Modelling developments in consciousness within a multidimensional framework

TL;DR

This paper expands a multidimensional model of consciousness to study how it changes over time and across species.

Contribution

The paper introduces temporal profiles to the multidimensional framework of consciousness.

Findings

Temporal profiles allow modeling of consciousness changes across life cycles and disorders.

The expansion enables new comparisons across developmental stages and species.

The model highlights the importance of fluctuations in disorders of consciousness.

Abstract

A recent advancement in consciousness science has been the introduction of a multidimensional framework of consciousness. This framework has been applied to global states of consciousness, including psychedelic states and disorders of consciousness, and the consciousness of non-human animals. The multidimensional framework enables a finer parsing of both various states of consciousness and forms of animal consciousness, paving the way for new scientific investigations into consciousness. In this paper, the multidimensional model is expanded by constructing temporal profiles. This expansion allows for the modelling of changes in consciousness across the life cycles of organisms and the progression over time of disorders of consciousness. The result of this expansion is 2-fold: (i) it enables new modes of comparison, both across stages of development and across species; (ii) it proposes that more attention be given to the various types of fluctuations that occur in patients who are suffering from disorders of consciousness.

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