Visual awareness is thought to result from integration of low- and high-level processing; instances of integration failure provide a crucial window into the cognitive and neural bases of awareness. We present neurophysiological evidence of complex cognitive processing in the absence of awareness, raising questions about the conditions necessary for visual awareness. We describe an individual with a neurodegenerative disease who exhibits impaired visual awareness for the digits 2 to 9, and stimuli presented in close proximity to these digits, due to perceptual distortion. We identified robust event-related potential responses indicating 1) face detection with the N170 component and 2) task-dependent target-word detection with the P3b component, despite no awareness of the presence of faces or target words. These data force us to reconsider the relationship between neural processing and visual awareness; even stimuli processed by a workspace-like cognitive system can remain inaccessible to awareness. We discuss how this finding challenges and constrains theories of visual awareness.

视觉意识被认为是低级和高级处理集成的结果。整合失败的实例提供了进入认知的认知和神经基础的关键窗口。我们提出了在缺乏意识的情况下复杂认知过程的神经生理学证据，这引发了有关视觉意识所必需条件的问题。我们描述了一个神经退行性疾病的人，其对数字2到9的视觉意识受损，并且由于知觉失真而在靠近这些数字的位置呈现出刺激。我们确定了鲁棒的事件相关电位响应，这些响应指示1）使用N170组件进行人脸检测，以及2）使用P3b组件进行任务相关的目标词检测，尽管没有人脸或目标词的存在。这些数据迫使我们重新考虑神经处理和视觉意识之间的关系。即使是像工作区一样的认知系统处理的刺激，也可能无法被意识感知。我们讨论了这一发现如何挑战和限制视觉意识的理论。