Sleep and Dreams

Question 1

What is the order of the stages of sleep and explain Stage 1 of sleep

Answer 1

The order of the stages - Stage 1, 2, 3, 4, 3, 2, 5(REM), repeat but begining on stage 2.
Stage 1 - This is light sleep and its the transition between wakefullness and sleep. The brain begins produces theta waves which are slow. This stage lasts 5-10 mins and if you wake someone during, they may say they weren’t alseep

Question 2

Explain stage 2 and 3 of sleep

Answer 2

Stage 2 - Last around 20 mins and the brain produces bursts of quick rhythmic brain waves called sleep spindles. Your body temperature decreases and yourheart rate slows down.
Stage 3 - There are deep slow brainwaves produced, and its the transitional period between light sleep and deep sleep.

Question 3

Explain stage 4 of sleep

Answer 3

Delta sleep because of slow brain waves produced. THis deep sleep last around 30 minutes. sleepwalking usually occurs at the end of stage 4 of sleep

Question 4

Explain stage 5/REM sleep

Answer 4

Most dreaming occurs during REM sleep and is characterised by rapid and random movement of the eyes as well as breathing rates increasing and more brain activity. REM sleep occurs 3-5 times each night and can be called paridoxical sleep because your body systems are active but your muscles are relaxed. All together it lasts around 90-120 all night.

Question 5

Explain the aim of the Dement and Kleitman study

Answer 5

Whether more dreaming occurs during REM than non-REM sleep.
Whether there is a connection between the length of time spent in REM sleep and what the participants report after.

Question 6

Explain the method of the Dement and Kleitman study

Answer 6

It was a lab experiment with a group of volunteers (7 males and 2 females). They went to the lab in the evening, and during the day they were asked not to drink caffeine or alcohol. They were measured using PSG’s and electrodes were attached to their body to monitor heart rates, brain activity, muscle activity and eye movements. They were woken up at different times during the night and had to say what they were dreaming about, but it only counted if they could describe it in detail. They wrote them down instead of speaking to an experimenter. Subjects were woken 5-15 mins after REM sleep begun and were asked if they had been dreaming for 5 or 15 mins. Some subjects were woken after their eyes either moved: mainly vertically, mainly horizontally, both, or little movement, and they were asked what they dreamt of.

Question 7

Explain the results of the Dement and Kleitman study

Answer 7

Participants said that more dreaming occurred in REM sleep and when they recalled dreams from NREM it was often close to the end of REM.
Participants were correct when they guessed the length of their dreams when in REM sleep. There was a connection to eye movements and the content of the dreams.

Question 8

Explain the conclusion of the Dement and Kleitman study

Answer 8

All of the aims were found. They found that most dreaming occurs during REM sleep than NREM sleep. The participants reported they were in REM sleep and dreaming for the correct amount of time. Were is a relationship between rapid eye movements and the content of the dreams.

Question 9

Explain the strengths of the Dement and Kleitman study

Answer 9

This study supports the idea that you can study dreams from an objective way and that opens up more research.
It was a lab experiment and so it had high control over extraneous variables that could have effected the results. So participants avoided caffeine and alcohol so they wouldn’t effect the DV.
The experimenters weren’t biased when they were choosing the sample because it was volunteer sampling so they wanted to take part, which makes it more ethical.

Question 10

Explain the weaknesses of the Dement and Kleitman study

Answer 10

Dreams may have been more easily recalled from REM sleep than NREM because NREM is a deeper stage of sleep than REM, so dreaming could occurs there but it’s harder to recall.
Their sample was limited and small and there were more men used so there is a lack of generalisability.
It was a lab experiment so there was a lack of ecological validity, participants may have not experienced average sleep and would have slept better in their own beds (field experiment)
Waking people from sleep is unethical

Question 11

explain the Restoration Theory by Oswald

Answer 11

This theory says we sleep to restore and repair the body and mind that have worked hard throughout the day.
It restores your body by: repairing cells, restoring energy, and removes waste chemicals that built up
It restores your brain by: letting it rest, restores supplies of neurotransmitters, and restores supplies of brain proteins
The theory also says that NREM sleep restores physiological functions and REM sleep restores mental functions

Question 12

evidence to support the restoration theory

Answer 12

Babies spend 50-60% if sleep in REM sleep, and change to a normal 25% when they grow up. So babies have more REM sleep to develop their brain and grow.
Research shows REM sleep increases after sleep deprivation and physical activity. During sleep your body increases cell division and protein synthesis which suggests sleep repairs and restores you.
After an ultra marathon, the runners slept 90 mins more over 2 nights, specifically NREM sleep rising from 25% to 45%.
Horne reported that sleep deprivation didn’t stop people from playing sports or make them ill. It seems sleep isn’t for physical functioning, at least for short term

Question 13

Evaluation of restoration theory

Answer 13

Strength - evidence is increasing that sleep is more important to restoration of the body. It’s clear that humans perform badly if they didn’t get enough sleep (Peter Tripp) and this supports the restoration theory
Weaknesses - sleep has many functions, so it’s too simplistic to suggest sleep is just about restoring.

Question 14

Explain how sleep can facilitate information processing (cognitive approach)

Answer 14

In the cognitive approach, it says that sleep is used to facilitate, process and consolidate information. During sleep your mind organises all your memories and gets rid of unwanted information.
It also says that sleep transfers information from STM to LTM otherwise they are forgotten. This happens during NREM sleep (deep sleep). This means that without sleep, we couldn’t consolidate our memories because your not getting enough sleep.
Reverse learning theory says that sleep organised information so the number of neocortex connections isn’t too high. So if people didn’t sleep, Crick and Mitchison predicted that you would hallucinate and develop strange thoughts or become obsessed with things. Also REM sleep prevents the strange thought because dreaming would weaken the contorted connections getting rid of the thoughts.

Question 15

Give a brief explanation of Crick and Mitchisons reorganisational theory of dreaming

Answer 15

This theory says we dream to forget and reorganise and once we do this it makes our storage better. It says that dreams are a side effect of getting rid of waste in the brain as the cortex takes a lot of information in the day and so during REM sleep the unwanted information is gotten rid of to make space for new information.
Reverse learning can be used to get rid of parasitic memories during REM sleep, so sleep is for cognitive reorganisation.

Question 16

Give some evidence to support the reorganisational theory of dreaming

Answer 16

The echidna and 2 species of dolphin have a lack of REM sleep and they are seem to have large brains. This is because they can organise and get rid of useless information because they don’t get enough REM sleep.
Experimenters have looked at models of learning and seen that memories can build up but be reduced by using reverse learning.

Question 17

Evaluate the reorganisational theory of dreaming

Answer 17

Strength - It’s gives a reason why REM sleep is needed, which is by making memory better by organising.
- The spiny anteater has no REM sleep and so it has a giant frontal cortex. This holds useless memories which humans get rid of in REM sleep.
Weaknesses - it’s based on computer models of memory and the research is mainly on animals not humans. Also multiple studies show that sleep doesn’t delete memories but it improves it.
- it doesn’t explain why dreams have plots, and they make sense. That doesn’t correlate with the idea that dreams are random.

Question 18

Explain the aim of the Czeisler et al study

Answer 18

The aim was to identify the conditions that could quickly train the suprachiasmatic nucleus.

Question 19

Explain the sample of the Czeisler et al study

Answer 19

They used 8 healthy men aged 22-29 and they had no medical, sleep or psychological disorders. None of them have worked the night shift before and none of them had jet lag in the last 6 weeks. They were asked to not to drink alcohol or caffeine and they weren’t using drugs which were shown by urinary screenings.

Question 20

Explain the method of the Czeisler et al study

Answer 20

It was a lab experiment and 8 males had to work in night shift conditions. The control group were in ordinary light when working and when heading home but the treatment group was kept in very bright light when working and when travelling home and while sleeping they were blacked out from any light.

Question 21

Explain the results of the Czeisler et al study

Answer 21

People in the treatment group were more tired during the day and slept 2 more hours than the control group. The alertness and performance of the treatment group improved.

Question 22

Explain the conclusion and meaning of the Czeisler et al study

Answer 22

The control group didn’t adapt but the treatment group did adapt to the night shift and the SCN was shifted using bright-dark conditions.
The ability to shift circadian rhythms and improve shift-workers sleep helps productivity and safety.

Question 23

Evaluate the Czeisler et al study

Answer 23

Strength - it was a lab experiment and so it had good control of the conditions that could have effected the results
- multiple tests were used that gave evidence which agreed with each other
- they used independent groups so that means the participants didn’t get a chance to practice the task by doing it more than one time.
Weakness - The sample was very small and can’t be generalised to women and it isn’t representative of the population
- lab experiments have low ecological validity because the environment is artificial and not natural.

Question 24

ID

Answer 24

THe unconscious mind. ITs motivations are simple and desires pleasure and gratification.

Question 25

Ego

Answer 25

THe concscious mind that controls all rational thoughts

Question 26

Superego

Answer 26

superego is partly conscious and partly unconscious. It is our awareness of society’s rules, provides us
with a moral sense of right and wrong, and can makes us feel guilty.

Question 27

Describe the psychodynamic process of dreaming

Answer 27

During sleep, the id becomes dominant, and the id’s main motivation is pleasure and gratification.
Concerning dreams, Freud explained them as a window into our unconscious and our deepest desires and
anxieties, which are mostly of a sexual nature coming to real life. He said dreams express repressed
childhood memories or obsessions. According to Freud, through our dreams, our subconscious uncovers
wishes that our conscious mind has learned to repress, and we use dreams to give our unconscious a
chance to live out our deepest wishes and desires.

Question 28

Manifest content

Answer 28

this is the story of the dream, it's often based on the events of the day (similar to the
reorganisational theory). This is the bit of the dream which we can remember.

Question 29

Latent content

Answer 29

The underlying meaning of the dream. We look to dream symbols to work out what our
dreams mean, ultimately revealing what is in our unconscious mind.

Question 30

Repression

Answer 30

It often happens that we believe memories have been forgotten, when in fact they have
been pushed out of the conscious and into the unconscious. These repressed thoughts are believed to be
accessed only during our dreams.

Question 31

Displacement

Answer 31

This claims that we focus the emotions we feel towards another we cannot confront and
onto a more accessible target.

Question 32

Sublimation

Answer 32

This defence mechanism means we replace socially unacceptable impulses with socially
acceptable behaviours. This again can we see in our dreams when we change the latent content into
more acceptable manifest stories.

Question 33

elaboration

Answer 33

This defence mechanism involves us adding in more detail in to our dream, this
means that it will be harder to analyse our dreams. Having a dream with more detail, means that the
latent content will be under a greater disguise.

Question 34

Condensation

Answer 34

Our mind attempts to
defend ourselves from its content by condensing more than one image in to one.