Psych. Ch. 5 "Consciousness" Flashcards
Consciousness
A person’s subjective experience of the world
Experience is…
The defining feature of consciousness
Psychology, apart from objects, has to make sense of…
Subjects
The two great mysteries of consciousness:
the problem of other minds, and the mind/body problem.
Phenomenology-
How things seem to the conscious person
Problem of other minds:
the fundamental difficulty we have in perceiving the consciousness of others; no way to tell if someone’s experience is at all like yours.
“zombie”:
a hypothetical nonconscious person
Two dimensions of mind perception:
experience and agency
Agency:
ability for self-control, planning, memory, or thought
The mind/body problem:
the issue of how the mind is related to the brain and body
Rene Descartes:
proposed that the human body is a machine made of physical matter but that the human mind or soul is a separate entity made of a “thinking substance”.
Brain activity happens before:
conscious experience or movement
• Four properties of consciousness:
intentionality, unity, selectivity, and transience
• Intentionality:
being directed toward an object
• Unity:
resistance to division; attention
• Selectivity:
the capacity to include some objects but not others.
• Dichotic listening:
consciousness can filter out some info, but it can also tune in to other info.
• The cocktail party phenomenon:
people tune in one message even while they filter out other nearby.
• Transience:
the tendency to change; the mind is a constant stream.
• Minimal consciousness:
consciousness that occurs when the mind inputs sensations and may output behavior; sensing sunlight.
• Full consciousness:
you know and are able to report your mental state; thinking about the fact that you are thinking about things.
• Self consciousness:
focuses on oneself to the exclusion of almost everything else; embarrassed, center of attention; on camera; deep thought about personal qualities.
• Experience sampling technique:
people are asked to report their conscious experiences at particular times; thinking aloud.
• Mental control:
the attempt to change conscious states of mind.
.
• Thought suppression:
the conscious avoidance of a thought.
• Rebound effect of thought suppression:
the tendency of a thought to return to consciousness with greater frequency following suppression
• Theory of ironic processes of mental control:
ironic errors occur because the mental process that monitors errors can itself produce them; by trying not to think of a white bear, the mid searches for it.
• The actual process of thinking is:
unconscious
• Dynamic unconscious:
an active system encompassing a lifetime of hidden memories, the person’s deepest instincts and desires, and the person’s inner struggle to control these forces.
• Repression:
a mental process that removes unacceptable thoughts and memories from unconsciousness and keeps them in the unconscious.
• Freudian slips-
forgetting the name of someone you dislike; have some surplus meaning that may appear to have been created by the unconscious mind.
• Cognitive unconscious:
includes all the mental processes that are not experienced by a person but that give rise to the person’s thoughts, choices, emotions, and behavior.
• Subliminal perception:
when thought or behavior is influenced by stimuli that a person cannot consciously report perceiving; degree of influence on behavior is very small.
• Altered states of consciousness can cause:
changes in thinking, disturbances in the sense of time, feelings of the loss of control, changes in emotional expression, alterations in body image or sense of self, perceptual distortions, and changes in meaning or significance.
Altered state of consciousness:
a form of experience that departs significantly from the normal subjective experience of the world and the mind; dreams.
• Hypnagogic state:
presleep consciousness
• Hypnopompic state:
postsleep consciousness
Beta waves
high frequency (alertness)
Alpha waves
low frequency (relaxation)
What are the five stages of sleep?
Theta waves, sleep spindles & K complexes, delta waves (3&4), REM sleep.
• REM sleep-
a stage of sleep characterized by rapid eye movement and a high level of brain activity
• Electrooculograph (EOG):
used to measure eye movements
• You cycle between REM and slow-wave sleep stages every:
90 minutes
• REM deprivation causes a rebound of more …
REM cycles the next night
• Insomnia (most common):
difficulty falling or staying asleep
• Sleep apnea-
the cessation of breathing for brief periods during sleep
Narcolepsy
sudden sleepiness
Sleep paralysis:
waking up and unable to move
• Five major differences between waking and dream consciousness:
emotion, thought, sensation, uncritical acceptance, difficult remembering.
Manifest content:
a dream’s apparent or superficial meaning
latent content:
a dream’s real meaning
• Dreams often don’t have sensible storylines because …
the dreamer’s ability to plan is inactive (prefrontal cortex).
what does the brain physically inhibit while dreaming?
movement
• Psychoactive drugs:
chemicals that influence consciousness or behavior by altering the brain’s chemical message system; tripping out.
• Depressants:
reduce the activity of the CNS; alcohol, barbituates, benzodiazepines, toxic inhalants.
• Expectancy theory:
alcohol effects are produced by people’s expectations of how alcohol will influence them in particular situations.
• Balanced placebo design:
behavior is observed following the presence or absence of an actual stimulus and also following the presence or absence of a placebo stimulus.
• Alcohol myopia:
alcohol hampers attention, leading people to respond in simple ways to complex situations.
• Barbituates:
sleep aids and anesthetics
• Benzodiazepines:
minor tranquilizers; antianxiety drugs
• Stimulants:
excite the CNS, increase levels of dopamine and norepinephrine, heightening arousal and activity levels; caffeine, amphetamines, nicotine, cocaine, modafinil, and ecstacy (MDMA).
• Narcotics (opiates):
drugs derived from opium that are capable of relieving pain; opium, heroin, morphine, methadone, codeine, oxycontin.
• Hallucinogens:
drugs that alter sensation and perception, often causing hallucinations.
• Hypnotic analgesia:
the reduction of pain through hypnosis in people who are hypnotically susceptible.
