Chapter 5 Flashcards
(83 cards)
Stream of consciousness
Term used by William James to describe the mind as a continuous flow of changing sensations, images, thoughts, and feelings. Basically described what is going on in your head during the day.
Metacognition
The process of thinking about thinking. James called these “fringes” as all the thoughts and feelings that we have about our thoughts. This refers to the example used in class about the study of the happiness of people based on the font of a sentence.
Consciousness
An individual’s awareness of external events and internal sensations under a condition of arousal, including awareness of the self and thoughts about one’s experiences. (aware you are seeing things)
What are the two parts to consciousness?
awareness and arousal
Awareness
The subjective state of being conscious of what is going on. Areas of the prefrontal cortex are associated with awareness. It is considered the global brain network.
Global brain network
Multiple brain areas work together to create consciousness. Assembly of neurons that are thought to work in cooperation to produce the subjective sense of consciousness.
Arousal
A physiological state determined by the reticular activating system. If in the words where it is quiet. A twig snapping is going to grab our attention quickly.
Reticular activating system
A network of structures including the brain stem, medulla, and thalamus that are involved in the experience of arousal and engagement with the environment.
Theory of mind
An individuals’ understanding that they and others think, feel, perceive, and have private experiences.
What are the ideas around the Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD)?
Called a “spectrum” disorder because there is wide variation in the type and severity of symptoms people experience. Difficulty with communication and interaction with other people. Restricted interests and repetitive behaviors. Symptoms that hurt the person’s ability to function properly in school, work, and other areas of life.
What are the levels of awareness?
Higher-level consciousness, lower-level consciousness, altered states of consciousness, subconscious awareness, and no awareness.
Higher-level consciousness
Consists of controlled processing.
Controlled processes
The most alert states of human consciousness, during which individuals actively focus their efforts toward a goal. Key aspect of it is executive function. Doing a math problem like calculus.
Executive function
Higher-order, complex cognitive processes, including thinking, planning, and problem solving. Key aspect of this is cognitive control: the ability to maintain attention by reducing interfering thought and being cognitively flexible.
Lower-level consciousness
Includes automatic processes and daydreaming.
Atomatic processes
States of consciousness that require little attention and do not interfere with other ongoing activities. Listening to music while studying.
Daydreaming
Mind wandering, imaginary scenarios, potentially useful.
What are some benefits to daydreaming?
Could help us cope, create stuff, solve problems, and come up with plans.
Altered states of consciousness
Mental states that are noticeably different from normal awareness. Can by produced by trauma, fever, fatigue, sensory deprivation, meditation, hypnosis, psychological disorders, and drugs.
Subconscious awareness
Consists of waking subconscious awareness and subconscious awareness during sleep and dreams.
Waking subconscious awareness
Processes going on just below the surface of our awareness. Consists of incubation which is the subconscious processing that leads to a solution after taking a break from conscious thought about the problem. Also utilizes parallel processing: subconscious information information processing also can occur simultaneously in a distributed manner along many parallel tracks. Example: when you see a dog run across the street, a lot is subconsciously processed to produce that picture like the color of the dog, its identity, and its movement.
Subconscious awareness during sleep and dreams
Our level of awareness is lower than when we daydream, but sleep and dreams are not absence of consciousness. Still aware of external stimuli. Roommate who had a dream abut something that Dr. Pilot was watching.
No awareness
Consists of unconscious thoughts which according to Freud is a reservoir of unacceptable wishes, feelings, and thoughts that are beyond conscious awareness. Many people now don’t exactly agree with that but they believe that there are unconscious processes just not that extreme.
Biological rhythems
Periodic fluctuations in the body, such as the rise and fall of hormones and accelerated and decelerated cycles of brain activity, that can influences behavior.