 2022Article
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3 authors.
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Abstract
Cognitive theories of consciousness, such as global workspace theory and higher-order theories, posit that frontoparietal circuits play a crucial role in conscious access. However, recent studies using no-report paradigms have posed a challenge to cognitive theories by demonstrating conscious accessibility in the apparent absence of prefrontal cortex (PFC) activation. To address this challenge, this paper presents a computational model of conscious access, based upon active inference, that treats working memory gating as a cognitive action. We simulate a visual masking task and show that late P3b-like event-related potentials (ERPs), and increased PFC activity, are induced by the working memory demands of self-report generation. When reporting demands are removed, these late ERPs vanish and PFC activity is reduced. These results therefore reproduce, and potentially explain, results from no-report paradigms. However, even without reporting demands, our model shows that simulated PFC activity on visible stimulus trials still crosses the threshold for reportability - maintaining the link between PFC and conscious access. Therefore, our simulations show that evidence provided by no-report paradigms does not necessarily contradict cognitive theories of consciousness.
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Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.