Within the depth-psychology corpus broadly construed, 'network' operates across at least three analytically distinct registers that nonetheless converge on a shared insight: that mind, affect, and selfhood are constitutively relational rather than localised. In cognitive neuroscience and affective science—represented here by Barrett, Menon, Craig, Carhart-Harris, and Paulus—the term designates large-scale functional brain systems (default mode network, salience network, central executive network, interoceptive network) whose reciprocal coupling and dynamic switching underlie emotion construction, predictive processing, and self-regulation. Barrett's account of the interoceptive network as the substrate for emotion construction is paradigmatic of this position. Menon's tripartite network model formalises the switching logic that has become foundational for understanding psychopathology. A second register, represented by Thompson, treats the network as a figure for autopoietic biological organisation: the metabolic network of the cell that recursively regenerates both its components and its boundary is the minimal prototype for mind-in-life. A third, more classical connectionist usage appears in Thompson's account of artificial neural networks as candidate models of cognition. Allan's cognitive-linguistic usage—semantic category networks—bridges biological and computational concerns through the notion of polysemy. The central tension is between network-as-substrate (fixed functional architecture) and network-as-process (dynamically reconfigured, entropy-sensitive, state-dependent). Carhart-Harris's entropic-brain thesis sharpens this tension by treating increased network entropy as constitutive of primary states of consciousness. Across all registers, network thinking displaces the classical location of mental functions in discrete regions, insisting instead on distributed, emergent, and relational organisation.
In the library
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My lab has discovered that these regions form an interoceptive network that is intrinsic in your brain, analogous to your networks for vision, hearing, and other senses. The interoceptive network issues predictions about your body
Barrett argues that interoception is sustained by a dedicated, intrinsic brain network whose core function is predictive modelling of the body, making it the neurobiological substrate of constructed emotion.
Barrett, Lisa Feldman, How Emotions Are Made: The Secret Life of the Brain, 2017thesis
the central executive network (CEN), whose key nodes include the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC), and posterior parietal cortex (PPC) and the default mode network (DMN)… During the performance of cognitively demanding tasks, the CEN typically shows increases in activation, whereas the DMN shows decreases
Menon establishes the antagonistic coupling of CEN and DMN as the organisational backbone of a three-network model that anchors contemporary accounts of cognitive control and psychopathology.
Menon, Vinod, Saliency, switching, attention and control: a network model of insula function, 2010thesis
in order to comprehend insula function it is important to not only understand cognitive and affective tasks which modulate activity in this region, but to also identify the functional circuits that are associated with it
Menon proposes a 'network perspective' as the methodological prerequisite for understanding the insula's role in bridging homeostatic, affective, and cognitive processing.
Menon, Vinod, Saliency, switching, attention and control: a network model of insula function, 2010thesis
Within this boundary, the cell comprises a metabolic network… the metabolic network is able to regenerate its own components, including the components that make up the membrane boundary
Thompson grounds the concept of network in autopoietic biology, where the metabolic network is the self-generating, self-bounding organisation that defines life at its minimal unit.
Thompson, Evan, Mind in Life: Biology, Phenomenology, and the Sciences of Mind, 2007thesis
the transition from normal waking consciousness to primary consciousness is marked by an increase in system entropy… INCREASED NETWORK ENTROPY IN THE PSYCHEDELIC STATE
Carhart-Harris advances the entropic-brain thesis, arguing that psychedelics disorganise the brain's normally stable network configurations, producing the unconstrained cognition characteristic of primary consciousness.
Carhart-Harris, Robin, The Entropic Brain: A Theory of Conscious States Informed by Neuroimaging Research with Psychedelic Drugs, 2014thesis
the AIC and ACC bilaterally serve as a 'core control network' that guides brain function by engaging and dise[ngaging other networks]
Craig identifies the AIC-ACC dyad as a multiplex 'core control network' that coordinates all other large-scale brain networks and thereby orchestrates the moment-to-moment regulation of feeling and behaviour.
Craig, A.D. Bud, How Do You Feel? An Interoceptive Moment with Your Neurobiological Self, 2014thesis
This physiological multiplexing allows it to guide behavior by controlling the selection and timing of active networks, by serving as a link for the exchange of information between different networks
Craig elaborates how the core control network achieves inter-network coordination through physiological multiplexing, supplying the computational resource for flexible, context-sensitive behaviour.
Craig, A.D. Bud, How Do You Feel? An Interoceptive Moment with Your Neurobiological Self, 2014supporting
DMN regions are centers of dense connectivity, implying that they serve as important connector hubs for information integration and routing… this functional centrality of the DMN is not shared by other brain networks
Carhart-Harris positions the DMN as the apex of a functional hierarchy by virtue of its uniquely dense connectivity, making it the primary orchestrator of information flow across the entire network architecture.
Carhart-Harris, Robin, The Entropic Brain: A Theory of Conscious States Informed by Neuroimaging Research with Psychedelic Drugs, 2014supporting
the anterior insula is important for translating emotional salience into activation of the cognitive control network to implement goal-directed behavior
Paulus frames the anterior insula as a transduction hub that converts interoceptive salience into network-level cognitive control, with direct implications for understanding addiction as a network disorder.
Paulus, Martin P., Interoception and drug addiction, 2013supporting
the anterior insula is important for translating emotional salience into activation of the cognitive control network to implement goal-directed behavior
Paulus (2014) reiterates the translational role of the anterior insula between the salience network and cognitive control systems, emphasising its relevance for addiction neuroscience.
Paulus, Martin P., Interoception and drug addiction, 2014supporting
the insula is critical for translation of sensory and limbic affective information for use in decision-making processes, executive control, and goal-directed behavior via activation of executive control networks
Lovelock frames network connectivity—particularly insula-mediated switching between salience and default mode networks—as the neurobiological mechanism through which alcohol disrupts interoceptive regulation.
Lovelock, Dennis F., Interoception and alcohol: Mechanisms, networks, and implications, 2021supporting
The network is trained to convert numerical (rather than symbolic) input representations into numerical output representations… Such cognitive performances correspond to emergent patterns of activity in the network
Thompson surveys connectionist artificial neural networks as a computational paradigm that models cognition through emergent, distributed patterns rather than explicit symbolic representations.
Thompson, Evan, Mind in Life: Biology, Phenomenology, and the Sciences of Mind, 2007supporting
the reaction network which characterizes the organization of the system must produce all the species of molecular component which are considered to materially constitute the system, and these components must themselves generate the reaction network
Thompson explicates the autopoietic condition of mutual constitution between reaction network and system boundary, establishing the logical circularity at the heart of living organisation.
Thompson, Evan, Mind in Life: Biology, Phenomenology, and the Sciences of Mind, 2007supporting
A prediction originates as a multisensory summary, representing the goal of the concept, in a portion of the interoceptive network known as the default mode network
Barrett locates the origin of predictive concept formation within the default mode network as a sub-region of the broader interoceptive network, integrating predictive processing theory with network neuroscience.
Barrett, Lisa Feldman, How Emotions Are Made: The Secret Life of the Brain, 2017supporting
Your brain has a network to help resolve these uncertainties, known as your control network. This is the same network that transforms an infant's 'lantern' of attention into the adult 'spotlight' you have now.
Barrett identifies the control network as the neural system that resolves competing predictions during conceptualisation, linking developmental maturation to network-level attentional dynamics.
Barrett, Lisa Feldman, How Emotions Are Made: The Secret Life of the Brain, 2017supporting
All animals regulate their body budget to stay alive, so they all must have an interoceptive network of some sort.
Barrett grounds the interoceptive network in evolutionary biology, arguing that some form of interoceptive network is a universal requirement for homeostatic regulation across the animal kingdom.
Barrett, Lisa Feldman, How Emotions Are Made: The Secret Life of the Brain, 2017supporting
functional neuroimaging studies using resting state, task-related, and structural connectivity measures have shown that individual brain structures are organized in functional network
Paulus situates drug addiction within a network-organisation framework, arguing that interoceptive dysfunction in addiction must be understood at the level of large-scale functional systems rather than isolated structures.
Paulus, Martin P., Interoception and drug addiction, 2013supporting
functional neuroimaging studies using resting state, task-related, and structural connectivity measures have shown that individual brain structures are organized in functional network
Paulus (2014) reaffirms the network-organisation account of addiction, underscoring that resting-state connectivity reveals system-level pathology beyond any single structure's dysfunction.
Paulus, Martin P., Interoception and drug addiction, 2014supporting
stimulants reduced within- and between-network functional connectivity in central executive, salience, and default networks… enhanced salience–central executive and salience–default network coupling may reflect deficits in context-dependent engagement
Yang demonstrates that stimulant-mediated symptom improvement in ADHD operates through normalisation of inter-network connectivity, vindicating the tripartite network model as a framework for psychopharmacological intervention.
Yang, Zhen, Neural correlates of symptom improvement following stimulant treatment in adults with ADHDsupporting
Metastable brain states allow for the flexible reconfiguration of neural networks while avoiding extreme integrative or segregative brain configurations
Siegel invokes metastability theory to argue that healthy neural-network dynamics require a balance between integration and differentiation, making network flexibility the neurobiological signature of adaptive executive function.
Siegel, Daniel J., The Developing Mind: How Relationships and the Brain Interact to Shape Who We Are, 2020supporting
we have neural networks around both the intestines and the heart, which preceded, in our evolutionary history, the emergence of the extensive networks of interlinked neurons inside the skull
Siegel extends the network concept beyond the skull-based brain, locating enteric and cardiac neural networks as evolutionarily prior systems that complicate any purely encephalocentric account of mind.
Siegel, Daniel J., The Developing Mind: How Relationships and the Brain Interact to Shape Who We Are, 2020supporting
The processing is further assisted by support networks such as the default mode network and by normal modulation signals hailing from brain-stem nuclei and basal forebrain nuclei
Damasio situates large-scale support networks, including the default mode network, as modulatory auxiliaries to sensory integration within the cortical hierarchy.
Damasio, Antonio R., The strange order of things life, feeling, and the making, 2018supporting
Seeley et al. (2007) used region-of-interest (ROI) and independent component analyses (ICA) of resting-state fMRI data to demonstrate the existence of an independent brain network
Menon reviews the methodological evidence establishing the salience network as a distinct, empirically isolable functional system via resting-state connectivity analysis.
Menon, Vinod, Saliency, switching, attention and control: a network model of insula function, 2010supporting
The interoceptive network is made up of two overlapping networks that go by many other names, depending on the interests of the scientists who named them
Barrett clarifies the terminological complexity surrounding the interoceptive network, acknowledging its overlap with the default mode and salience networks under different scientific naming conventions.
Barrett, Lisa Feldman, How Emotions Are Made: The Secret Life of the Brain, 2017supporting
The default mode and salience networks go by many names (Barrett and Satpute 2013)
Barrett notes in an endnote the proliferation of aliases for major brain networks, pointing to a bibliographic resource for navigating the terminological landscape.
Barrett, Lisa Feldman, How Emotions Are Made: The Secret Life of the Brain, 2017aside
historical expansion of an aorist form through the network will follow the pathways of the semantic links… the extending form will not 'jump over' from middle use A to middle use C, without affecting the intermediate use B
Allan applies a semantic-network model to Ancient Greek morphology, arguing that polysemous forms spread through contiguous pathways in the network, providing an empirical constraint on historical semantic analysis.
Allan, Rutger, The Middle Voice in Ancient Greek A Study of Polysemy, 2003supporting
In order to grasp the idea of a complex category network, it may be useful to have a look at an example of a lexical category given by Langacker himself
Allan introduces Langacker's cognitive-grammar notion of a category network to model the polysemous structure of the Greek middle voice, treating semantic complexity as an organised network of usage events.
Allan, Rutger, The Middle Voice in Ancient Greek A Study of Polysemy, 2003supporting
the enhancement of network control by the right AIC underscores its fundamental significance for every aspect of adult human life
Craig emphasises the developmental significance of right-AIC network control, arguing that childhood education shapes the very network capacities most central to adult interoceptive and emotional competence.
Craig, A.D. Bud, How Do You Feel? An Interoceptive Moment with Your Neurobiological Self, 2014aside
more networks being engaged during medication sessions emerged for the retrieval condition as well
Wong reports that stimulant medication recruits a broader set of networks during working-memory retrieval in ADHD, illustrating pharmacological modulation of network engagement.
Wong, Christina G., The Effects of Stimulant Medication on Working Memory Functional Connectivity in Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorderaside
functioning as a 'living organ' of a larger social ecosystem—such as a city, a region, or a global community—that it helps to sense and see itself in order to co-shape its next wave of collective opportunities
Siegel extends network metaphors beyond neuroscience to social systems, describing universities as living nodes within ecosystemic networks of collective sense-making and change.
Siegel, Daniel J., The Developing Mind: How Relationships and the Brain Interact to Shape Who We Are, 2020aside