Introduction

In the Introduction a brief history was given of the fortunes of consciousness within mainstream psychology: how the early pioneers of the late nineteenth century such as Wundt and James found their work on phenomenal consciousness side-lined. So the idea of consciousness as phenomenal, with experience primary, was lost in favour of the other competing concepts at that time, namely consciousness as causal agent, a notion influenced by Freud (Chalmers 1996: 14).

For my research project I tried to look as widely as possible within the field of consciousness studies as a logical and necessary step for the study of ASCs. In this chapter I give a brief review of consciousness research by traditional psychologists. There are very many impressive studies and neuroscience has had a profound influence in this field. A neuroscientific approach was not appropriate for my own research which instead explored ASCs using an experiential approach. In this chapter I draw attention to three specific problems in consciousness studies: first there is a lack of agreement on a definition of consciousness (Jonkisz et al. 2017; Snider 2017: 15; Pereira et al. 2010: 213). Second there is a problem with trying to connect neurological patterning in the brain with lived experience, even though there has been a move to include phenomenal approaches in the literature. Third, there is a paucity of research into ASCs. In this chapter I will also consider the early work of William James. He began his career using positivist methods but moved to more unorthodox and phenomenological approaches. He also moved into the study of more spiritual areas of experience in his quest to understand consciousness. In both respects he therefore forms a bridge between traditional psychology and the branch of psychology which eventually became part of my theoretical perspective: Transpersonal psychology. His contribution to the Transpersonal movement will be explained in Chapter 3.

Traditional Psychology and Consciousness

There is still a lack of consensus on defining consciousness, even though everyone experiences it. Alfredo Pereira et al. reported on the proceedings of a workshop involving 15 eminent consciousness theorists but concluded there is still no common agreed definition in psychology, partly because each side of the debate relies on particular theoretical positions (Pereira et al. 2010: 216). Several writers at the forefront of consciousness research continue to admit that an agreed definition remains elusive (Tye 2017; Jonkisz et al. 2017). David Chalmers, a philosopher and cognitive scientist also concludes there is no consensus on subjective or phenomenal aspects of consciousness (Chalmers 2018: 7).

Key theories explored in this chapter include materialism, functionalism, information processing models and consciousness defined as phenomenal experience. I will also briefly review the main camps in the debate surrounding the link between brain and the phenomenal, drawing on neuroscientific research. Whilst having great respect for the high level of research and scholarship involved, these theories did not prove fruitful for my project.

Ram Vimal points to the key definitions derived from different theoretical positions: consciousness defined as a series of neurobiological processes in the brain, consciousness as a series of cognitive functions and consciousness defined as phenomenal, our experience of the world (Vimal 2009: 10). The demise of the phenomenal as explanation was briefly mentioned in Chapter 1. Richard Stevens explains how a materialist functional explanation came to dominate psychology. A phenomenal orientation to consciousness had been used in the pioneering work of Wundt. But partly as a result of poor relationships between laboratories (Kulpe and Titchener apparently disagreed as to whether thought could be image-less), the phenomenal fell out of favour (Stevens 2000: 103). As a result psychology became more materialist and scientific. Chalmers also points out that the development and dominance of behaviourist approaches in the early part of the twentieth century allowed objective explanations to take over, such that behaviourists even denied that consciousness existed (Chalmers 1997: 14). But this led to particular problems: if mental states are behavioural, how then can they actually cause behaviour? Chalmers concludes that consciousness is phenomenal (Chalmers 1997: 16). But one fundamental question which has not been answered is why we need conscious experience. We have objective behavioural and cognitive functions but why should these be accompanied by conscious experience? (Chalmers 2018: 7). Further, the problem of such phenomenal experience and its relation to neural activity, the so-called hard problem (Chalmers 1995) has contributed to the development of neuroscience in psychology, which I discuss briefly below. But first, how do traditional psychologists define consciousness?

Physicalism

Physicalist approaches point to particular areas of the brain responsible for conscious activity: a ‘functionally intact upper dorsal pons region’ and ‘a dominant EEG frequency faster than 8 Hz’ (Pereira et al. 2010: 216). Daniel Dennett is a prolific writer in this area. He is a firm Physicalist, claiming that everything we know about consciousness originates in neural processes. Dennett has also explored robotics, which perhaps gives an indication of how he views humans and consciousness. He reviewed a project at MIT to build a robot exactly like a human, and he reasons that this will be possible because we are ‘more or less’ like robots. In his view we are just ‘extraordinarily complex, self-controlling, self-sustaining physical mechanisms’ (Dennett 1997: 17).

His critics say that he is unable to account for our basic conscious awareness by using only materialism. A.J. Rudd reasons that explaining consciousness as something merely physical is wrong because our experience of consciousness is not physical. It is also wrong because if we were in a world where we only knew a physical level, we would not experience consciousness at all. We know about it because we already experience it, and that experiencing has to be explained (Rudd 1998: 460). Dennett later developed an approach to the study of consciousness which he called ‘heterophenomenology’. At first glance this appears to be a positive methodological step in considering more than a material base. He suggests collecting individual utterances of beliefs about our conscious state. But he downgrades these utterances to ‘theorist’s fictions’ (Dennett 2003: 20). So he has not in my view given a workable theory of consciousness. Nevertheless he has been a prolific researcher and writer over many years.

Cognitive Approaches

These developed in the late 1950s with a focus on how the brain processes information. Models of consciousness were created where sensory input and processing are achieved rather like a computer. There is no attempt to define consciousness here, except as a function of the brain. Bernard Baars developed information processing models further to incorporate the idea of a ‘global workspace’ within the brain, and this became an important model within this field. He assesses consciousness and the unconscious in functionalist terms only and points out that consciousness is hopelessly inefficient. To counter this he suggests the brain has evolved a central ‘workspace’ to integrate the distributed information processing systems we use. He incorporates neuroscience, citing two basic principles as the foundation of his workspace, of competition and cooperation between neurological signals (Baars 1988). In later work Baars maintains his global workspace model but now likens it to a social media ‘chat room’ which sends out dominant messages to the rest of the brain (Baars and Gage 2010: 288). Critics of Baars’ workspace include Susan Blackmore who is a prominent writer in consciousness studies. Blackmore suggests that workspace theory with its central processing area has been overtaken by more recent theories which suggest that the functions of a workspace are distributed throughout the brain (Blackmore 2002: 27). Such models see consciousness in functionalist terms. So consciousness simply reflects the level of information integration in the brain (Tononi and Koch 2008: 253). Max Velmans specifically rejects the idea of a global workspace because it conflates consciousness with the workspace. Instead conscious experience is first person, workspace is a third person account (Velmans 2009: 150). Such a Dualist perspective is discussed below.

Some physicalists try to edge in a bit of subjective experience whilst holding to the view that consciousness is physical. For example Robert Howell draws on the work of the philosopher Bertrand Russell, and his theory of knowledge acquired by acquaintance. This is a way of knowing about our experiences which cannot be known in any other way except our experience. But Howell is also adamant that his position is not dualist (Howell 2013: 74). Michael Graziano, who is also a Physicalist, considers subjective awareness but degrades it as a notion comparable with ancient folk beliefs. For him this awareness is a mere by-product of neural processes (Graziano 2020: 158). Similarly, Dennett in his recent writing has not changed his view, and still maintains that awareness is nothing more than representations provided by the brain (Dennett 2018). Another prominent writer in the field of consciousness studies, Ned Block, also rejects the idea of the phenomenal because he asserts such processes are automatic. Therefore we do not need conscious awareness of them (Block 2007: 481).

Physicalism has remained popular partly because there has been an explosion in neuroscientific studies. Not all of these are Physicalist, but in general they mark a shift in the focus of consciousness research. This has also occurred in social anthropology, notably with the influential work of Charles Laughlin (2017, 2003; Laughlin and Takahashi 2020) and will be discussed in Chapter 5.

A highly respected figure in the field of neuro-psychology is Giulio Tononi. His seminal study (2016) is interesting because he accepts phenomenal experience as valid. However, it is analysed only as a network linking it to neural correlates in the brain. Conscious experience becomes a complex and highly regulated series of cause-effect actions in neurons. Phenomenal consciousness is explained solely by its physical substrate (Tononi et al. 2016: 450‒452).

Phenomenal Approaches and the Hard Problem

The second main camp in the consciousness debate holds a Dualist position, where it is accepted that consciousness cannot be explained as merely physical because we have subjective experience of it. This has led to a fierce debate about how our subjective experience links with the brain, the so-called hard problem of consciousness, a term coined by Chalmers (1995).

In the last two decades there has been growing acceptance of the dualist perspective, that consciousness cannot be reduced to brain or function. Anthony Marcel was an early advocate. He explains consciousness as something we experience directly, involving awareness. He also refers to higher-order consciousness or meta-cognition (knowing that you know something). He is critical of functionalism as an indirect approach, because it studies functions of the mind rather than consciousness itself (Marcel 1988). Michael Tye explains phenomenal consciousness as the subjective experience of things ‘knowing what it is like to experience something’, and ‘our perceptual experiences, bodily sensations, felt reactions and felt moods’ (Tye 2017: 23). Max Velmans has been a pioneer in promoting the importance of the phenomenal. He draws on neuroscientific studies but is firmly against trying to explain consciousness solely in terms of neural processes (Velmans 2005: 293). So consciousness cannot be reduced to the same physical substance as the brain (Velmans and Nagasawa 2012: 8). Further he sees the experience of consciousness as a construct, so each individual inhabits a unique world in many ways (Velmans 2005: 311). This is a particularly interesting comment because, as we will see later in this chapter, William James challenged current thinking at the start of the twentieth century concerning the nature of reality and the unique world of each individual (Siegfried 1992).

In recent writing Velmans acknowledges the methodological difficulties in trying to study private experience and quotes John Watson 1913 who refused to study consciousness because it did not fit within natural science boundaries. But Velmans points to a fundamental problem for both physicalists and Dualists in misdescribing phenomenal experience, which leads to faulty methods of investigation (Velmans 2017: 713). Although he holds a Dualist position, Velmans is critical of Dualists who separate the object perceived from the subjective experience of it. Instead Velmans says that what we see is only our private perception and therefore there is no separation of subject/object. ‘That is, in terms of phenomenology there is no difference between “observed phenomena” and “experiences”’ (ibid.: p. 715). Further Velmans explains that perceptual projection is involved, where something we experience ‘out there’ will involve preconscious processing but will be experienced as something detached from ourselves, although scholars to date cannot explain how this is done. Velmans is adamant this cannot be reduced to the physical: ‘…this effect is subjective, psychological, and viewable only from a first-person perspective. Nothing physical is projected from the brain’ (Velmans 2012: 46). Velmans is also critical of scientific experiments which separate out the accounts of the subject from experimenter reports which are seen as objective when in fact they are subjective too (Velmans 2017: 722). Velman’s work is impressive and inspiring. I first came across his ideas at Goldsmiths College where I studied social anthropology and was enthralled by his public lectures in psychology.

In recent years there has been a tendency to solve the Dualist problem by combining neuroscience with the phenomenal. However, according to Paul Snider (2017), such studies do not always measure what they think they are measuring. Access consciousness (meaning what we report of our experience) is sometimes studied rather than the phenomenal (ibid.: 15), a point also made by Michael Tye (2017) mentioned earlier. Secondly, Snider also suggests that whilst correlates are found between neurons and phenomenal experience, the link is not explained. He is also critical of studies which isolate one target stimulus as this is not how we experience the world phenomenologically. (Snider 2017: 22‒23).

It is also somewhat problematic that mixing phenomenology and physicalist or cognitive accounts is also mixing epistemological traditions. Alison Gopnik points out that consciousness is a ‘phenomenologically defined category’ and should not be described as merely a cognitive function (Gopnik 1993). The result of trying to incorporate a phenomenal definition is unsatisfactory because it is a juxtaposition of two models rather than one, with no explanation of the link. Snider refers to this approach as the use of ‘epistemically objective facts about ontologically subjective phenomena’ (Snider 2017: 13). Polak & Marvan try to mitigate the problem of this relation by showing that phenomenal experience can occur at an unconscious level. But ultimately they admit that the phenomenal is beyond the realms of scientific enquiry (Polak and Marvan 2019: 3). Over 100 years ago James recognized that vast areas of human experience, including mysticism, religion and psychical phenomena, what he termed an ‘unclassified residuum’, cannot be explained scientifically (Gitre 2006: 14). This is discussed in more detail below.

My hope is that traditionalist studies in consciousness will eventually bear fruit in defining consciousness and the elusive link between phenomenal experience and the brain. In terms of my project, the literature revealed a need to explore more specialist areas of psychology rather than rely on traditional accounts. Secondly, despite the side-lining of James’s phenomenal theories, particularly by behaviourists, it was heartening to see that the phenomenal is now gaining respectability in traditional psychology. My main concern, however, was to explore studies of ASCs.

Altered States in Traditional Psychology

Traditional psychology literature has much to say on consciousness but not so much on ASCs. Psychologists recognize that they are unpopular as a focus of research. Such reticence has been noted in both psychology and anthropology (Windt 2011: 245; Herbert 2011: 201). They are acknowledged as very difficult to define and study, partly because they are inner transient experiences (Dietrich 2018: 9, Blackmore 2013: 362). To date there is no agreed workable definition of ASCs (Dietrich 2018: 10), echoing a similar problem for consciousness mentioned earlier. Several writers also acknowledge a core problem in agreeing on a definition of a so-called normal state, from which altered states spring (Blackmore 2013: 363; Dietrich 2018: 10). However, one pioneering theorist, Charles Tart, still maintains we have a normal waking state as a baseline from which to gauge ASCs and that ASCs are qualitatively different from our normal state (Garcia-Romeu and Tart 2013: 123).

At the time of my Doctoral research (which I wrote up in 2012), there was very little literature available in traditional psychology concerning mild everyday ASCs. Here I aim to give some idea of the current state of ASC research. In line with my own focus on the phenomenal and everyday experience, I have included some studies which touch on these areas. However, there is still no overarching paradigm for ASC research (Vaitl et al 2013: 3). There is a tendency still to focus on particular ASCs such as hypnosis, near-death and hallucinations with very few theorists attempting to make any connections between them as ASCs. One interesting development has been increasing research in the use of psychedelics, with a view to gaining insight into neurological behaviour during ASCs.

What has not changed is a continuing lack of research into everyday ASCs, with one or two exceptions, such as Abraham (2018) on daydream. The standpoints around the hard problem of consciousness which were reviewed in the previous section are also present in ASC research. In similar vein some authors insist that neurological data is all that is required to understand ASC experience. Others add in a phenomenological level but the focus is still neurological. So ASCs for them are a mere result of neural activity.

Some Historical Background and Key Developments

Here I offer a brief history of ASCs in society, and the path of research. Albert Garcia-Romeu and Charles Tart trace the use of ASCs back to prehistoric times, evidenced in cave paintings thought to depict entoptic visions from ingested substances. Similarly in ancient Greece the Eleusinian mystery rituals probably involved the use of hallucinogenic plants to induce ASCs. Despite worldwide use of ASCs in most cultures for thousands of years, ASCs as a topic of study have been neglected by Western academic departments. Garcia-Romeu and Tart recognize William James at the beginning of the twentieth century as a ‘trailblazer’ for ASC research. He induced his own ASCs using nitrous oxide and gave a seminal lecture about them in 1902. In particular he did not give any priority to so-called ordinary waking consciousness, but saw it as one of many types and levels of consciousness available to us (Garcia-Romeu and Tart 2013: 124, 125). This, according to Etzel Cardena, set the agenda for ASC research (Cardena 2018: 242). Cardena also notes the pioneering work at the end of the nineteenth century of F. W. H. Myers, who concluded that such areas of consciousness were the site of creative genius (Cardena 2018: 243).

One drawback for research into ASCs was the influence of Freud. He took a very negative view, seeing them as the product of repressed instincts and drives. Ricoeur explains how Freud saw desire as hallucination, a fantasy (in a negative sense), with the ego bringing us back to the everyday world (Ricoeur 1970: 284). This helped to keep ASCs off the research agenda.

It was only in the 1960s that there was more interest. A more enlightened approach emerged with ASCs seen as positive experience. This was helped by the development of the Counterculture in Western society, a growth in the use of meditation in the West, and Aldous Huxley’s experiments with mescaline. His account, Doors of Perception (1954), became a classic text. Cardena mentions seminal writers in ASC research: including Arnold Ludwig (1966). Charles Tart (1975) and Robert Ornstein (1986) (in Cardena 2018: 243).

Beischel et al (2011) have noted a tendency amongst scholars to see ASCs as pathological (Beischel et al 2011: 3). But he also recognizes an increase in studies of positive ASCs. Beischel sees Arnold Ludwig’s (1966) work on mystical states, defined experientially, as critical in the move towards recognition of ASCs as positive (Beischel et al. 2011). Charles Tart offered a classic study of ASCs (1975) and remains a prolific writer: in particular, he asserted that ASCs should be studied as state-specific, that it was difficult to study them whilst the researcher was in another state (Tart 1975: 206). He has therefore become an important voice in a recent trend towards participatory study, explored in Chapter 3. Beischel also notes increasing cross-cultural work on ASCs (Beischel et al. 2011: 114). Such work draws heavily on Transpersonal anthropology, and is explored in Chapter 5. Despite the development of studies of positive ASCs, Jennifer Windt suggests that a tension remains between studies which still see ASCs as pathological, and those which study positive higher experience which is usually spiritual (Windt 2011: 245). One welcome trend has been acceptance of therapeutic application of ASCs, (including hypnosis, meditation and clinical use of psychedelics in some areas of psychotherapy) which is seen as helping to revive interest in them.

Some researchers confine themselves to a Materialist explanation. For example Annti Revonsuo suggests ASCs are mere reflections of mechanisms in the brain which misrepresent the world (Revonsuo et al. 2009). One highly significant and exciting development is the identification of a neuronal substrate for ASCs (Vaitl et al. 2013), with a common mechanism known as the DMN—default mode network (Tabatabaeian and Jennings 2018). Vaitl offers a review of neurological research and ASCs including near-death states, extreme environmental conditions leading to ASCs and trance from excessive dance and drumming. He includes some everyday experience such as sleep drowsiness and daydream. His stated aim, however, is to focus on extreme states, and to match all categories with neuronal correlates. He incorporates a phenomenological level: being active and alert to the environment, awareness, self-awareness and changes in sensory and subjective experience. But the focus is primarily on the arousal system as causal. Vaitl’s appraisal is sometimes limited. For example, daydream is defined and deemed to arise from a ‘no-task, no-stimulus, no response situation’ (Vaitl et al. 2013: 5). But a classic study by Jerome Singer revealed daydream in response to external stimuli (Singer 1975; Singer and Antrobus 1963). In my own empirical research I uncovered a variety of stimuli which induced daydreams, which were often rich in content. Vaitl et al. appear to downgrade ASCs to little more than the products of neuronal activity, simply ‘a natural consequence of the workings of the brain’ (Vaitl et al. 2013: 34).

Psychobiological studies of ASCs have typically involved the use of EEG which has revealed a common mechanism for ASCs. Tabatabaeian and Jennings (2018) suggest shared neurophysiological features across a variety of ASC inducers including trance, excessive exercise and epilepsy. EEG reveals greater activity in low-frequency bands—delta, theta and slow alpha—and that these are associated with internally directed attention. They also characterize ASC inducers as acting like sensory deprivation. Similar to Girn and Christoff (2018), some aspects of mystical experience such as loss of ego are explained as a mere reaction to disruption of these networks (Tabatabaeian and Jennings 2018).

Hinterberger et al. (2015) examine the neural substrate of a mere change in attention, described as an everyday ASC. It is debatable whether this may be classified as an ASC, which I mentioned in Chapter 1. However Farthing (1992) considers a change of attention as the baseline for all ASCs. Hinterberger looks at 3 types of attention: within oneself (intrapersonal), towards the outer world (extra-personal) and having empathic connections with others. EEG revealed that Alpha2 and beta2 were increased in the empathic condition compared with extra-personal attention. Also when attention was focused on an external object rather than the self, then delta waves were significantly higher (Hinterberger et al. 2015).

Psychedelic ASC Research

One of the biggest developments in ASC research in recent years has been a growing body of psychobiological research involving the use of psychedelics to induce ASCs. Harris Friedman (2006) documents their history: Psychedelics in research began as early as 1896 using peyote and later ibogaine, both natural substances. They were seen as psychoto-mimetics with an application in the scientific study of psychosis. The first known use in therapy was Dr. Sandison’s psycholytic therapy in 1953. But their use was banned in the USA in the 1960s on grounds of safety. Later the ban was lifted, and research resumed at the University of New Mexico in 1990. Wider use in clinical trials came in the following decade (Friedman 2006: 40, 41). Girn and Christoff (2018) focus on research using psilocybin and LSD. They are known to reliably induce ASCs and allow researchers to investigate clinical issues. Girn and Christoff interested me because they consider phenomenal everyday experiences of the self. They examine in impressive detail the self-via feelings of body ownership, body boundaries and the autobiographical self which is based on personal memories. However, their stated aim is to examine neural correlates rather than the phenomenal (Girn and Christoff 2018). In common with much psychedelic research they hope that findings may contribute to clinical studies, including work on depression, and therapies where ego disillusion can contribute to well-being (Girn and Christoff 2018: 145/6). But in my view psychedelic research should also involve much more work on experiential aspects.

Perhaps not surprisingly the hard problem of consciousness (the link between neural substrates and phenomenal experience of being conscious) also appears in some ASC studies, although it is not prominent. Yaden et al. (2021) suggests that psychedelic research is unlikely to help with the hard problem. But he reviews three hypotheses which may shed some light on it. The Entropic Brain Hypothesis sees levels of entropy (disorder, randomness) increased with psychedelics which result in a phenomenal increase in diversity and vividness as well as an increase in influence from lower-level processing (ibid.: 617). The cortico–striato–thalamo–cortical (CSTC) model shows that psychedelics interfere with the work of the thalamus in controlling sensory information flow to the cortex, resulting in sensory overload. Third, the Claustro-cortical circuit model has multiple cortical connectivity and is claimed to help us understand the hard problem of how phenomenal experience may arise from neural activity (quoting Barrett et al. 2020). Yaden et al. make an important point in calling for more systematic research into ASCs which they feel is lacking (Yaden et al. 2021: 619) and which was also puzzling me during my research.

A further concern I have with the use of psychedelics in research is a lack of discussion about the differentiating effect of inducers on the ASC experience. Instead ASCs induced by psychedelics are sometimes made to stand for all ASC experience. A further problem is recognizing individual differences in these effects. There is a hint of recognition in Schmidt and Berkemeyer (2018). They constructed a database built on questionnaires administered post-ASC experience with psychedelics. They explain that scientific interest in ASCs is to try and establish what is normal functioning, in order to help clinical populations with impairment. But they admit that there is no consideration in the studies reviewed of inducers used and individual differences (Schmidt and Berkemeyer 2018).

Other areas which proved of interest during my Doctoral studies were: daydream, flow, hypnagogia and hypnosis. Of these, my fieldwork participants only reported daydream and some hypnagogia. My discussion below therefore focuses primarily on daydream (including more recent studies) with brief sections for flow, hypnagogia and the category of ‘high hypnotizables’ from the hypnosis literature.

Daydream

Whilst daydream has often been seen in our culture as an aspect of laziness and of little use, Jerome Singer explored these as healthy everyday states. His work was pioneering, beginning with a research programme in the 1950s, which has laid the foundations for most research since (McMillan et al. 2013). Singer firmly rejected Freud’s view of ASCs as pathological. He was influenced by James’s ‘stream of consciousness’ model (Abraham 2018). His experimental work led him to define daydream, following William James’s model (1950), as a stream of vague thoughts, which mostly comment on perception. Typically daydream is a change of attention from the external world to inner thoughts. Such ASCs vary from just a change of attention to full-blown fantasies, often involving unusual imagery. He distinguished 3 main types: positive-constructive, guilty-dysphoric and poor attentional control (Singer 2006, 1975).

Daydream is of interest in my research because it is a mild everyday ASC and it appears to fill up so much of our everyday experience. Kripke and Sonnenschein (1978: 328) suggest we daydream about every 90 minutes. Similarly Anna Abraham (2018) says most people daydream several times a day. Generally researchers suggest a conservative 50% of our waking lives, which is actually very high (Konishi and Smallwood 2016 in Abraham 2018). During my fieldwork I was informed by the work of Singer, particularly because he recognized that daydream can be positive and involve fantasy. Such experience was very prevalent amongst my participants.

But traditional psychology has neglected daydream, partly because, like other ASCs, they are inner transient experiences and so difficult to study. Since the work of Singer, some theorists have tried to look again at what defines daydream. Abraham (2018) in her excellent review says that in psychology both daydream and mind-wandering are often used interchangeably. But daydream is said to be independent of any context, whereas mind-wandering usually refers to moving away from a task to daydream. Abraham rejects the idea that such states are unguided, since we constantly work on our personal goals (ibid.: 38). Explanations of why and when the mind wanders vary between positive and even creative thought during tasks which are undemanding, to recognition that rumination on the past can be negative and disadvantageous (ibid.: 37). Finally Abraham suggests that daydream may not be an ASC because we daydream so often. The waking state which becomes altered is also in her view fictitious (Abraham 2018: 41). Nevertheless my research revealed rich experiences of daydream amongst fieldwork participants which were seen by them as quite separate from an identified ‘normal’ waking state. They did not distinguish daydream from mind-wandering.

Abraham’s review also includes work on neurological correlates of ASCs. She is critical of theorists who identify the neuronal network known as the DMN (default mode network) as exclusively involved in daydream and mind-wandering, because it has since been linked to other cognitive activity (Abraham 2018: 42).

Just a few researchers swim against the tide of neuroscience to offer insights using phenomenology. Yoshimi and Vinson (2015) draw on the work of Aron Gurwitsch, a phenomenologist and psychologist who was deeply influenced by Husserl, Schutz and William James. He was innovatory in applying Husserl’s phenomenology to Gestalt psychology. Gurwitsch’s model of consciousness included ‘(1) a theme of data at the focus of attention organized according to Gestalt law; (2) unattended data relevant to the theme; (3) Marginal or unattended data not relevant to the theme’ (Yoshimi and Vinson 2015: 107). This model has proved useful in understanding consciousness and mind-wandering. Peter Crout (2020) explains that the focus of attention ‘behaves like an autonomous self-defining system’ but with mind-wandering this autonomy is lost. Instead the theme begins to interact with thoughts at the margin of consciousness (ibid.: 9). Crout disagrees with Metzinger (2013) and others who define mind-wandering as lacking in any mental autonomy. Instead he suggests, like James, that the fringes of consciousness often guide our thoughts and are often more important than central aspects (ibid.: 14). Mind-wandering may also stay relevant in following the previous theme of attention in our conscious state, but retain elements from the margin or unconscious (Crout 2020: 18, 19). In my fieldwork I focused on daydream and not mind-wandering, although I think the boundaries between them are not always easy to identify.

Hypnagogia, Flow and High Hypnotizables

Hypnagogia is not prominent as a research area in psychology. It is more commonly addressed as a stage in sleep onset, forming part of sleep research. McKellar (1957) was a pioneer, acknowledging that hypnagogia occurs quite regularly in everyday experience but is not always recognized by experiencers as a specific state. Mavromatis (1987) extended his work and established this as an ASC between waking and sleeping. Recent research suggests that the dividing line between waking and sleeping is not always clear-cut and that the median state offers creative insights. Sue Llewellyn (2016) suggests that creative individuals may have a more malleable division between these states. Llewellyn quotes neurological studies such as Baird et al. (2012) which show that creativity is preceded by neural activation spreading more widely across conscious, unconscious and memory, making remote associations possible. Fluidity of boundaries between waking and sleep may allow REM dream images to appear in these creative states (ibid.: 128). James (1950/1890) is also quoted when he identified ‘the most unheard of combinations of elements’ and ‘the unexpected’ as the only law in such states (James in Llewellyn 2016: 131).

‘Flow’ is a term coined by Mihaly and Isabella Csikszentmihalyi. They applied Maslow’s concept of intrinsic motivation to artists, who concentrate for long periods and may work for no intrinsic reward. This experience resembles a harmonious flow in the mind. It involves deep absorption, feeling adequate for the task, positive motivation and mood (Csikszentmihalyi 1988: 19). They also emphasize that it is an ‘important deviation’ from ordinary waking consciousness but also allows continuing interaction with the world (Csikszentmihalyi and Nakamura 2018: 102). Several ‘dimensions’ of flow are detailed: a narrowing of attention onto the stimulus activity, so that action and awareness merge; awareness of self but no self-judgement; and a sense of still being in control. There is also a change in experience of time (ibid.: 106). The authors admit that some of these dimensions are found in other ASCs but flow is an ‘optimizing of ordinary consciousness, not a turning away from it’ (p. 107). I had some misgivings about flow as a viable concept, since it resembles other ASCs. It is similar to the state of absorption, which I also focused on in my fieldwork. But their point about optimizing the ordinary waking state is an important one. In my fieldwork many experiences of ASCs were timeout from ordinary consciousness and the world whereas an experience of flow will be alert to the world and also require notable skill in the activity involved (Csikszentmihalyi and Nakamura 2018:109). ‘Flow’ has become very popular in psychology and particularly in sport psychology (Young and Pain 2002; Cooper 1998). It has also had its critics. Stevens suggests flow is a construct creating what it looks for, rather than mapping real experience (Stevens 2000). But Csikszentmihalyi used the experiences of participants via interviews and diaries. Flow is a very specific state, and one which is common in everyday life. It would seem to qualify as an ASC since, according to its originators, it is not a normal everyday conscious state but an optimizing of it.

Hypnosis is well documented in mainstream psychology. Descriptions of individuals easily hypnotized by Ernest Hilgard seemed useful early on in my research, including: ability for absorption, involving suspension of critical faculties; actively receptive to things, living in the moment; ability for very vivid imagery (Hilgard 1970). Theorists of hypnosis sometimes emphasize the social situation involved, but Hilgard emphasizes altered cognitive processing and dissociation (Hilgard 1970; Farthing 1992). Amanda Barnier and colleagues (2014) have more recently conducted research with high hypnotizables. These abilities have been known since research into hypnosis began in the 1890s (Barnier et al. 2014: 168). Hilgard (1970) found that responses to suggestion were profound, such as becoming paralyzed in one arm when instructed by the hypnotizer (ibid.: 169). Barnier’s research found these responses were so extreme that subjects could mimic clinical cases of delusion, showing disruption to perceptual systems. This disruption included similar changes in neural patterning to those of clinical patients (Barnier et al. 2014: 175, 177). Hypnosis is not of course an everyday state, but I did find some elements of high hypnotizable descriptions amongst participants, particularly those capable of very vivid imagery in their everyday ASCs.

William James as a Bridge between Traditional and Transpersonal Psychology

In Chapter 1 the work of William James was briefly mentioned as an inspiration for my research. James began his career within traditional psychology at the end of the nineteenth century. He also inspired a much later Transpersonal movement in psychology and is seen as one of its founders. He therefore acts as a kind of bridge between these two literatures. In this section I will first consider James the traditional psychologist, his work on consciousness, and how his epistemological parameters began to change.

Eugene Taylor, an expert on James, explains that James was interested in the question of how mental experience comes to characterize our sense of a substantive world out there. So he began to study thought as a continuous constructive process. This led to the study of consciousness. He explored advances in French experimental psychology, including studies of the subconscious (Taylor 1996: 8). He also maintained an interest and belief in multiple states of consciousness (ibid.: 35) and of the transcendent (ibid.: 5), and these became highly relevant in my research. His work was experimental and positivist at this time, but crucially it was his work in neurophysiology that led him to an interest in consciousness. Secondly he began to study unorthodox psychical phenomena such as automatic writing (Taylor 1996: 19‒20). This area of his work is discussed in more detail in Chapter 3. James moved beyond the confines of paradigms accepted at that time, positing a realm beyond the cognitive centre of attention. He concluded that the self was a metaphysical problem (Taylor 1996: 30). He established his career by opening the first psychology laboratory at Harvard University, and also wrote Principles of Psychology (1950), his major work. But one of the chapters ‘Mind-Stuff Theory’ shows him exploring ideas of the unconscious beyond traditional writers such as Maudsley and the tradition of Schopenhauer. Instead for James the unconscious is not an entity but a series of multiple states of consciousness (Taylor 1996: 35).

John Stuhr explores James’s radical empiricism, developed in keeping with his phenomenological approach. James asserted that consciousness should be explored as experiences, and that these can be explained by their relations with each other (Stuhr 2022: 183). In Will to Believe James shed some light on what he meant by radical empiricism: radical means there is no single point of view by which we can understand the world; empirical refers to a reliance on experience rather than facts (James 1902 in Stuhr 2022: 184). This approach in part stemmed from James’s belief that our sense of reality relies too much on the language we use so that we see only an atomistic view of things (ibid.: 186). Instead consciousness and its content should not be separated.

Stuhr also explains that James’s overall view of reality was pluralist and that we and the universe are always in process (Stuhr 2022: 191). James was also anti-rationalism which helped to form his radical empirical approach. James was highly critical of rationalists who believe that rationalism can explain everything, and that facts are sufficient (Hackett 2022: 69). So we can see here an unorthodox approach in his methods and in the objects of inquiry, which were very much at odds with traditional psychology. Garcia-Romeu & Tart explain that his radical empiricism and the use of first-person accounts were critical in his pioneering work on consciousness and ASCs. They point out that in some ways his work may be linked to current calls for a paradigm shift in the science of consciousness away from ‘stringent materialism’ (Garcia-Romeu and Tart 2013: 126).

The radical empirical approach taken by James reflected the deep influence of Husserl and phenomenology on his work, although he did not completely reject the evidence of his earlier physicalist work. In Chapter 1 the work of Husserl and European phenomenologists was mentioned. They saw the importance of studying subjective experience in order to show how our consciousness alters our experience of the everyday world. Husserl wanted to develop a science of phenomena to clarify how objects are experienced and present themselves in consciousness. He tried to develop a method of focusing on the data of consciousness to clarify their role in the process of meaning construction (Spinelli 1989). Critics such as Paul Ricoeur have difficulty with understanding this interpretation of our experience of the world. He and other critics question Husserl’s idea that to get to the reality of things we need to bracket out our presuppositions, termed the ‘epoche’. Ricoeur criticizes what he interprets as Husserl’s transcendent reality (Ricoeur 1967). Hanna also explains that Husserl believed in the possibility of an intuitive way of knowing that spontaneously leads to fundamental insights into the nature of self and the world. This intuition was based on a kind of mystical ‘seeing’ (Hanna 1993). So Husserl was effectively advocating an ASC as a way of gaining knowledge.

This emphasis on the study of consciousness, the idea of a kind of pure experience of the world, and of a kind of direct knowing within an ASC, are all elements which appeared in James’s work. But he did not use or develop the method of the epoche. Not surprisingly, James was seen as highly unorthodox in his ideas about our experience of the world ‘out there’ which were at odds with much of Western thought (Eisendrath 1971). Like Husserl he realized that everything we experience is mediated by our subjectivity. Since the everyday world is only available to us through our own mediation of it, James was able to conclude that reality should be whatever we think it is (Siegfried 1992).

James suggested we live in a kind of bubble of reality or a ‘lifeworld’, and this too originated with Husserl (Spinelli 1989). It was taken up by the philosopher Alfred Schutz to mean an inter-subjective world which is created by inhabitants of that world. Schutz drew on the work of William James to acknowledge that we may inhabit other levels of reality in our imagination (Schutz 1973; Maloy 1977). But James used ‘lifeworld’ to mean an idiosyncratic world we construct personally: ‘Each of us literally chooses, by way of attending to things, what sort of universe he shall appear to himself to inhabit’ (James 1950: 424), and our sense of reality comes from our own sense of self ‘our own reality…is the ultimate of ultimates for our belief’ (James 1950: 297). Social constructionists in the social sciences much later took up the idea of constructing our own reality (Shotter 1993). I mention this idea of a lifeworld because I was to find many examples in my fieldwork, sometimes described like one continuous ASC to inhabit.

James’s ideas on the individual constructing their everyday world and his emphasis on consciousness as experienced led to my approach of studying ASCs by collecting accounts of them in my fieldwork. I was interested in looking at the unique experience of the individual and how much their ASC experience created a personal sense of the world, akin to James’s assertion of a constructed experience of it.

Perhaps the most well-known model in James’s writings is where he described conscious experience like a wandering ‘stream’ with thoughts as pebbles interrupting the flow (Siegfried 1992). This stream has a unique personal form, it is in constant change, it is sensibly continuous and is largely cognitive (Wild 1980). ‘Consciousness then does not appear to itself chopped up in bits… it is nothing jointed, it flows. A river or stream are the metaphors by which it is most naturally described’ (James 1950: 239). He saw us constructing each moment, so perception and attention were primary for him in experience (Siegfried 1992). He also realized the importance of attention: ‘Each of us literally chooses, by way of attending to things, what sort of a universe he shall appear to himself to inhabit’ (James 1950: 424).

However, there is some debate as to whether James really believed in the existence of consciousness. Instead of consciousness as a container or place Nelson, for example, suggests he saw it as a functional property. It just becomes like a shadow in our alert conscious state (Nelson 2000). Jonathan Bricklin also suggests that James’s model of a stream is somewhat inconsistent, given that he also wrote of it as a chain of discontinuous links which he described as ‘discrete pulses of perception’(Bricklin 2010). But Andrew Bailey also qualifies his criticism of a continuous stream by admitting that James probably meant an undivided stream where we also individuate states within it (Bailey 1999). John Wild points out that although James was influenced by Kant, this idea of a continuous consciousness did not lead him to adopt Kant’s idea of a substantive self or a subjective unifying principle. At the same time James did see this stream having a personal form (Wild 1980). But even if the ‘stream’ is not completely continuous, it describes a phenomenal experience of how most people experience their conscious state, and this was confirmed in my Fieldwork.

My interest in consciousness and ASCs was partly a curiosity about all the areas of experience which are not founded on a clear focus on the everyday world ‘out there’. This also became a key part of James’s model of consciousness. Mangan links James’s work with the Enlightenment where scholars began to realize that conscious and non-conscious elements are involved in cognition (Mangan 2017: 673). He was particularly interested in areas just outside conscious experience such as the ‘subliminal self’ (Myers 1992) and ‘the Fringe’. James divided experience into a kind of nucleus of sensory material and ‘feelings of relation’ or a ‘Fringe’ which is outside our awareness but necessary for cognitive function. In fact the ‘Fringe’ does most of our cognitive work. Essentially it provides context information for nuclei such as the intention to say something and moments between thoughts (Mangan 2017: 676). James explains: ‘Every definite image in the mind is steeped and dyed in the free water that flows round it. With it goes the sense of its relations, near and remote, the dying echo of whence it came to us, the dawning sense of whither it is to lead. The significance, the value, of the image is all in this halo or penumbra that surrounds or escorts it’ (James 1950: 255). Other examples are connecting words like ‘but’ which have a feeling attached, and experiences or names we recognize but cannot name (Bailey 1999). In sum Mangan says the Fringe helps us deal with the unfamiliar, where our regular contextual information is inadequate (Mangan 2017: 682).

More interesting is the recognition that this ‘Fringe’ is also the site of creative thinking, where we try out thoughts and ideas before any clear focus (Baars 1988). These areas appear to have links with ASCs in that there is often a vague sense of conscious experience in between boundaries of ASCs which are not always easily defined. Such an experience forms part of hypnagogic states before sleep (Mavromatis 1987) mentioned earlier.

James’s work inspired my research for several reasons: he made a detailed study of consciousness. Yet he was writing at a time when the field of psychology was relatively new. James did not therefore have the benefit of modern debates and developments in theory, nor modern technology and MIT scans. He relied on introspection which was at that time respectable as a method in science according to Mangan (1999). Secondly, he was concerned to get past physicalism as the site of study and look at what people actually experience, following Husserl. He offers a phenomenal common-sense description of everyday experience. His writings which are relevant to ASCs, particularly mystical states, went beyond the boundaries of scientific enquiry in an effort to establish the nature of consciousness and altered consciousness.

Some Reflections

The study of consciousness was side-lined in psychology, partly because of the dominance of behaviourism, an approach which dismissed any phenomena that cannot be observed. So Skinner saw consciousness as little more than a reaction to stimuli (Skinner 1969; Strange 1978). In recent years, interest in consciousness as a field of inquiry has made the work of James more relevant. Cardena 2018 calls for more research into ASCs. He notes recent research into contemplation and psychedelics. But many other ASCs are ignored. He believes this is partly because ASCs are not treated as a basic aspect of human consciousness and cognition. Cardena finds this all the more surprising, given the beneficial effects of ASCs (Cardena 2018: 254). He suggests that ASCs have been used in most cultures and religions in order to get at ‘a fuller awareness’ of a ‘real reality’ (Cardena 2018: 245). It was partly the lack of research into ASCs which inspired my own research. Anna Abraham describes daydream and mind-wandering as creators of a ‘veritable possibility space’ where consciousness meets imagination (Abraham 2018: 47). Anees Sheikh describes fantasy and imagination as the core of ASCs (Sheikh 1984). This aspect of ASC experience gave me the impetus to start my research.

At the start of this chapter I referred to 3 key problems I had noted when starting my literature search:

  1. 1.

    Lack of agreement on a definition of consciousness. This problem is generally acknowledged in the literature as still lacking a solution and that neuroscience is not the answer. Velmans, whose pioneering work I discussed earlier in this chapter, explains that consciousness cannot be reduced to the same physical substance as the brain (Velmans and Nagasawa 2012: 8). Consciousness cannot be defined in a materialist sense because it is our experience of the phenomenal world that we construct for ourselves (Velmans 2009).

  2. 2.

    Whilst correlates may be found between neurons and phenomenal experience, the link is still not explained (Snider 2017: 22‒23).

  3. 3.

    There is a paucity of research into ASCs and Cardena (2018) reports that this remains an ongoing problem.

Although my own research was experiential, I found the studies reviewed in this chapter very exciting and holding promise for the future of consciousness studies. They are giving more and more insight into neural processes. However, I maintain that the insights gained will not go very far in defining consciousness. This is because it lies beyond anything material, a point made by Velmans mentioned earlier in this chapter (Velmans and Nagasawa 2012: 8; Velmans 2005: 293). When I was 3 my parents bought a radiogram. It was a large wood cupboard housing a radio and a record player. One day they found me searching inside the cupboard. I said I was looking for the people I could hear on the radio. I was reminded of this experience when I found that neuroscientific studies of consciousness give us a mechanical structure but not the signal of our conscious experience. William James recognized this with his ‘transmissive’ theory. James rejected the popular view amongst contemporaries that the brain somehow produces consciousness via neurochemical reactions. Instead a transmissive account suggests that consciousness pre-exists the brain and that the brain transmits consciousness, rather like a radio receiving and then transmitting a radio signal (Barnard 2014: 45, 46). Nevertheless I am hopeful that scholars from across the spectrum of theories and methodologies around consciousness will work more and more together to our common end.

In the next chapter I will explore some of the literature which proved more useful for my own research into ASCs. This is the work of Transpersonal psychologists, including William James and why he came to be seen as a founder of the Transpersonal movement in psychology.