Consciousness Flashcards
Consciousness
awareness of surroundings, internal state and ourselves
- we’re not Consciousness all the time and can vary in term of degree and quality
- important in assessing patients with medical issues (head trauma, sleeplessness, substance abuse)
level of awareness increase
- alertness: increased awareness
- reticular formation: brain structure, part of the brain stem
- ## level of awareness can also decrease:
level of awareness decrease:
decrease awareness
- tiredness & fatigue ( sleep)
- deeper unconscious: (not easily reversed)
- can occur because of trauma, loss oxygen to brain and drugs (both med purposes and addiction - coma is a big example
Alertness refers to the increased awareness of:
sensory input: Alertness refers to increased awareness of different sensory inputs being received.
Sleep:
- crucial to our ability to live
- after sleepless days: hullicantions does occur
- chronic low-level sleep deprivation is linked to bad outcomes (poor cognitive performance, increase risk of obesity, heart disease and diabetes)
measuring sleep
using the EEG electroencephalography
- show different sleep stages
- EMG muscle activiy
- EOG: eye activity
- polysomnographt: sleep study to measure multiple phsycoligal parametrs
REM sleep
rapid eye movement
- quick bursts of eye movemnt
- similar brain waves to beta waves awakeness
- little muscle movemnt (atonia)
- irregular breathing heart rate
- major of dreaming happen in this stage
- REM rebound: catch up on REM after missing sleep (if we messd a rem sleep stage, we’ll spend the other night catching up)
non-REM stage 1
theta waves, have a lower frequency than alpha and low amplitude
- slow eye movement and light
non REM stage 2
theta waves - heart rate and breathing rate slow
- K-complex and sleep spindles
- K-complex: periodic, high-amplitude bursts.
-sleep spindel: occasional high-frequnce bursts activity that play a role in memory consolidation
non REM 3
Deep sleep
- slow-wave sleep (delta waves)
-delta waves( have failry high amplitude
- this stage important for memory processing and rest
regulating sleep
circadian rhythm: 24hr sleep -wake cycle that is governed by melatonin
- melatonin is generated from pineal glands
-adrenal cortex - cortisol- wakefulness
sleep disorders (Dyssomnias)
-insomnia: difficulty falling alseep
- narcolepsy: excessive daytime sleepiness (abnormal REM sleep), cataplexy: (loss of muscle control), sleep paralysis, hypnagogic hallucinations
- sleep apnea: airway obstruction during sleep
Sleep disorder (parasomnia)
Parasomnia: sleep disorder that include abnormal behavior during sleep
- sleepwalking (somnambulism)
- night terrors: sleeper plunged into fight or flight response 30sec-3 mins
-nightmares:
DREAMS
- activation/synthesis model: neurons activate during REM and synthesize experince
- problem solving theory: dreams as a way of processinf-resolving real-world problems
- cognitive theory: dreams are a visualization of our cognitive processes
Manifest: surface-level details
-latent: underlying meaning - wish fulifillment: resolution of represses conflict
Hypnosis:
hypnotists induce a hyper-suggestible state in a subject
- extremely responsive to certain suggestion even after hypnosis session
- receives considerable skepticism
