Michael Graziano - Consciousness and the Social Brain
Book Page   Topic        
Graziano - Consciousness  11 Attention schema theory
Graziano - Consciousness  11 A specific network of brain areas in the cerebral cortex    is especially active during social thinking. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  14 To explain consciousness,    you must explain memory,    because calling up memories    gives me my self identity. 3
Graziano - Consciousness  14 How knowledge can be encoded in the brain is not fundamentally mysterious, but how we become aware of the information is. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  19 One of the only truths about awareness    that we can know with an objective certainty    is that we can say that we have it. 5
Graziano - Consciousness  19 How awareness emerges    from the brain    is unexplained. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  19 How awareness controls    the brain    is unexplained. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  19 The brain is an information processing device. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  22 Awareness is information.    It is a description of a perception-like feature.    It can be bound to other features    to help form an overarching description of an object. 3
Graziano - Consciousness  23 Awareness as a Sketch of Attention 1
Graziano - Consciousness  23 Attention is when one integrated set of signals    rises in strength   and outcompetes other signsls. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  23 Each signal can gain a boost    from a variety of sources.    Strong sensory input, coming from the outside, can boost a particular signal in the brain (a bottom-up bias),    or a high-level decision in the brain can boost a particular signal (a top-down bias). 0
Graziano - Consciousness  23 As a winning signal emerges    and suppresses competing signals,    as it shouts louder and causes the competition to hush,    it gains a larger influence over other processing in the brain. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  25 Attention is not data encoded in the brain;    it is a data handling method.    It is something the brain does,    a procedure,    an emergent process.    Signals compete with each other,    and a winner emerges. 2
Graziano - Consciousness  25 A schema is a coherent set of information that, in a simplified but useful way,    represent something more complex. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  25 Awareness is an Attention Schema. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  25 Awareness allows the brain to understand attention. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  25 According to the attention schema theory,    awareness is handled by the brain    like color.    Awareness and color are computed features.    They are representations.    They represent something physically real    – wavelength in the case of color,    attention in the case of awareness. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  25 The awareness feature can be bound to color    and to many other features    as the brain constructs    an overarching representation of an object. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  26 Cognitive access to the bound description    allows the brain to conclude and report not only that the object has this shape and that color, this motion and that location,    but that these properties come with awareness    fused to them. 1
Graziano - Consciousness  26 If the hypothesis is correct,    if awareness is a schema    that describes attention,    then we should be able to find similarities between awareness and attention. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  26 Graziano is suggesting a specific reason    why awareness and attention are so similar to each other;    the one is the brain’s schematic description    of the other.  0
Graziano - Consciousness  26 Awareness is a sketch of attention. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  27 It is possible to attend to a visual image by all behavioral measures, processing the picture in depth, and even responding to it, while being unaware of it.    (Daydreaming (awareness) while driving a car (attention) on a long trip.) 1
Graziano - Consciousness  27 Because attention and awareness can be dissociated,    we know that they are not the same thing.    But mismatches between them are rare. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  27 Awareness is evidently a close but imperfect    indicator of attention. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  30 The brain contains specialized machinery that computes a description of someone else's state of attention. It is part of the machinery for social thinking. 3
Graziano - Consciousness  30 Humans have an ability to monitor the gaze of others.    We know when other people are looking. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  31 The proposed attention schema can use gaze direction as a cue,    but does not necessarily do so.    It brings together a totality of evidence to constrain a rather rich and sophisticated model of someone else's attention. 1
Graziano - Consciousness  31 It can use the model of someone else's attention    to help understand    other people and predict their behavior. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  31 Graziano is proposing that the same machinery    used to model another persons attentional state in a social situation    is also used to model one's own attentional state. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  32 All three proposed attention schema properties    overlap    in a region of the cerebral cortex that lies just above the ear, with the relative emphasis on the right side of the brain. 1
Graziano - Consciousness  33 Within the proposed brain region, two adjacent areas have been studied most intensively. They are the superior temporal sulcus (STS) and the temporal-Laredo Junction (TP J). 1
Graziano - Consciousness  33 These areas are probably themselves collections of smaller, specialized subunits that presumably work in a cooperative fashion    and interact with larger, brain-wide networks. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  33 These areas are recruited during social perception. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  33 These areas    track one's own state of attention. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  33 Damage to these areas    leads to a devastating clinical disruption of awareness. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  37 The theory that awareness is an extension schema. 4
Graziano - Consciousness  59 The heart of the attention schema theory    is that awareness is a schematized descriptive model of attention. 22
Graziano - Consciousness  60 Attention can be understood at least partly through a theoretical framework called bias competition. 1
Graziano - Consciousness  60 This competition can be influenced by a variety of signals. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  60 One type of signal is called bottom-up. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  61 A second type of signal is called top-down. 1
Graziano - Consciousness  61 The combination of top-down and bottom-up signals    will bias the competition in favor of one or the other    stimulus representation. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  61 Once a sensory representation has won the competition    and the signal strength is boosted,    that representation is much more likely    to drive the behavior of the animal. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  128 The classical syndromes of social impairment,    including autism,    social anxiety disorder,    schizoid personality disorder,    and sociopathic personality type,    are not generally associated    with a derangement of conscious experience. 67
Graziano - Consciousness  129 A person could be socially impaired in half a dozen ways    and have no loss of awareness. 1
Graziano - Consciousness  129 A difficulty in recognizing faces, and reading people's expressions, and judging emotions, and reconstructing someone else's thoughts or beliefs, and empathy, or following social norms, and feeling uncomfortable in the crowd – none of these difficulties should have any particular relationship to a reduction in awareness. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  129 In the attention schema theory, there is no reason to suppose that autistic people,   or schizoid people,    or shy people    or psychopathic  malefactors,    or any other people with social disabilities    are any less conscious than the rest of us. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  129 Damage to the attention schema    should disrupt one's own awareness    and disrupt a specific part of social intelligence,    the ability to track or understand    other people's attention. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  131 Attention is a data handling method. 2
Graziano - Consciousness  131 Attention does operate on information;    it enhances some informational representations in the brain    while inhibiting others. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  131 Attention is an emergent property;    it emerges from the competition among signals in the brain. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  131 Attention is not itself information.    It is something that happens to information. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  131 In the attention schema theory, the brain constructs an informational model    to usefully represent the process of attention. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  131 We become aware of information,    that awareness emerges from information,    that awareness operates on information,    or that awareness is a state under which information enters. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  141 The parietal cortex    is one of the main integrative hubs      in the brain. 10
Graziano - Consciousness  143 According to the attention schema theory, the brain constructs    a constantly shifting,    constantly updated information model    of schema A. 2
Graziano - Consciousness  144 The attention schema A acts like a hub.    It is a nexus    at the center of a vast set of bound information,    represented in diverse brain  areas,    that makes up the contents of consciousness. 1
Graziano - Consciousness  144 Because of the involvement of a large bound set of information    that spans the brain,    the attention schema theory is a type of integrated information theory. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  145 In attention schema theory,    consciousness is not integrated information per se.    Rather we are conscious of information    that is integrated with an attention schema. 1
Graziano - Consciousness  152 In the attention schema theory,    consciousness does not emerge from information,    but instead it is information.    It is information that describes the process    of attending to something. 7
Graziano - Consciousness  152 In the case of visual consciousness, the brain binds together    information about the visual image (V)  that is being attended,    information about the agent (S) performing the attention,    and a schema (A) or information structure, that roughly represents the dynamics and implications of attention.  0
Graziano - Consciousness  152 A brain-spanning representation is formed, S+A+V. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  152 Something else is computing the consciousness part    of visual consciousness,    the awareness,    the A part of S+A+V. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  152 If the attention schema theory is correct,    the visual circuitry by itself will not provide the answer to visual consciousness.    Something else is computing that consciousness part of visual consciousness,    the awareness,    the A part of    S+A+V. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  155 Blindsight 3
Graziano - Consciousness  155 When the primary visual cortex is damaged, such as from a stroke, people report that they are blind in the affected part of the visual space. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  159 If the attention schema theory is correct,    then at the center of awareness    lies a computed and constantly recomputed    informational model,    the attention schema. 4
Graziano - Consciousness  159 The human brain uses a model of this type, an attention schema,    to model and predict the behavior of other people. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  159 By hypothesis, the brain could use the same machinery    to compute a model of its own attentional state,    to help predict and guide its own behavior. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  161 The remarkable results from the monkey brain    were extended to the human brain, mainly by scanning people using an MRI. 2
Graziano - Consciousness  161 A region of the human cortex    responds more strongly    to the site of faces then to others objects. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  161 A fold in the cortex called the superior temporal sulcus (STS) is a particular hotspot of social processing in the human brain. It seems to correspond to the monkey STP both in its function and its location in the brain. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  162 The STS cortical area becomes active when a person sees or thinks about the intentional actions of other people, such as hand actions, or changes in gaze direction, or facial expressions. 1
Graziano - Consciousness  162 One aspect of social cognition is termed "theory of mind", which refers to the ability of a person to construct a model theory    about the contents of someone else's mind. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  164 If the attention schema theory is correct,    if awareness is an attention schema,    then this schema might be constructed    mainly in one brain area,    or it might be constructed    by a more complex interaction among many brain areas. 2
Graziano - Consciousness  164 The brain’s informational model of the physical body,    of its shape and movement,    can be roughly attributed    to a specific set of brain structures. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  164 Perhaps we have some hope of finding    an approximate area    or set of areas in the brain    for the attention schema. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  164 The MPFC is active when people focus on their own thoughts and emotions. It is a set of interconnected brain regions that are active during quiet, introspective thought, such as when people are daydreaming, or replaying memories. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  166 The attention schema may be computed in some map-like way,  as are so many of the properties of the brain. 2
Graziano - Consciousness  177 A region of the brain,    encompassing the temporal parietal junction (TPJ) and the superior temporal sulcus (STS),    is active during social thinking. 11
Graziano - Consciousness  177 The TPJ and STS brain regions    are recruited    when people think about    other people's minds. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  177 Yet this same general region of the brain,    when damaged,    can cause a devastating disruption    in one's own awareness of the world.    It can cause clinical neglect. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  177 The overlap of these two properties    suggested a deep connection    between social thinking and awareness. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  177 It suggested that just as we use our social intelligence    to attribute awareness to someone else,    we may also attribute awareness to ourselves. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  177 Awareness itself may be at construct    computed by some part of the social machinery. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  177 Over the past decades, the possible relationship    between social perception and clinical neglect    has been ignored. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  178 Attention is a competition among signas in the brain. 1
Graziano - Consciousness  178 Competition fluctuates    as various signals rise up      and then sink down again    to give play to other signasls. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  178 Attention can be guided by specific control signals in the brain. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  178 These control signals    do not entirely dictate    the state of attention.    Instead, they bias it. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  178 The biasing signal that help to guide attention    are generated mainly in the parietal and frontal lobes,    and the so-called parietal-frontal attention network. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  178 When a person's attention    was shifted to a new location,    especially to a sudden or unexpected stimulus,    the brain showed elevated activity    it is set of areas including the TBJ,   some parts of the STS,    and a region in the lower part of the frontal lobe. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  178 The brain activity    was strongest    in the right hemisphere. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  179 Bodily attention is an important part    of modeling a mind. 1
Graziano - Consciousness  179 The cortex    is generally organized by functional proximity.    Similar or related functions    tend to be processed near each other. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  179 When people reminisce,    recalling specific memories from their own past lives,    a widespread set of brain areas    is typically active,    among them consistently the TPJ. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  180 Apparent involvement of the TPJ with autobiographical memory. 1
Graziano - Consciousness  180 In the attention schema theory,    awareness is a constructed feature,    a model of information,    that can be bound to other information    in the brain. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  180 One type of information particularly relevant to consciousness    is self-knowledge. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  180 Autobiographical memory helps to define your sense of personhood    and your sense of continuity through time. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  180 In the attention schema theory,    autobiographical memories are not a part of awareness itself,    but they can be linked to awareness. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  180 Autobiographical memories help define the "I" in "I am aware of X." 0
Graziano - Consciousness  181 A large set of functions had been attributed to the TPJ and STS    in the right hemisphere,    especially to the TPJ. 1
Graziano - Consciousness  181 The TPJ is involved in social cognition,    especially in reconstructing the beliefs of other people. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  181 The STS is also involved    in some aspects of social perception. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  181 The TEJ and STS become active    when you switch attention    to a new item. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  181 Damage to the DPJ and STS    on the right side of the brain    can sometimes lead to a profound neglect    of everything on the left side of space. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  181 This neglect,    caused by TPJ and STS damage,    is the most devastating derangement of awareness    known in the clinical literature. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  181 The TPJ    is involved in computing    the spatial locus of one's own mind. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  181 The TPJ is consistently recruited    when people recall autobiographical memories. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  182 The brain uses the process of attention    in order to sort data,    to focus on some signals    at the expense of other signals. 1
Graziano - Consciousness  182 The attention schema is a descriptive model of attention. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  182 The descriptive model of attention    is used in social perception    to monitor and predict    someone else's state of attention,    and in effect attributing awareness to another person. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  182 The descriptive model of attention    is also used to model one's own attention,    in effect attributing awareness to oneself. 0
Graziano - Consciousness  186 Rizzolatti and colleagues first discovered mirror neurons in the premotor cortex of macaque monkeys. 4
Graziano - Consciousness  197 Graziano was brought up in the scientific and  atheistic fold and still considers himself a scientist first and atheists second. 11
Graziano - Consciousness  198 To talk about spirituality or religion to a room full of scientists, you are expected to start with a disclaimer. 1
Graziano - Consciousness  208 In the attention schema theory,    awareness is a model of attention. 10
Graziano - Consciousness  210 If you perceive consciousness in someone,    then you empathize and cooperate. 2
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