Chapter 6 - States of Consciousness Flashcards
(39 cards)
What is consciousness ?
- Study of consciousness – Rooted in philo + psych
Direct relationship between the workings of the brain & the experience of thinking, feeling, and acting
Ingestion of drugs can alter subjective awareness, bump on the head can drastically alter personality
Paradoxically, although a tremendous amount of processing must be completed to create a conscious perception of the world, there is no “feeling” of the work involved
Dualism – Idea that the mind & body are fundamentally different entities
Split - Brain Phenomenon
Surgery involving cutting through corpus callosum (large band of axons connecting both hemispheres) to reduce seizures in people suffering with epilepsy
Hemispheric specialization – Hemispheres have different functions
2 hemispheres unable to share info
RH cannot use language (Temporal lobe in LH)
Left side of body begins to act “on its own”
e.g. Patients shown an image of a cat (or the word cat) in right visual field, this message would travel to the left visual cortex → left temporal lobe → respond that they saw a cat. Vice versa, message never arrives at the “language” portion of the brain
If patients are asked to draw the image with their left hand (controlled by the RH), they are easily able to re-create the image BUT wont know why
e.g. Asking a patient to get a drink of water in the left ear will result in them following the command, despite having no idea why
Conscious Experience
Dan Dennett, Philosopher – Conscious awareness based on perception, but our experiences work like perception— we form an impression of the world in a way that is useful
He will go through several examples that illustrate how our experience of the world can be influenced by suggestions, ambiguity, and state of mind.
Argues consciousness is result of several processes in the brain that can operate independently & interact with one another depending on what the task demands
Challenges in studying consciousness : Subjective experience of our own existence
2 Components of Conscious Experience
2 components of conscious experience :
Conscious content – Subjective experiences of your internal & external world
“Sense of self,” your plans, dreams, day-to-day perception of space and time
Awareness
Without awareness, your heart continues to beat, and you continue to blink without needing to execute explicit conscious commands to make them occur
States of consciousness – Different levels of arousal and attention
Your experience of particular state of consciousness is based on several processes.
influenced by factors beyond your “control.”
e.g. time flying when having fun
William James (1890) discussed this in his textbook Principles of Psychology, remarking that “my experience is what I agree to attend to”
Conscious content heavily dependent on state of consciousness
Attention
Process of selecting information from the internal & external environments to prioritize for processing
- Passive, Active
Passive Attention
Involuntary OR automatic, occurs when bottom-up info from external environment requires a response
e.g. When you hear a loud noise in a quiet room, it is likely that you will immediately stop what you are doing and search for the source of the noise.
Active Attention
When attention is directed by goals and top-down processing, requires effort
e.g. When you search a cluttered table for your keys
Some features of the environment are noticed readily and effortlessly while others can be missed
What is noticed depends on the goals, experiences, and state of mind of the individual
In the lab, under controlled conditions, attention is often directed based on the instructions given by the experimenter
Selective (Focused) Attention
Occurs when you attend to 1 source of information while simultaneously ignoring other stimuli
Some features of the environment necessarily more important + relevant than others
e.g. Stimuli that predict or are associated with threat
Some more noticeable based on their qualities
Stimulus salience – Low-level properties, bottom-up qualities of a scene influencing how we direct attention (e.g. color, font, loudness)
Attentional capture – When attention is diverted because of the salience of a stimulus
Top-down processing also plays role (needed prior experience)
As we develop expertise in a given area, we are better able to allocate attention to more
important features of the scene / ignore less relevant info (e.g. coaches, doctors)
Less conscious attention as we become more proficient at a skill
e.g. Focusing on road while driving or listening to a single conversation in a loud room
Even when some info not part of conscious awareness, still being processed
e.g. If someone yelled your name at party, you would reorient your attention to respond
Cocktail Party Effect
Loud room, even though several people are talking and there is noise you can block all of this out + listen to a convo you are having with another person
Dichotic Listening Task
Participants are asked to wear a pair of headphones that will play one message in one ear and a second, different, message in the other. Participants are asked to attend to + repeat one message, ignore the second. Participants generally have very little trouble completing this task. Have a fair amount of difficulty reporting details of what occurred in the unattended ear
Can notice + remember specific info such as if a male speaker changes to a female speaker in the unattended ear
Corteen & Wood (1972) Experiment
Researchers presented list of cities to participants followed by a mild but uncomfortable electric shock → people learn that the city name means something unpleasant is coming. Participants were then asked to complete a dichotic listening task : message to unattended ear included names of the cities paired with shock + new cities, other nouns. While participants were listening to the recordings, galvanic skin response (GSR - measure of arousal level of symp NS, responds when you hear something startling / emotionally engaging) measurements were also taken. When city names that had been paired with shock were presented to unattended ear, participants exhibited a response on 38% of the trials. City names that had not been paired with shock created a response 23% of the time, and unrelated words on only 10% of the trials. Although the participants were not consciously aware of what had played in the unattended ear, data suggest that the information was processed by the auditory system and identified as meaningful at least some of the time.
Divided Attention
Divided attention (Multitasking) : When we simultaneously attend to 2 or more tasks at once
e.g. Talking with a friend in the car about your class while driving
Not particularly proficient at multitasking and often make errors.
Experience contributes to your ability to multitask
As you become particularly well skilled at a task → becomes automatic (without awareness)
Not impaired by other tasks, fast / effortless processing
Once skill becomes automatic, it frees up attention to focus on other features of the environment
Predictability – Some automatic tasks far more predictable than others
Typing predictable
Walking down a city street are less predictable (tripping)
Consequences –
Mistyping vs Injury
Rosenbloom (2006) – Observed driving performance under two conditions :
1. Observations were made while participant was driving without cell phone
2. All participants received a call on a hands-free phone, and their driving was monitored
- When engaged in calls, participants left smaller distance between their own cars and the ones in front of them & more likely to increase their speed
- Most drivers were unaware that their driving had changed.
- Drivers make significantly more errors and are far more likely to miss important information when engaged in cell phone conversations
Inattentional Blindness & Change Detection
Occurs when we are engaged in one task and completely miss other information, can be caused when task is complex
Can also be possible to experience difficulty noticing even when actively looking for a specific stimulus
e.g. Dan Dennett, Flicker task – Participants shown 2 variations of the same picture, usually with one difference between the images. The first image is presented briefly (e.g., 250 milliseconds) → white screen → shown the 2nd version of image → another white screen. Despite the fact that participants know that a change is going to occur, it is not uncommon for participants to require a rather substantial amount of time to locate it
Intentional Change Detection
Flicker task, participants aware that a change will occur and are actively using selective attention to find it
People far quicker at identifying changes to animate stimuli compared to inanimate stimuli
Objects that don’t belong in a scene, like a fire hydrant in the living room, are noticed quickly
Movie continuity errors
*Change Blindness
Apollo Robbins, entertainer & pickpocket – Magic exploits the natural tendencies of our attentional system
Inhibition – While he holds your attention in one location, your brain is actively blocking the processing of other parts of the scene (miss the secret behind his “magic”)
Subliminal Stimulus
- Sensory stimulus that is processed but does NOT reach the threshold for conscious perception
- Brain will process info even if we are unaware that we experienced it
Subconscious Processing vs Subliminal Processing
Subconscious Processing – Info we are aware of, but not necessarily aware that it is influencing our behavior
Subliminal Processing – Info we cannot consciously detect, even if we were looking for it
- Subvisual messages (messages presented too quickly for visual system to perceive)
- Subaudible messages (played at a low volume with a louder message played over it)
What are the effects of subliminal messages ?
- Have minimal to no effect on behavior
- Subliminal messages NOT consciously perceived, BUT images still activate photons in the eye & auditory messages bend the hair cells in the ear → Messages not considered salient enough for processing
Attention Disorders
- Attention + content consciousness → Closely linked
- When regions of the brain that facilitate attention are damaged or work differently from normal, the experience of consciousness is also affected
Visual Neglect
Lesions on right (inferior) parietal lobe of the cortex → Patients lose awareness of visual stimuli on the left side
e.g. Only shave / makeup to half of their face, eat food from half their plate, and if asked to copy an image, only draw the right side
Can still report some details of color and form of the visually neglected stimuli
Intact “what” visual system still evaluating of entire visual message, despite the fact that participants are unaware of them
Although info not brought to conscious awareness, visual stimuli in neglected region can still have an impact on behavior
2 nearly identical images of same house ( 1 image, the left side of the house was on fire), patient chose house not on fire to live in but didnt know why
Attention-Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD)
One of most commonly diagnosed psychological problems in childhood in US, symptoms can often become less severe as the child grows up BUT early influences of disorder can disrupt normal development
Behaviors associated with ADHD include 9 individual measures of attention & 9 different behaviors associated with hyperactivity. To qualify for diagnosis, individuals need to have 6 or more in both categories
Behaviors : Impulsivity, poor planning, hyperactivity, inability to sustain attention on a single task
Characterized by difficulties that interfere with task-oriented behaviors
Behaviors must occur to such a degree that they impair the child’s ability to function normally
Difficulties are most often first noticed in classroom – Symptoms incompatible with demands of quietly sitting, listening to the teacher, and working on a project for a prolonged period of time. Many children with ADHD → poor academic performance, problems with social functioning
Because of both impulsivity and hyperactivity, parents often complain that their children have difficulty following rules or sets of instructions.
Causes unclear, BUT genetics influence expression of disorder
Symptoms of ADHD are similar to those produced by damage to the prefrontal cortex
Heritability of ADHD ranges from 75–91%
Can be manageable with diagnosis + treatment – Medications (Ritalin, Adderall) improve concentration + often reduce hyperactivity
individuals who do not have ADHD also report increased ability to focus and concentrate while using these drugs
Adderall is among the more commonly abused drugs on college campuses today
Therapies designed to train parents & teachers to reward desired behavior, ignore undesirable actions → Children rewarded for completing behaviors like following complicated directions, keeping organized calendars, & completing assigned tasks, while their distracting or disruptive behavior is not rewarded with attention from a parent or caregiver
Sleep
- Altered state of consciousness, brain actually quite active
- Critically important to survival
- Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung both interested in dreams – Believed symbols & metaphors useful to provide clues t state of unconscious mind
Fatal Familial Insomnia
- Hereditary disease affecting thalamus
- Cause people to die bc of lack of sleep
- Early on, people unable to fall asleep → Leads to weight loss & inability to maintain homeostasis
- Death follows 12-18 months after symptoms
