Consciousness and Action Control

Abstract

their action-control model, Norman and Shallice (1986) distinguish between habitual, stimulus-driven actions on the one hand and actions that are assumed to be under 'delib-erate conscious control'. It is interesting to note that this terminology implies (for no given reason) that unconscious deliberate control is inconceivable. In the same spirit, Libet (1985) has suggested that consciousness might have a 'veto' that prevents unwanted actions from execution. It is true that this veto idea puts consciousness somewhat later into the information-processing chain than other approaches would imply, but it still follows the tradition of (a) identifying responsible decision making with consciousness and (b) locating this process in between perception and action. The folk-psychological idea underlying these choices is that we, as conscious agents, may not be able to control what we perceive but we do control how we react to that. The possible connection between consciousness, deliberate choice, and action control has many interesting and far-reaching implications, including questions regarding the freedom of choice, social responsibility, and legal accountability. None of these big questions will be addressed in this chapter, which instead will focus on the possible role of consciousness in the planning and selection of rather simple actions, which often consist in just a key-press.