Awareness is the

state State may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Literature * ''State Magazine'', a monthly magazine published by the U.S. Department of State * ''The State'' (newspaper), a daily newspaper in Columbia, South Carolina, United States * '' Our ...

of being

conscious Consciousness, at its simplest, is sentience and awareness of internal and external existence. However, the lack of definitions has led to millennia of analyses, explanations and debates by philosophers, theologians, linguisticians, and scien ...

of something. More specifically, it is the ability to directly know and perceive, to feel, or to be cognizant of events. Another definition describes it as a state wherein a subject is aware of some information when that information is directly available to bring to bear in the direction of a wide range of behavioral actions. The concept is often synonymous to consciousness and is also understood as being

consciousness Consciousness, at its simplest, is sentience and awareness of internal and external existence. However, the lack of definitions has led to millennia of analyses, explanations and debates by philosophers, theologians, linguisticians, and scien ...

itself. The states of awareness are also associated with the states of

experience Experience refers to conscious events in general, more specifically to perceptions, or to the practical knowledge and familiarity that is produced by these conscious processes. Understood as a conscious event in the widest sense, experience invol ...

so that the structure represented in awareness is mirrored in the structure of experience.

Concept

Awareness is a relative

concept Concepts are defined as abstract ideas. They are understood to be the fundamental building blocks of the concept behind principles, thoughts and beliefs. They play an important role in all aspects of cognition. As such, concepts are studied by s ...

. It may be focused on an internal state, such as a visceral feeling, or on external events by way of sensory perception. It is analogous to sensing something, a process distinguished from observing and perceiving (which involves a basic process of acquainting with the items we perceive). Awareness or "to sense" can be described as something that occurs when the brain is activated in certain ways, such as when the color red is what is seen once the

retina The retina (from la, rete "net") is the innermost, light-sensitive layer of tissue of the eye of most vertebrates and some molluscs. The optics of the eye create a focused two-dimensional image of the visual world on the retina, which then ...

is stimulated by light waves. This conceptualization is posited amid the difficulty in developing an analytic definition of awareness or sensory awareness. Awareness is also associated with consciousness in the sense that this concept denotes a fundamental experience such as a feeling or intuition that accompanies the experience of phenomena. Specifically, this is referred to as awareness of experience. As for consciousness, it has been postulated to undergo continuously changing levels.

Peripheral awareness

Peripheral awareness refers to the human ability to process information at the periphery of attention, such as when we acknowledge the distant sounds of people outside while we sit indoors and concentrate on writing a report.

Self-awareness

Popular ideas about

suggest the phenomenon describes a condition of being aware of oneself (self-awareness). Modern

systems theory Systems theory is the interdisciplinary study of systems, i.e. cohesive groups of interrelated, interdependent components that can be natural or human-made. Every system has causal boundaries, is influenced by its context, defined by its structu ...

, which offers insights into how the world works through an understanding that all systems follow system rules, approach self-awareness within its understanding of how large complex living systems work. According to

Gregory Bateson Gregory Bateson (9 May 1904 – 4 July 1980) was an English anthropologist, social scientist, linguist, visual anthropologist, semiotician, and cyberneticist whose work intersected that of many other fields. His writings include '' Steps to a ...

, the mind is the dynamics of

self-organization Self-organization, also called spontaneous order in the social sciences, is a process where some form of overall order arises from local interactions between parts of an initially disordered system. The process can be spontaneous when suffic ...

and that awareness is crucial in the existence of this process. Modern systems theory maintains that humans, as living systems, have not only awareness of their environment but also self-awareness particularly with their capability for

logic Logic is the study of correct reasoning. It includes both formal and informal logic. Formal logic is the science of deductively valid inferences or of logical truths. It is a formal science investigating how conclusions follow from premis ...

and curiosity. Efforts to describe consciousness in neurological terms have focused on describing networks in the

brain The brain is an organ that serves as the center of the nervous system in all vertebrate and most invertebrate animals. It consists of nervous tissue and is typically located in the head ( cephalization), usually near organs for special ...

that develop awareness of the

qualia In philosophy of mind, qualia ( or ; singular form: quale) are defined as individual instances of subjective, conscious experience. The term ''qualia'' derives from the Latin neuter plural form (''qualia'') of the Latin adjective '' quālis'' () ...

developed by other networks. As awareness provides the materials from which one develops subjective ideas about their experience, it is said that one is aware of one's own awareness state. This organization of awareness of one's own inner experience is given a central role in

self-regulation Self-regulation may refer to: *Emotional self-regulation *Self-control, in sociology/psychology *Self-regulated learning, in educational psychology *Self-regulation theory (SRT), a system of conscious personal management *Industry self-regulation, ...

Neuroscience

Neural systems that regulate

attention Attention is the behavioral and cognitive process of selectively concentrating on a discrete aspect of information, whether considered subjective or objective, while ignoring other perceivable information. William James (1890) wrote that "Att ...

serve to attenuate awareness among complex animals whose central and

peripheral nervous system The peripheral nervous system (PNS) is one of two components that make up the nervous system of bilateral animals, with the other part being the central nervous system (CNS). The PNS consists of nerves and ganglia, which lie outside the brain a ...

s provide more information than

cognitive Cognition refers to "the mental action or process of acquiring knowledge and understanding through thought, experience, and the senses". It encompasses all aspects of intellectual functions and processes such as: perception, attention, thought ...

areas of the brain can assimilate. Within an attenuated system of awareness, a

mind The mind is the set of faculties responsible for all mental phenomena. Often the term is also identified with the phenomena themselves. These faculties include thought, imagination, memory, will, and sensation. They are responsible for vario ...

might be aware of much more than is being contemplated in a focused extended consciousness.

Basic awareness

Basic awareness of one's internal and external world depends on the

brain stem The brainstem (or brain stem) is the posterior stalk-like part of the brain that connects the cerebrum with the spinal cord. In the human brain the brainstem is composed of the midbrain, the pons, and the medulla oblongata. The midbrain is cont ...

Bjorn Merker Bjorn (English, Dutch), Björn (Swedish, Icelandic, Dutch, and German), Bjørn (Danish, Faroese and Norwegian), Beorn (Old English) or, rarely, Bjôrn, Biorn, or Latinized Biornus, Brum (Portuguese), is a Scandinavian male given name, or less oft ...

, an independent neuroscientist in Stockholm, Sweden, argues that the brain stem supports an elementary form of conscious thought in infants with hydranencephaly. "Higher" forms of awareness including

self-awareness In philosophy of self, self-awareness is the experience of one's own personality or individuality. It is not to be confused with consciousness in the sense of qualia. While consciousness is being aware of one's environment and body and life ...

require cortical contributions, but "primary consciousness" or "basic awareness" as an ability to integrate sensations from the environment with one's immediate goals and feelings in order to guide behavior, springs from the brain stem which human beings share with most of the

vertebrates Vertebrates () comprise all animal taxa within the subphylum Vertebrata () ( chordates with backbones), including all mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians, and fish. Vertebrates represent the overwhelming majority of the phylum Chordata, wi ...

. Psychologist Carroll Izard emphasizes that this form of primary

consists of the capacity to generate emotions and awareness of one's surroundings, but not an ability to talk about what one has experienced. In the same way, people can become conscious of a feeling that they cannot label or describe, a phenomenon that is especially common in pre-verbal infants. Due to this discovery medical definitions of brain death as a lack of cortical activity face a serious challenge.

Basic interests

Throughout the brain stem, there are interconnected regions that regulate eye movement that are also involved in organizing information about what to do next, such as reaching for a piece of food or pursuing a potential mate.

Changes in awareness

The ability to consciously detect an image when presented at near-threshold stimulus varies across presentations. One factor is "baseline shifts" due to top down attention that modulates ongoing brain activity in sensory cortex areas that affects the neural processing of subsequent perceptual judgments. Such top down biasing can occur through two distinct processes: an attention driven baseline shift in the

alpha wave Alpha waves, or the alpha rhythm, are neural oscillations in the frequency range of 8–12 Hz likely originating from the synchronous and coherent ( in phase or constructive) electrical activity of thalamic pacemaker cells in humans. Historic ...

s, and a decision bias reflected in

gamma wave A gamma wave or gamma Rhythm is a pattern of neural oscillation in humans with a frequency between 25 and 140 Hz, the 40- Hz point being of particular interest. Gamma rhythms are correlated with large scale brain network activity and cognitive ...

Living systems view

Outside of

neuroscience Neuroscience is the science, scientific study of the nervous system (the brain, spinal cord, and peripheral nervous system), its functions and disorders. It is a Multidisciplinary approach, multidisciplinary science that combines physiology, an ...

biologists, Humberto Maturana and Francisco Varela contributed their Santiago theory of cognition in which they wrote: This theory contributes a perspective that cognition is a process present at organic levels that we do not usually consider to be aware. Given the possible relationship between awareness and

cognition Cognition refers to "the mental action or process of acquiring knowledge and understanding through thought, experience, and the senses". It encompasses all aspects of intellectual functions and processes such as: perception, attention, thoug ...

, and

, this theory contributes an interesting perspective in the

philosophical Philosophy (from , ) is the systematized study of general and fundamental questions, such as those about existence, reason, knowledge, values, mind, and language. Such questions are often posed as problems to be studied or resolved. Som ...

and

scientific Science is a systematic endeavor that builds and organizes knowledge in the form of testable explanations and predictions about the universe. Science may be as old as the human species, and some of the earliest archeological evidence ...

dialogue of awareness and living systems theory.

Communications and information systems

In cooperative settings, awareness is a term used to denote "knowledge created through the interaction of an agent and its environment — in simple terms 'knowing what is going on'". In this setting, awareness is meant to convey how individuals monitor and perceive the information surrounding their colleagues and the environment they are in. This information is incredibly useful and critical to the performance and success of collaborations. Awareness can be further defined by breaking it down into a set of characteristics: * It is knowledge about the state of some environment * Environments are continually changing, therefore awareness knowledge must be constantly maintained * Individuals interact with the environment, and maintenance of awareness is accomplished through this interaction. * It is generally part of some other activity – generally making it a secondary goal to the primary goal of the activity. Different categories of awareness have been suggested based on the type of information being obtained or maintained: * Informal awareness is the sense of who's around and what are they up to. E.g. Information you might know from being collocated with an individual * Social awareness is the information you maintain about a social or conversational context. This is a subtle awareness maintained through non-verbal cues, such as eye contact, facial express, etc. * Group-structural awareness is the knowledge of others roles, responsibilities, status in a group. It is an understanding of group dynamics and the relationship another individual has to the group. * Workspace awareness – this is a focus on the workspace's influence and mediation of awareness information, particularly the location, activity, and changes of elements within the workspace. These categories are not mutually exclusive, as there can be significant overlap in what a particular type of awareness might be considered. Rather, these categories serve to help understand what knowledge might be conveyed by a particular type of awareness or how that knowledge might be conveyed. Workspace awareness is of particular interest to the

CSCW Computer-supported cooperative work (CSCW) is the study of how people utilize technology collaboratively, often towards a shared goal. CSCW addresses how computer systems can support collaborative activity and coordination. More specifically, the ...

community, due to the transition of workspaces from physical to virtual environments. While the type of awareness above refers to knowledge a ''person'' might need in a particular situation, ''

context awareness Context awareness refers, in information and communication technologies, to a capability to take into account the ''situation'' of ''entities'', which may be users or devices, but are not limited to those. ''Location'' is only the most obvious el ...

'' and ''

location awareness Location awareness refers to devices that can passively or actively determine their location. Navigational instruments provide location coordinates for vessels and vehicles. Surveying equipment identifies location with respect to a well-known loca ...

'' refer to information a ''computer system'' might need in a particular situation. These concepts of large importance especially for AAA (

authentication Authentication (from ''authentikos'', "real, genuine", from αὐθέντης ''authentes'', "author") is the act of proving an assertion, such as the identity of a computer system user. In contrast with identification, the act of indicat ...

authorization Authorization or authorisation (see spelling differences) is the function of specifying access rights/privileges to resources, which is related to general information security and computer security, and to access control in particular. More f ...

, accounting) applications. The term of location awareness still is gaining momentum with the growth of ubiquitous computing. First defined by networked work positions ( network location awareness), it has been extended to mobile phones and other mobile communicable entities. The term covers a common interest in whereabouts of remote entities, especially individuals and their cohesion in operation. The term of context awareness is a superset including the concept of location awareness. It extends the awareness to context features of an operational target as well as to the context of an operational area.

Covert awareness

Covert awareness is the knowledge of something without knowing it. Some patients with specific

brain damage Neurotrauma, brain damage or brain injury (BI) is the destruction or degeneration of brain cells. Brain injuries occur due to a wide range of internal and external factors. In general, brain damage refers to significant, undiscriminating t ...

are for example unable to tell if a pencil is horizontal or vertical.

Awareness and attention

Some scientists have proposed that awareness is closely related and in some ways synonymous with

while others have argued that they are different.There is evidence to demonstrate that awareness and attention have distinct neural correlates, though the majority of research analyses the attention, awareness, and perception of only visual stimuli.Wyart V, Tallon-Baudry C (2008) Neural dissociation between visual awareness and spatial attention. J Neurosci 28:2667–2679.

References

External links

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Cornell University
Recent findings in the awareness of brain damaged people. {{Consciousness Cognition Consciousness Systems psychology Unsolved problems in neuroscience Mindfulness (psychology) Concepts in epistemology