[Week 4] State of Consciousness

Question 1

Blood Alcohol Content (BAC)

Answer 1

Blood Alcohol Content (BAC): a measure of the percentage of alcohol found in a person’s blood. This measure is typically the standard used to determine the extent to which a person is intoxicated, as in the case of being too impaired to drive a vehicle.

Question 2

Circadian Rhythm

Answer 2

Circadian Rhythm: The physiological sleep-wake cycle. It is influenced by exposure to sunlight as well as daily schedule and activity. Biologically, it includes changes in body temperature, blood pressure and blood sugar.

Question 3

Consciousness

Answer 3

Consciousness: the awareness or deliberate perception of a stimulus

Question 4

Cues

Answer 4

Cues: a stimulus that has a particular significance to the perceiver (e.g., a sight or a sound that has special relevance to the person who saw or heard it)

Question 5

Depressants

Answer 5

Depressants: a class of drugs that slow down the body’s physiological and mental processes.

Question 6

Dissociation

Answer 6

Dissociation: the heightened focus on one stimulus or thought such that many other things around you are ignored; a disconnect between one’s awareness of their environment and the one object the person is focusing on

Question 7

Euphoria

Answer 7

Euphoria: an intense feeling of pleasure, excitement or happiness.

Question 8

Flexible Correction Model

Answer 8

Flexible Correction Model: the ability for people to correct or change their beliefs and evaluations if they believe these judgments have been biased (e.g., if someone realizes they only thought their day was great because it was sunny, they may revise their evaluation of the day to account for this “biasing” influence of the weather)

Question 9

Hallucinogens

Answer 9

Hallucinogens: substances that, when ingested, alter a person’s perceptions, often by creating hallucinations that are not real or distorting their perceptions of time.

Question 10

Hypnosis

Answer 10

Hypnosis: the state of consciousness whereby a person is highly responsive to the suggestions of another; this state usually involves a dissociation with one’s environment and an intense focus on a single stimulus, which is usually accompanied by a sense of relaxation

Question 11

Hypnotherapy

Answer 11

Hypnotherapy: The use of hypnotic techniques such as relaxation and suggestion to help engineer desirable change such as lower pain or quitting smoking.

Question 12

Implicit Associations Test

Answer 12

Implicit Associations Test (IAT): A computer reaction time test that measures a person’s automatic associations with concepts. For instance, the IAT could be used to measure how quickly a person makes positive or negative evaluations of members of various ethnic groups.

Question 13

Jet Lag

Answer 13

Jet Lag: The state of being fatigued and/or having difficulty adjusting to a new time zone after traveling a long distance (across multiple time zones).

Question 14

Melatonin

Answer 14

Melatonin: A hormone associated with increased drowsiness and sleep.

Question 15

Mindfulness

Answer 15

Mindfulness: a state of heightened focus on the thoughts passing through one’s head, as well as a more controlled evaluation of those thoughts (e.g., do you reject or support the thoughts you’re having?)

Question 16

Priming

Answer 16

Priming: the activation of certain thoughts or feelings that make them easier to think of and act upon

Question 17

Stimulants

Answer 17

Stimulants: a class of drugs that speed up the body’s physiological and mental processes.

Question 18

Trance States

Answer 18

Trance: a state of consciousness characterized by the experience of “out-of-body possession,” or an acute dissociation between one’s self and the current, physical environment surrounding them.