TY  - JOUR
A1  - Leeuwen, Tessa M. van
A1  - Singer, Wolf
A1  - Nikolić, Danko
T1  - The merit of synesthesia for consciousness research
T2  - Frontiers in psychology
N2  - Synesthesia is a phenomenon in which additional perceptual experiences are elicited by sensory stimuli or cognitive concepts. Synesthetes possess a unique type of phenomenal experiences not directly triggered by sensory stimulation. Therefore, for better understanding of consciousness it is relevant to identify the mental and physiological processes that subserve synesthetic experience. In the present work we suggest several reasons why synesthesia has merit for research on consciousness. We first review the research on the dynamic and rapidly growing field of the studies of synesthesia. We particularly draw attention to the role of semantics in synesthesia, which is important for establishing synesthetic associations in the brain. We then propose that the interplay between semantics and sensory input in synesthesia can be helpful for the study of the neural correlates of consciousness, especially when making use of ambiguous stimuli for inducing synesthesia. Finally, synesthesia-related alterations of brain networks and functional connectivity can be of merit for the study of consciousness.
KW  - synesthesia
KW  - consciousness
KW  - semantics
KW  - parietal cortex
KW  - effective connectivity
KW  - qualia
KW  - NCC
KW  - ambiguous stimuli
Y1  - 2015
UR  - http://publikationen.ub.uni-frankfurt.de/frontdoor/index/index/docId/51904
UR  - https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:hebis:30:3-519041
SN  - 1664-1078
N1  - Copyright © 2015 van Leeuwen, Singer and Nikolić. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
VL  - 6
IS  - Art. 1850
SP  - 1
EP  - 9
PB  - Frontiers Research Foundation
CY  - Lausanne
ER  -