How aware are we of our surroundings? Consciousness How aware are we of our surroundings?

Consciousness Consciousness: Our awareness of things inside and outside ourselves a psychological construct, like intelligence or emotion

Consciousness as sensory awareness Selective Attention: we can only focus on one thing at a time with our mind Sensory awareness: the sensations that you are aware to

Consciousness as inner awareness Inner awareness: being aware of things inside yourself What does it feel like to jump into a pool? Who was your best friend when you were younger? What does it feel like to have someone break up with you You are not sensing these things, but they still exist

Consciousness as sense of self Think of the way children refer to themselves. What do they say? Can babies recognize themselves in the mirror? Sense of self: being aware of our own existence

What Consciousness Does Our consciousness has 3 functions: 1. Restricts our attention. Keeps our brain from being overwhelmed by stimulation by processing things serially and limiting what we notice and think about. 2. Provides us with a mental “meeting place” Sensation combines with memory, emotions, and motives.

What Consciousness Does 3. Allows us to create a mental model of the world that we can manipulate. Unlike other simpler organisms, we are not prisoners of the moment: We don’t just act reflexively to stimulation. Humans are the only animal with the ability to set goals… Fact!

The Non-conscious Process The Non-Conscious Mind Great at multitasking! Can handle many streams of information at the same time Walking, chewing gum and breathing The Conscious Mind Can focus on just one task, Has to process things serially (in sequence.) Has Limits

Mental Imaging We can use our conscious mind to “zoom in” on an image. Lets try it…. Close your eyes. Picture a cat.

The Results Is the cat black? Does it have a long tail? Does it have a collar on? Does it have short hair? Does it have white paws? Psychologists have found that the smaller the detail, the longer people take to respond.

Two Levels of the Non-conscious Mind Preconscious and Unconscious. Preconscious memories: Information that is not currently in consciousness, but can be recalled voluntarily. Unconscious: Cognition (thought) without awareness. -Involves levels of brain systems that range from autopilot to those which can have subtle influences on consciousness and behavior.

What Unconscious Is and Isn’t A dictionary defines unconscious as being in a loss of all consciousness, like when a person faints. In psychology, it has a different meaning. To show this, lets look at an example. Fill in the blanks to complete the word below: D E F _ _ _

Answer Using a technique called priming, psychologists can have some influence on the answer people give. There were a number of possible answers to the example: defend, defeat, defect, defile, deform, defray, defuse and define. There is an increased likelihood you chose define. Why?

Freud’s View of Consciousness Conscious: this is the part of the mind that holds what you’re aware of. We can verbalize about your conscious experiences and can think about it logically. Preconscious: ordinary memory. These memories can be readily brought into conscious. Unconscious: Freud felt that this part of the mind wasn’t accessible to awareness. It’s a dump box for urges, feelings and ideas that are tied to anxiety, conflict and pain. They haven’t disappeared and exert influence on our conscious actions and awareness

Freud’s View of Consciousness