Ch 4 Consciousness 09 21 2015 William James came up with stream of consciousness Consciousness given time Our awareness of everything around us and in our minds at any Organizes our behavior thoughts sensations and feelings Consciousness is what we call an emergent property o Emergent Properties Complex systems start to behave in ways that you can never predict Text says Generated from a set of action potentials Waking Waking consciousness o When our thoughts feelings and sensations are clear and organized o Kind of our baseline of consciousness Altered states of consciousness o Shifts in the quality or pattern of our mental activity o States in which our waking consciousness are shifted in some o Important bc they give us methods to study the baseline sort of way consciousness o Ex of altered states of consciousness Day dreaming Hypnotic states Meditative states Increased alertness Divided attention attention divided b w two or more tasks Sleep o Sleep the Circadian Rhythm circa diem about a day approximately 24 hours Circadian Rhythms Biological rhythms our body goes through that take about 24 hours Key Players Suprachiasmatic nucleus SCN of the hypothalamus Pineal Gland Melatonin o When it gets dark the SCN triggers the secretion of melatonin from the pineal gland making us feel sleepy o When it gets light the SCN stops the secretion of melatonin allowing the body to waken Other Factors related to sleep Serotonin o Related to sleep regulation Body temperature o The higher the body temperature the o the lower the body temperature the more alert we are sleepier we are Adenosine sleepy o As it builds up we become more o Caffeine adenosine antagonist What happens if you don t sleep Microsleeps seconds Brief periods of sleep that last only a few Missing a single night of sleep You will suffer problems with concentration and simple task performance Sleep Deprivation Symptoms Trembling hands inattention staring off into space droopy eyelids general discomfort psychological symptoms irritability depression mania hallucinations Extended Sleep Deprivation Missing multiple days of sleep no sleep or reduced levels o Significant impairment in functioning Long term sleep deprivation and health o Obesity o Impaired immune system functioning increased inflammatory response The actual answer is WE DON T KNOW there s no definitive answer No one completely understand why we sleep or why we have to sleep Adaptive Theory of Sleep sleep is a product of evolution We ve evolved to sleep primarily to stay away from predators o Predators were nocturnal so we learned to climb into trees and rest at night o Explains why animals humans sleep when they do Restorative Theory of Sleep Sleep is necessary for physical health Why do we sleep Evidence for this theory most of our restoration and repair occurs at night in the 3rd or 4th stages of sleep Gives answer to why we sleep 2 Kinds of Sleep REM Rapid Eye Movement sleep Active sleep o Refers to our brain activity When we re in REM sleep our brain is almost as active as when we re awake and doing stuff Dream during this stage o Where 90 of our dreams happen Voluntary muscles are paralyzed o If we weren t paralyzed we would do absolutely everything we do in our dream Non REM sleep Restful sleep o Our brain is not as active and therefore we don t need to paralyze ourselves Voluntary muscles are not paralyzed Sleeping and Aging Stages of Sleep The older we get the less REM sleep we have the less total sleep we have When we re young we sleep 12 16 hours a day We have much more REM sleep N1 previously Stage 1 light sleep May experience o Hypnagogic images hallucinations or vivid visual events o Hypnic jerk knees legs or whole o If woken usually not aware you were body jerks asleep N2 Stage 2 sleep spindles Sleep spindles brief bursts of activity only lasting a second or two If woken will be aware you were sleeping N3 Stages 3 deep sleep Deepest stage of sleep Body is at it s lowest level of functioning o Temp drops heart rate drops etc Time at which growth occurs neuro growth physical growth regeneration healing If woken you will be pissed REM Sleep 4th stage Body temperature rises to almost waking temperature eye lids move and heart rate increases Brain activity is similar to waking brain activity 90 of dreams take place in REM sleep If woken you ll probably remember being in a dream REM paralysis voluntary muscles are paralyzed Importance of REM sleep o Experience more REM sleep after a stressful day o Experience more non REM sleep after physically demanding day o If deprived of REM sleep you ll experience REM rebound the following night o Infants engage in more REM sleep than adults Period of brain growth and development About 50 of sleep is REM vs adults whose REM sleep is only about 20 of our sleep Your N3 s get smaller as the night goes on N3 is biggest during 1st sleep cycle Dreams Most people don t remember their dreams most people forget their dreams some people dream in black and white but everyone dreams even animals dream Why do we dream According to Freud wish fulfillment o People s repressed conflicts and events cause them problems o Dreams are symbolic representations of past conflicts desires and events stemming from childhood o Manifest content VS latent content Manifest content the actual content of your dream what you re actually dreaming about Latent content what the dream represents or means not directly observable Lucid dreams You become aware you re in a dream and manipulate things in the dream Activation Synthesis Models o Dreams are produced by the pons Inhibits movement Sends signals to the cortex o Since frontal lobes are basically shut down dreams are sometimes bizarre o Activation Information Mode Model Modifies the activation synthesis models Information gathered while awake can have an influence on the synthesis of dreams Information Processing also a theory of why we sleep o Sleep allows us to consolidate process information from the day dreams are a by product of this consolidation Pursuing evidence of these theories is really difficult but why o B c most people forget most of their dreams some forget all of their dreams and in order to test these theories we need to know the content of all of someone s dreams To do this people keep dream journals and write down their dreams right when they wake up This is where most of the data of dreams comes from Better data comes from sleep studies Wake someone up when they re in REM to ask
View Full Document
Unlocking...