title: Conscious intention and motor cognition.
abstract: The subjective experience of conscious intention is a key component of our mental life. Philosophers studying 'conscious free will' have discussed whether conscious intentions could cause actions, but modern neuroscience rejects this idea of mind-body causation. Instead, recent findings suggest that the conscious experience of intending to act arises from preparation for action in frontal and parietal brain areas. Intentional actions also involve a strong sense of agency, a sense of controlling events in the external world. Both intention and agency result from the brain processes for predictive motor control, not merely from retrospective inference.
authors.affiliation: Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience, University College London, 17 Queen Square, London WC1N 3AR, UK.
authors.forename: Patrick
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Haggard
mesh_terms: D001921:Brain / Q000502:physiology*; D003071:Cognition / Q000502:physiology*; D003243:Consciousness / Q000502:physiology*; D006801:Humans; D033182:Intention; D008280:Magnetics; D009039:Motion Perception / Q000502:physiology*; D009068:Movement / Q000502:physiology*; D009474:Neurons / Q000502:physiology