CHAPTER 8 CONSCIOUSNESS LECTURE NOTES Consciousness Attention o Active cognitive processing of a limited amount of information selected from the vast amount of information available to the senses o Selective Attention Tracking one message and ignoring another The Cocktail Party Phenomenon o Research of E Colin Cherry We have the ability to follow one conversatios despite distractions of other conversations Shadowing Mindfulness o Paying deliberate attention to immediate situation at hand o Mindlessness o Attention is generally a purposeful application of our consciousness but it also operates automatically and at different levels Stroop Effect reading is not easily controlled Other theories that explain attention o Filter Theories Donald Broadbent We filter information right after it enters into sensory memory Disproved later when research showed that there is certain information that we can pick up even if not attending to it Your own name o Attentional Resource Theories We have a fixed amount of attention that can be allocated to what the task requires o Multiple pools Levels of Consciousness o Preconscious Contains information that could easily become conscious but is not continuously available Tip of the tongue Most common experience of consciousness Subliminal perception Blindsight Subconscious o Information is not easily accessible o According to Freud information that is too anxiety provoking is repressed kept in the unconscious Repression keeps us from being distressed by the information Still affects our behaviors Near Death Experiences o During this time people undergo unusual psychological experiences Feelings of peace or intense joy Some feel that they have left their bodies Some speak of reunions with friends and family These experience are more common for those who are ill least common for those who commit suicide and between for accident victims o Possible causes Random firing of the dying brain Lack of oxygen Insufficient blood in occipital lobe can lead to tunnel effect Altered States of Consciousness o All altered states of consciousness share certain characteristics Cognitive process tend to be more shallow Perceptions of the self or the rowrld are usually different than when awake Normal inhibitions or control over behavior weaken Sleep o Reticular formation Area of the brain responsible for sleep cycle o No neurotransmitter responsible for this o During sleep people become RELATIVELY but not TOTALLY unaware of outside stimuli o Not clear why we sleep But good sleep is a predictor of longevity Why we sleep o Preservation and Protection One view is that sleep serves an adaptive function Evidence o Sleep patterns vary depending on how much time the animal strives to find food o Sleep patterns vary depending on how well animals can hide themselves when they sleep o Restoration A second view is that we sleep to restore depleted resources and dissipate accumulated waste Sleep has chemical causes Circadian Rhythms o Biological Cycles that last about 24 hours in humans o We tend to sleep about8 hours a day Dogs like to sleep around 16 hours per day The desert spadefoot toad sleeps for about 9 months Snails can sleep for up to 3 years Bullfrogs never sleep o Despite cultural differences most people sleep and wake with the cycle of sunlight Sleep Deprivation o 1 sleepless night Participants appear cheerful and relaxed o 2nd sleepless night Severe exhaustion by 3 30 AM if given long test problems they tend to fall asleep but deny it o 3 sleepless nights Participants are tense and irritable mood swings o Microsleep Occurs by 3rd night People stop what they are doing and stare into space Brain waves resemble those in sleep Visual illusions and hallucinations can occur Auditory hallucinations are most common o After 4 nights Participants become paranoid Stage of Sleep o Awake Alpha waves are active o Stage 1 sleep Alpha waves become smaller and more rapid If awoken feels like thoughts didn t make much sense o Stage 2 Spend more than half of our sleep in this stage Muscle tension is much lower o Stage 3 Delta waves Large and slower than alpha waves Experience delta waves 20 50 of the time o Stage 4 o Delta waves take up more than 50 of this stage Stages of Sleep Continued o The first four stages are known as N REM sleep Non Rapid Eye Movement o The 5th stage is called REM sleep Associated with dreaming About 1 hour after stage 1 Hardest to wake people in this stage Although the brain is active the body is almost entirely paralyzed Sleep Disorders o Insomnia Affects about 15 of adults Another 15 report occasional insomnia Affects primarily women and the elderly o Sedatives Typically decrease REM sleep which is also the most revitalizing Tend to keep working during the day Habit forming o Narcolepsy Uncontrollable urge to fall asleep during the day Loss of consciousness for about 10 to 15 minutes at a time Mostly a disorder of the waking state rather than a sleep disorder Fall right into REM sleep Affects 1 or 2 people in every 1000 o Sleep Apnea A breathing disorder in which a person stops breathing repeatedly Can occur hundreds of times a night Most common in overweight men over 40 Also associated with alcohol consumption o Sleepwalking Somnambulism Able to see walk talk but usually can t remember the episode Usually not accompanied by dreaming Occurs in about 30 of children and 2 to 3 of adults It is a myth that waking a sleepwalker will cause them harm May be more dangerous for you to wake someone up who is sleepwalking since they might be temporarily confused and might strike out Dreams o Calkins We average about 4 dreams per night Dreams draw on people places and happenings of waking life Why do we dream o Freud Dreams allow us to express our unconscious wishes in a disguised way The royal road to the unconscious o Others Dreams represent everyday concerns expressed in language that is specific to dreams o Problems Solving view Dreams are a way for us to work out our problems o Activation Synthesis view Dreams are our interpretations of neutral activity that happens at night Nightmares o Anxiety arousing dreams Tend to increase during times of stress o Most common in children Night Terrors o Sudden awakenings from N REM sleep that are accompanied by feelings of panic Daydreaming o A state of consciousness somewhere between sleeping and being awake that shifts our attention from external input to internal thoughts and images Helps us creatively Disruptive when focus