prerepresentational

Prerepresentational is an adjective used in cognitive science, philosophy of mind, and related fields to describe processing states or stages that occur before the formation of mental representations of the world. Prerepresentational processes are typically understood as shaping, organizing, or filtering sensory input without encoding propositional content or beliefs about objects and events.

In contrast to representational states, prerepresentational stages do not stand in for external objects; they provide structure for later contentful representations. Examples include basic sensory transduction, feature extraction (such as edges, orientations, and motion), early neural organization like retinotopic maps, and attentional selection that determines which information is forwarded for further processing.

The notion is used to analyze perception and cognition in several frameworks. Some accounts treat prerepresentational processing as unconscious and non-semantic, essential for building stable representations. Others argue that even early processing carries implicit content or probabilistic structure, challenging a strict prerepresentational division.

In philosophy, the term is associated with discussions of non-conceptual content, preconceptual experience, or prerepresentational states in perceptual justification. It also appears in discussions of artificial intelligence and cognitive architectures when describing raw data processing layers prior to symbol formation.

Critics point to difficulties in isolating prerepresentational stages and in specifying their epistemic role. Nonetheless, the concept helps distinguish stages of information processing that precede and are necessary for the formation of representations.