Primary states of consciousness: A review of historical and contemporary developments

Schoeller, Félix

doi:10.1016/j.concog.2023.103536

Cited by 8 publications

(10 citation statements)

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“…Dopamine's role in reward prediction error processing is essential for adapting and relearning emotional responses [50], particularly in the context of positive experiences [51] with increased dopamine levels associated with positive affect and enhanced cognitive flexibility [52]. The potent dopaminergic response elicited by aesthetic chills could interrupt negative thought patterns, providing a unique opportunity for positive cognitive and emotional relearning [34,53,54], especially with regards to orienting to the semantic content of the stimulus.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Aesthetic chills mitigate maladaptive cognition in depression

Schoeller,

Jain,

Adrien

et al. 2024

BMC Psychiatry

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Background Depression is a major global health challenge, affecting over 300 million people worldwide. Current pharmacological and psychotherapeutic interventions have limited efficacy, underscoring the need for novel approaches. Emerging evidence suggests that peak emotional experiences characterized by awe, transcendence, and meaning hold promise for rapidly shifting maladaptive cognitive patterns in depression. Aesthetic chills, a peak positive emotion characterized by physical sensations such as shivers and goosebumps, may influence reward-related neural pathways and hold promise for modifying core maladaptive beliefs rooted in early adverse experiences. Methods We enrolled 96 patients diagnosed with major depressive disorder. A validated database of multimedia known to elicit chills responses (ChillsDB) was used for stimulus presentation. Participants’ emotional responses were assessed using the Emotional Breakthrough Inventory (EBI), while shifts in self-schema were measured via the Young Positive Schema Questionnaire (YSPQ). Results The study found that chill-inducing stimuli have the potential to positively influence the core schema of individuals with depression, impacting areas of self-related beliefs. The associated phenomenology triggered by chills appears to share similarities with the altered states of consciousness induced by psychedelic substances like psilocybin. Conclusions These preliminary results suggest that the biological processes involved in aesthetic chills could be harnessed as a non-pharmacological intervention for depression. However, further investigation is necessary to comprehensively understand the neurophysiological responses to chills and to evaluate the practicality, effectiveness, and safety of utilizing aesthetic chills as a preventive measure in mental health care.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Aesthetic chills mitigate maladaptive cognition in depression

Schoeller,

Jain,

Adrien

et al. 2024

BMC Psychiatry

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“…Unfortunately, the neuroimaging work conducted so far has focused exclusively on music as an eliciting stimulus (but see (Wassiliwizky et al, 2017)), and we simply cannot conclude anything yet regarding AC induced by CS such as films, speeches, stories, science, and rituals at large. A recently validated gold standard database of CS, extending beyond music, has been established by (Schoeller et al, 2022) later validated on 3000+ participants (Schoeller et al, 2023), marking the initial steps in uncovering the underlying neural mechanisms beyond mere musical pleasure. Here, we review some of the neural correlates associated with musical chills as a springboard (Figure 1), with all the limitations entailed.…”

Section: Neural Mechanisms Of Aesthetic Chills and Rewardmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Aesthetic chills (AC) are a strong emotional response to specific stimuli (chills stimuli, CS) such as music, films, or speech (Schoeller et al, 2022(Schoeller et al, , 2023, with a characteristic neural signature involving the mesocortical "reward" pathway (Blood & Zatorre, 2001;Ferreri et al, 2019;Salimpoor et al, 2011). Crucially, AC is associated with strong, discrete physiological response of shivering and/or goosebumps (Benedek & Kaernbach, 2011), which ordinarily regulate body temperature (hence AC are perhaps best characterized as "psychogenic shivers"), thereby providing a unique opportunity to study how brain and body interact during consummatory pleasure and reward learning (Contreras-Huerta et al, 2023;Paulus & Stewart, 2014).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Damasio & Damasio, 2022;Seth, 2013). Hence, in addition to providing novel insights into how pleasure comes about in the mind and brain, an understanding of the neural process supporting AC could lead to non-pharmacological substitutes for dopaminergic-related illnesses, as suggested by the recent findings suggesting that CS seem to improve reward learning (Jain et al, 2023) and maladaptive cognitions in anhedonic depression (Schoeller et al, 2023). CS include music (Blood & Zatorre, 2001;de Fleurian & Pearce, 2021), films (Schoeller et al, 2022;Schoeller, Eskinazi, et al, 2018;Schoeller & Perlovsky, 2016), stories (Schoeller & Perlovsky, 2015), poetry or speech (Wassiliwizky et al, 2017;Wassiliwizky & Menninghaus, 2021), scientific practice (Schoeller, 2015a), and religious and secular rituals (Schoeller, 2015a).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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The Neurobiology of Aesthetic Chills: How Bodily Sensations Shape Emotional Experiences

Schoeller,

Jain,

Pizzagalli

et al. 2023

Preprint

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The phenomenon of aesthetic chills—shivers and goosebumps associated with either rewarding or threatening stimuli—offers a unique window into the brain basis of conscious reward due to their universal nature and simultaneous subjective and physical counterparts. Elucidating the neural mechanisms underlying aesthetic chills can reveal fundamental insights about emotion, consciousness, and the embodied mind. What is the precise timing and mechanism of bodily feedback in emotional experience? How are conscious feelings and motivations generated from interoceptive predictions? What is the role of uncertainty and precision signaling in shaping emotions? How does the brain distinguish and balance processing of rewards versus threats? Here we review neuroimaging evidence and highlight key questions for understanding how bodily sensations shape conscious feelings of pleasure and meaning. This research stands to advance models of brain-body interactions shaping affect and may lead to novel non-pharmacological interventions for disorders of motivation and pleasure.

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“…In recent years, both consciousness and empathy have been deeply investigated by several scientists interested in neurosciences. Great attention has been dedicated to different newly proposed ways to assess consciousness (Plosnić et al, 2023 ; Vatrano et al, 2023 ) as well as to the definition and description of what we mean with the term “states of consciousness” (Schoeller, 2023 ) and to animal models of such complex functions (Zlomuzica and Dere, 2022 ). The same could be said for empathy: many efforts have been undertaken to propose unified theories between neural and psycho-cognitive aspects (Maliske et al, 2023 ) up to the very recent challenge of artificial empathy (Christov-Moore et al, 2023 ), and in all cases, it was shown that our empathic behavior can change as a function of particular “environmental” features (e.g., Migliore et al, 2019 ).…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%