Summary: New research examines why consciousness evolved and what studying birds reveals about its biological purpose. The work identifies three distinct forms of consciousness—basic arousal, general alertness, and reflexive self-awareness—each providing different adaptive benefits for survival, learning, and social coordination.
Pain and pleasure function as early alarm and reinforcement systems that enhance survival by helping organisms detect threats and learn from outcomes. More advanced forms of self-consciousness allow some animals, including humans, to reflect, plan, and navigate social environments more effectively.
Key Facts:
- Three types of consciousness: Basic arousal (an emergency alarm), general alertness (selective attention and learning), and reflexive consciousness (self-reflection and planning).
- Evolutionary sequence: Basic arousal likely appeared first; higher-order forms of self-awareness developed later and in parallel.
- Bird insights: Birds demonstrate that different brain architectures can evolve similar functional solutions for conscious processing, supporting broader evolutionary hypotheses.
Source: RUB
What is the evolutionary advantage of consciousness, and what can bird behavior and brain anatomy teach us about it? Researchers at Ruhr University Bochum have published two articles addressing these questions.
Consciousness research has expanded rapidly in recent decades, yet one central question remains: what function did consciousness originally serve? Understanding its functional role helps explain why some species developed conscious experience while others did not. Comparative studies of birds show that similar conscious functions can arise from very different neural structures.
Research groups led by Professors Albert Newen and Onur Güntürkün at Ruhr University Bochum present their findings in a special issue of Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B (published November 13, 2025).
Why pain and pleasure exist: an evolutionary perspective
Our conscious life includes both pleasurable and painful experiences: enjoying sunlight or music, and suffering injury or persistent negative moods. Why would evolution produce a perceptual system that includes both reward and suffering? Newen and coauthor Carlos Montemayor propose that these experiences reflect distinct adaptive functions.
They distinguish three core types of phenomenal consciousness with different roles: (1) basic arousal, (2) general alertness, and (3) reflexive (self-)consciousness.
Basic arousal likely evolved first as an alarm system that switches the organism into a life-preserving state. Pain is an especially effective signal of bodily damage and threat, prompting rapid defensive responses such as escape or immobilization.
The second stage, general alertness, allows an organism to prioritize and focus on a single element from a stream of competing inputs. This focused attention supports discovery of causal and statistical relationships in the environment—simple associations like smoke indicating fire, and more complex patterns that underpin advanced learning and scientific reasoning.
Reflexive consciousness, which appears in more complex forms in humans and some animals, enables self-reflection, planning, and social coordination. Simple reflexive forms, which evolved alongside the other two types, involve conscious registration of one’s own bodily states, sensations, perceptions, thoughts, and actions—for example, recognizing oneself in a mirror. Such self-representation supports future-directed planning and better integration within social groups.
What birds reveal about conscious perception
Gianmarco Maldarelli and Onur Güntürkün argue that birds display fundamental forms of conscious experience. They review behavioral and neurobiological evidence showing parallels between avian and mammalian consciousness across three domains: sensory consciousness, neural substrates, and self-perception.
Behavioral studies indicate that birds do more than reflexively process stimuli; they can subjectively experience ambiguous inputs. Pigeons, for example, alternate between different interpretations of ambiguous visual displays in ways that resemble human perceptual switching. Corvids show neural activity tied to subjective perception: some neurons respond not to the mere physical presence of a stimulus, but to whether the animal consciously perceives it.
Neuroanatomically, the avian brain contains functionally equivalent structures to mammalian regions implicated in conscious processing. The avian nidopallium caudolaterale (NCL), often compared to the mammalian prefrontal cortex, is highly interconnected and supports flexible integration of information. The avian forebrain connectome shows many similarities to mammals, suggesting birds meet criteria of leading theories of consciousness such as the Global Neuronal Workspace theory and Recurrent Processing accounts.
Regarding self-awareness, some corvids pass classical mirror tests, and other ecologically adapted experiments reveal situational self-recognition in pigeons and chickens. These responses—distinguishing a mirror image from a real conspecific and reacting based on context—indicate basic self-consciousness that likely supports social behavior and environmental interaction.
Taken together, the findings imply that consciousness is evolutionarily older and more widespread than previously thought. Birds demonstrate that conscious processing can occur without a mammalian-style cortex and that different neural architectures can produce analogous functional outcomes.
Key Questions Answered:
A: Early consciousness likely served as an alarm and reinforcement system—using arousal and pain to signal urgent threats and prompt rapid action to preserve life.
A: General alertness enables organisms to focus on the most relevant information, facilitating learning, identifying causal relationships, and making adaptive decisions in complex environments.
A: Reflexive self-consciousness supports reflection, long-term planning, social coordination, and the ability to represent oneself in relation to others—skills that improve survival and cooperation.
Editorial Notes:
- This article was edited by a Neuroscience News editor.
- Journal papers were reviewed in full.
- Additional context and clarity were added by editorial staff.
About this consciousness research news
Author: Albert Newen
Source: RUB
Contact: Albert Newen – RUB
Image: The image is credited to Neuroscience News
Original Research: Open access.
“Three Types of Phenomenal Consciousness and Their Functional Roles: Unfolding the ALARM Theory of Consciousness” by Albert Newen et al., Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B
Open access.
“Conscious Birds” by Onur Güntürkün et al., Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B
Abstract
Three Types of Phenomenal Consciousness and Their Functional Roles: Unfolding the ALARM Theory of Consciousness
The evolutionary origins of consciousness have received limited attention within dominant scientific theories, which often emphasize cortical correlates. To clarify and constrain competing accounts, this work distinguishes three core phenomena of phenomenal consciousness—basic arousal, general alertness, and reflexive (self-)consciousness—and assigns functional roles to each.
Basic arousal functions as an alarm to protect the organism by triggering rapid physiological and behavioral responses. General alertness promotes advanced learning and decision-making by enabling selective attention to salient information. Reflexive consciousness supports future-oriented planning and the capacity to model one’s own and others’ minds, which is important for social coordination.
An evolutionary and functional framing can guide empirical searches for distinct neural correlates of each conscious type and help reconcile divergent theoretical perspectives in consciousness science.
Abstract
Conscious Birds
This article argues that consciousness is not a uniquely human endpoint of evolution but a basic cognitive capacity that may be shared across animal groups. Evidence is reviewed showing that birds exhibit sensory awareness and forms of self-awareness, and that their neural architecture may support these capacities.
Behavioral experiments and neurobiological data are discussed in relation to major theories of consciousness—the Global Neuronal Workspace Theory, Recurrent Processing Theory, and Integrated Information Theory. While current findings are not decisive, avian neurophysiology and anatomy appear compatible with prerequisites for conscious processing as described by GNWT and RPT.