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Introduction to Psychology > Chapter 4 - Consciousness > Flashcards

Chapter 4 - Consciousness Flashcards

1
Q

What is the gateway to consciousness?

A

Attention

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2
Q

How can people manipulate consciousness?

A

Meditation

Drugs

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3
Q

When does consciousness shift everyday?

A

When we sleep

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4
Q

Consciousness

A

One’s moment-to-moment subjective experience of the world

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5
Q

Qualia

A

The qualitative experiences of your conscious state

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6
Q

Why can’t we know if two people’s experiences, or quali, are the same?

A

Each of us experiences consciousness personally

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7
Q

How is consciousness limited?

A

You are able to fully process only a limited amount of the information available to you at any given time

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8
Q

Change blindness

A

A failure to notice large changes in one’s environment

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9
Q

Study for change blindness procedure

A

Stranger was momentarily blocked by a large object and, while out of view, was replaced with another person of the same sex and race.

50% of the people giving directions never noticed they were talking to a different person

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10
Q

Findings on change blindness based on age

A

Older people were less likely to notice a change in the person’s asking them for directions, whereas younger people did better

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11
Q

Finding on change blindness based on categories

A

This finding supports the idea that the students encoded the strangers as belonging to a broad category of construction workers without looking more closely at them.

For these students, construction workers seemed pretty much all alike and interchangeable

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12
Q

Findings on change blindness based on looking at cell phones

A

Students using cell phones while walking across campus failed to notice a brightly coloured close riding a unicycle who was heading toward their walking path.

Students who were listening to music were much more likely to notice the clown

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13
Q

Shadowing

A

In this procedure, the participant receives a different auditory message in each ear.

The participant is required to repeat, or ‘shadow’ only one of the messages

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14
Q

What do all models of attention agree on?

A

More recent models of attention have revised the nature of the attention filter, but they all propose some type of gateway to prioritise processing and awareness of relevant information

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15
Q

Endogenous attention

A

Attention that is directed voluntarily

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16
Q

Exogenous attention

A

Attention that is directed involuntarily by a stimulus

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17
Q

Relationship between conscious awareness and response in the brain study

A

Brain activity in these regions followed the conscious perception of the face or house, which varied depending on how the participants allocated their attention

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18
Q

What can provide insights into their conscious experiences?

A

People share common patterns of brain activity

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19
Q

Why students often feel they are not missing anything when they multitask

A

They have the illusion that you were paying attention because you have no awareness of events that happened when your attention was otherwise occupied

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20
Q

Freudian slip

A

Occurs when an unconscious thought is suddenly expressed at an inappropriate time or in an inappropriate social context

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21
Q

Findings of selective listening studies

A

Found that even when participant’s could not repeat an unattended message, they still had processed its contents

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22
Q

What can processing of irrelevant details of attended stimuli also unconsciously influence?

A

Behaviour

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23
Q

Priming

A

A facilitation in the response to a stimulus due to recent experience with that stimulus or a related stimulus

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24
Q

Subliminal perception

A

The processing of information by sensory systems without conscious awareness

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25
Q

Subliminal messages effect on behaviour

A

If they work at all, have minimal effects on most behaviour

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26
Q

Study on subliminal messages based on tapes

A

This research indicated that people’s beliefs about which tapes they listened to influenced the effects of the messages.

People who thought they were hearing subliminal messages about memory reported improved memory, even if they heard the self confidence tape

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27
Q

Subliminal images studies findings on brain regions

A

These studies found that the subliminal images of money and of frightening stimuli produce activity in brain regions involved in emotion and motivation

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28
Q

Automatic processing occurs when?

A

When a task is so well learned that we can do it without much attention

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29
Q

Benefit of automatic processing

A

It allows us to devote our limited consciousness to there tasks

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30
Q

Effect of attention on automatic processing

A

Paying too much attention can interfere with automatic behaviours

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31
Q

Stroop task procedure

A

Participants are asked to identify as quickly as possible the colour in which letter strings are printed

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32
Q

How does subjective consciousness vary?

A

Varies naturally over the course of the day

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33
Q

Altered consciousness

A

Being in a state that changes your subjective perception of consciousness from how you typically experience it is referred to as altered consciousness

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34
Q

Meditation

A

A mental procedure that focuses attention on an external object, an internal event, or a sense of awareness

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35
Q

Concentrative meditation

A

Focus attention on one thing, such as your breathing pattern, a mental image, or a specific phrase (sometimes called mantra)

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36
Q

Mindfulness mediation

A

You let your thoughts flow freely, paying attention to them but trying not to react to them

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37
Q

Early studies found what benefits in meditation?

A

Lower blood pressure

Fewer reports of stress

Changes in the hormonal responses underlying stress

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38
Q

Findings on the study based on meditation training

A

Those who underwent the meditation training showed greater stress reduction and more significant improvement in attention than did the group that underwent relaxation training

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39
Q

Findings of study on meditation about brain

A

Participants who underwent an eight week meditation course not only reported less anxiety but also exhibited patterns of brain electrical activity that had previously been shown to correlate with positive emotional states

This pattern of brain activity was correlated with measures of enhanced immune function

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40
Q

What have researchers found about long term meditation?

A

Some researchers have suggested that long term meditation not only changes brain activity patterns but also affects brain anatomy or structure and helps maintain brain function over the life span

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41
Q

Runners’ high

A

One minute a person might feel pain and fatigue, and the next minute euphoria and a glorious release of energy

This state which is partially mediated by physiological processes results in a shift in consciousness

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42
Q

Religious ecstasy

A

Religious ceremonies often decrease awareness of the external world and create feelings of euphoria

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43
Q

The concept of flow

A

A particular kind of experience that is so engrossing and enjoyable that it is worth doing for its own sake even though it may have no consequence outside itself

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44
Q

The selective appeal of escapist entertainment

A

That it detracts people from selecting on their problems or their failure, thereby helping them avoid feeling bad about themselves

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45
Q

Hypnosis

A

A social interaction during which a person responding to suggestions, experiences changes in memory, perception, and/or voluntary action

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46
Q

What happens during a hypnotic induction?

A

The hypnotist makes a series of suggestions to at least one person

As the listener falls more deeply into the hypnotic state, the hypnotist makes more suggestions

If everything goes according to plan, the listener followed all the suggestions without hesitation

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47
Q

Post hypnotic suggestion

A

Sometimes the hypnotist suggests that, after the hypnosis session, the listener will experience a change in memory, perception, or voluntary action

Such suggestion is usually accompanied by the instruction to not remember the suggestion

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48
Q

Hypnotic suggestibility seems related to what?

A

Suggestibility seems related less to obvious traits such as intelligence and gullibility than to the tendencies to get absorbed in actives easily, to not be distracted easily, and to have a rich imagination

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49
Q

Sociocognitive theory of hypnosis

A

Hypnotised people behave as they expect hypnotised people to behave, even if those expectations are faulty.

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50
Q

Neodissociation theory of hypnosis

A

Acknowledges the importance of social context to hypnosis, but it views the hypnotic state as an altered state

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51
Q

One of the most powerful uses of hypnosis is hypnotic analgesia, which is

A

A form of pain reduction

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52
Q

Example of hypnotic analgesia

A

Plunging an arm into extremely cold water will cause high pain and cannot be done for long

People with hypnotic analgesia can do it for much longer

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53
Q

Circadian rhythms

A

Biological patterns that occur at regular intervals as a function of time of day

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54
Q

Sleepless gene

A

Regulates a protein that, like many aesthetics reduces action potentials in the brain

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55
Q

Why is sufficient sleep important?

A

For memory and good health and is often affected by physiological disorders, such as depression

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56
Q

Where does information about light detached by the eyes go to?

A

Sent to a small region of the hypothalamus called the suprachiasmatic nucleus

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57
Q

What does the suprachiasmatic nucleus do?

A

Sends signals to a tiny structure called the pineal gland

58
Q

What does the pineal gland do?

A

Secretes melatonin

59
Q

What is the function of melatonin?

A

A hormone that travels through the blood stream and affects various receptor in the body, including the brain

60
Q

Effect of bright light on melatonin

A

Suppresses melatonin production

61
Q

How can melatonin help?

A

Help cope with jet lag and shift work

Help to fall asleep

62
Q

How is your mind aware of your surroundings whiles you sleep?

A

Analysing potential dangers, controlling body movements, and shifting body parts to maximise comfort

63
Q

What is the use of the electroencephalograph (EEG)?

A

The machine measures the brain’s electrical activity

64
Q

What does the EEG show?

A

Neurones in the brain are extremely active

The EEG shows this activity as short, frequent, irregular brain signals known as beta waves

The people focus their attention on something or when they close their eyes and relax, brain activity slows and becomes more regular. This is known as alpha waves

65
Q

Stage 1 of sleep

A

The EEG shows short bursts of irregular waves called theta waves

You can easily be aroused and if awakened you will probably deny that you were asleep

66
Q

Stage 2 of sleep

A

Your breathing becomes more regular and you become less sensitive to external stimulation

Now you are really asleep

Although the EEG continues to show theta waves, it also shows occasional bursts of activity called sleep spindles and large waves called K-complexes

67
Q

Two findings indicate that the brain must work to maintain sleep

A

First, abrupt noises can trigger K-complexes

Second, as people age and sleep more lightly, their EEGs show fewer sleep spindles

68
Q

Stages 3 and 4

A

This period is marked by large, regular brain patterns called delta waves and is is often referred to as slow wave sleep

People in slow wave sleep are to wake and are often disoriented when they do wake up

69
Q

REM sleep

A

The stage of sleep marked by rapid eye movements, paralysis of motor systems, and dreaming

70
Q

Why is REM sleep sometimes called paradoxical sleep?

A

Because of the paradox of a sleeping body with an active brain

71
Q

How does the body show arousal during REM sleep?

A

Most males of all ages develop erections, and most females of all ages experience clitoral engorgement

72
Q

Percentage of people who report dreaming when waken up from REM sleep

A

80%

73
Q

Dreams

A

Products of an altered state of consciousness in which images and fantasises are confused with reality

74
Q

How long do people spend dreaming

A

On average, people spend six years of their lives dreaming

75
Q

REM dreams

A

More likely to be bizarre

May involve intense emotions, visual and auditory hallucinations and an uncritical acceptance of illogical events

76
Q

Non REM dreams

A

Often dull

May concern mundane activities such as deciding what clothes to wear or taking notes in class

77
Q

Relation of REM and dream state

A

REM does not produce the dream state

REM is simply correlated with the contents of dreams

78
Q

What did Freud speculate about dreams?

A

That dreams contain hidden content that represents unconscious conflicts within the mind of the dream

79
Q

Manifest content

A

Is the dream the dreamer remembers it

80
Q

Latent content

A

What the dream symbolises

It is the material that has been disguised to protect the dreamer from confronting a conflict directly

81
Q

Activation synthesis hypothesis

A

A hypothesis of dreaming proposing that the brain tries to make sense of random brain activity that occurs during sleep by synthesising the activity with stored memories

82
Q

Conscious experience of most dreams is fairly similar to waking life, with some intriguing differences. What are they?

A

Includes:

Lack of self awareness

Reduced attention and voluntary control

Increased emotionality

Poor memory

83
Q

Why is it difficult to research about dreams?

A

Because people often do not remember their dreams

84
Q

Finding of study on dreams and brain activity

A

Found that the brain activity associated with the content of the dream was similar to brain activity observed when people were looking at the related pictures

85
Q

Some dolphins have unihemispherical sleep. What does that mean?

A

The cerebral hemispheres take turns sleeping

86
Q

Research suggests sleep is adaptive for three functions:

A

Restoration

Avoiding danger at certain times of the day

Facilitation of learning

87
Q

Restorative theory

A

Sleep allows the body, incline the brain to rest and repair itself

88
Q

Evidence for restorative theory based on sports

A

After people engage in vigorous physical activity, such as running a marathon, they generally sleep longer than usual

89
Q

Evidence for restorative theory based on growth

A

Growth hormone, released primarily during deep sleep, facilities the rear of damaged tissue

90
Q

New research on the benefit of sleep for the restorative theory

A

Researchers have demonstrated that sleep may help the brain clear out metabolic by products of neural acuity, which can be toxic if they build up

These by products are cleared by interstitial space - fluid filled space between the cells of the brain

91
Q

Effect of 2 or 3 days of sleep deprivation surprising results

A

It has little effect on strength, athletic ability, or the performance of complex tasks

92
Q

Negative effects of short sleep deprivation

A

People find it more difficult to perform quiet tasks such as reading

Find it impossible to do mundane tasks

93
Q

Effects of long sleep deprivation

A

Causes mood problems and decreases cognitive performance

94
Q

Symptoms of chronic sleep deprivation patients

A

Experiences of attention lapses and reduced short term memory

95
Q

Reason of symptoms of chronic deprivation patients?

A

Perhaps in part because of the accumulation of metabolic by products of neural activity

96
Q

Why is sleep deprivation also dangerous?

A

Makes people prone to micro sleeps, in which they fall asleep during the day for period ranging from a few seconds to a minute

97
Q

Sleep deprivation possible benefit

A

When people are suffering from depression, depriving them of sleep sometimes alleviates their depression

This effect appears to occur because sleep deprivation leads to increased activation of serotonin receptors, as do drugs used to treat depression

98
Q

Circadian rhythm theory

A

Proposes that sleep has evolved to keep animals quiet and inactive during times of the day when there is the greatest danger, usually when it is dark

99
Q

Finding of learning during sleep study

A

Those who then slept for 90 minutes performed better on the maze afterward than the sleepless competitors did

Those who dreamed about the maze, however, performed the best

100
Q

Findings of the effect of sleep deprivation on memory

A

Sleep deprived students also showed poorer memory at subsequent testing

According to the investigators, there is substantial evidence that sleep not only consolidates mores but also seems to prepare the brain for tis more needs for the next day

101
Q

Insomnia

A

A disorder characterised by an inability to sleep that causes significant problems in daily living

102
Q

What is the estimate of people with insomnia

A

An estimated 12 to 20 percent of adults have insomnia

More common in women than in men and in older adults

103
Q

Why is it difficult to estimate how many people have insomnia?

A

Many people who believe they are poor sleepers overstimate how long it takes them to fall asleep and often understate how much sleep they get on a typical night

104
Q

Pseudoinsomnia

A

People dream they are not sleeping

105
Q

What is a major cause of insomnia

A

People worrying about sleep

106
Q

What is the most successful treatment for insomnia?

A

Combines drug therapy with cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT)

107
Q

Obstructive sleep apnea

A

A disorder in which people, while asleep, stop breathing because their throat closes

The condition results in frequent awakening during the night

108
Q

Effect of chronic apnea

A

Poor sleep which leads to daytime fatigue and problems such as an inability to concentrate while driving

Associated with cardiovascular problems and stroke

109
Q

Continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP)

A

During sleep, this device blows air into the persons’s nose or nose and mouth

110
Q

Narcolepsy

A

A sleep disorder in which people experience excessive sleepiness during normal waking hours, sometimes going limp and collapsing

111
Q

Evidence suggests that people with narcolepsy have

A

Low levels of a neurochemical that regulates wakefulness and REM sleep and that genetic may play a role in the development of narcolepsy

112
Q

REM behaviour disorder

A

Roughly the opposite of narcolepsy

The normal paralysis that accompanies REM sleep is disabled

113
Q

How to get a good night’s sleep?

A

Plan

Know your priorities

Stick to the plan

Practice saying no

114
Q

How to get a good night’s sleep when in bed

A

Establish a regular routine

Avoid alcohol and caffeine just before going to bed

Exercise regularly

Remember, your bed is for sleeping

Relax

Do not try to catch up on sleep

Avoid electronic devices late at night

115
Q

Effect of brain injury and drugs on conscious experience

A

Changes in brain structure through injury and changes in brain chemistry through drugs can profoundly change conscious experience

116
Q

Traumatic brain injury (TBI)

A

Impairments in mental functioning caused by a blow to or very sharp movement of the head

117
Q

What is TBI responsible for?

A

30% of all injury deaths

Substantial cause of disabilities that can last from days to decades

Can impair thinking, memory, emotions, and personality

118
Q

The greater the severity father injury…

A

The greater the chance that TBI is to be permanent

119
Q

Concussion

A

Include mental confusion, dizziness, a dazed look, memory problems, and sometimes the temporary loss of consciousness

120
Q

How many sport related concussions occur in the US every year?

A

Between 1.7 and 3 million

121
Q

Consciousness when in a coma

A

In this state, they have sleep/wake cycles - they open their eyes and appear to be awake

122
Q

What are some people during their comas

A

Some people in comas are conscious of what is happening around them

123
Q

What happens when people appear to have emerged from a coma?

A

They do not respond to external stimuli for more than a month, they are in a condition called unresponsive wakefulness syndrome

124
Q

Minimally conscious state

A

Some people who emerge from a coma are able to make deliberate movements, such as following an object with their eyes

They may even try to communicate

125
Q

What have researchers found on comas and consciousness?

A

Found that measuring brain metabolism via positron emission tomography imaging can identify which patients in unresponsive states are likely to regain consciousness

126
Q

Brain death

A

Irreversible loss of brain function

Unlike patients with unresponsive wakefulness, they show no activity in any region of the brain

127
Q

Psychoactive drugs

A

Causes changes in mood, awareness thoughts, feelings, or behaviour

128
Q

How do psychoactive drugs cause change to the brain’s neurochemistry?

A

By activating neurotransmitter systems

Either by imitating the brain’s natural

Or change the activity of particular neurotransmitter receptors

129
Q

Stimulants

A

Drugs that increase behavioural and mental activity

Stimulate or heighten activity of the central nervous system

130
Q

Depressants

A

Have the opposite effect of stimulants

Reduce behavioural and mental activity by depressing the central nervous system

131
Q

Opioids also known as narcotics

A

These drugs, derived from the opium poppy, bind with a special type of receptor in the brain and, in doing so, mimic the action of the neurotransmitter endorphins to help relieve pain

Opioids also provide intense feelings of pleasure, relaxation, and euphoria

132
Q

How does cocaine produce its stimulating effects?

A

By increasing the concentration of dopamine in the synapse

133
Q

What does amphetamines do?

A

They are stimulants that increase dopamine in the synapse

134
Q

Effects of amphetamines?

A

Their primary effect is to reduce fatigue

Amphetamines have a long history of use for weight loss and for staying awake

135
Q

Negative effects of amphetamines

A

Insomnia

Anxiety

Potential addiction

136
Q

How does methamphetamines work?

A

By blocking the reuptake of dopamine and increasing its release, methamphetamine produces high levels of dopamine in the synapse

Also stays longer in the body than most drugs

137
Q

Why can opioids be highly addictive?

A

Because they have dual physical effects

They increase pleasure by binding with mu opioid receptors and increase wanting of the drug by indirectly activating dopamine receptors

138
Q

What does marijuana do?

A

Like depressants, marijuana decreases reaction times and impairs motor coordination, memory formation, and the recall of recently learned information

139
Q

How long does THC stay in the body?

A

Up to 1 month unlike alcohol

140
Q

What is MDMA associated with?

A

Compared with amphetamines, MDMA is associated with less dopamine activity and more serotonin activity.

The serotonin release may explain ecstasy’s hallucinogenic properties

141
Q

Potential benefits of MDMA

A

Growing evidence suggests that MDMA may have potential benefits for use in the treatment of post traumatic stress disorder

Also may help those with autism cope with social anxiety

142
Q

What does alcohol do?

A

Inhibits neural activity by activating GABA receptors

GABA reception may also be the primary mechanism by which alcohol interferes with motor coordination and results in slowed reaction time

Introduction to Psychology (10 decks)

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