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Published byJames Phillips Modified over 9 years ago
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Consciousness and Information Processing Consciousness: our awareness of ourselves and our environment Allows us to voluntarily control and communicate our mental states Enables processing outside of our awareness Conscious Processing is sequential Slow and limited capacity EX: driving– hands and feet do the driving while your mind handles new challenges
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SLEEP and DREAMS What is sleep? Definition: periodic, natural, reversible loss of consciousness Biological Rhythms Periodic physiological fluctuations Our bodies experience 4 TYPES of Biological Rhythms
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Biological Rhythms Annual Cycles Example: Seasonal Affective Disorder Depression in the dark, winter months Twenty-eight-day Cycles Female Menstrual Cycle Twenty-four-hour Cycles Varying alertness, body temperature, and growth hormone secretion Ninety-minute Cycles Stages of sleep in 90 minute cycles
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The Rhythm of Sleep Circadian Rhythm The biological clock; regular body rhythms that occur on a 24 hour cycle. Example: body temperature Rises in morning, dips in early afternoon, dips more before we go to sleep Thinking is sharpest & memory is most accurate when we are in our peak circadian arousal Younger: “night owls” Older: morning people Transition from sleeping later to sleeping earlier occurs around age 20 (esp. for women who begin puberty earlier than men)
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The Rhythm of Sleep (cont’d) What disrupts our circadian rhythm? Jet Lag Light: triggers proteins & decreases melatonin Melatonin: sleep inducing hormone We can reset our biological clocks by adjusting sleep schedules
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SLEEP STAGES Every 90 minutes we pass through a cycle of 5 distinct sleep stages Stage 1: brief, many experience hallucinations; feeling of falling (body may jerk) Hallucinations: false sensory experiences Stage 2: 20 minutes, periodic sleep spindles; now fully asleep Sleep talking can occur at this stage Stage 3: transitional, only a few minutes until stage 4
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SLEEP STAGES cont’d Stage 4: deep sleep; brain emits large delta waves; 2 slow-wave sleep stages last for about 30 minutes— hard to awaken End of stage 4 likely to see sleep walking or bed wetting REM (Rapid Eye Movement): recurring sleep stage during which vivid dreams commonly occur AKA Paradoxical sleep: muscles are relaxed but other body systems are active
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About 1 hour after falling into a deep sleep go back to Stage 3 and Stage 2 (where you spend about half of your night) End in REM: heart rate increases, irregular breathing, eyes move around Often remember these dreams more vividly if woken during REM
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Sleep Theories 4 Theories for why we sleep 1. Protect 2. Recuperate 3. Remember 4. Growth
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WHY DO WE SLEEP? Sleep patterns are not uniform Age-Related Infants sleep for 2/3 of their day Most adults sleep for less than 1/3 Culturally Influenced Industrialized nations (USA) sleep less than those without artificial light
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Without interruption, most will sleep for 9 hours Can not “catch-up” on sleep The Need for sleep Strengthen memory Increases concentration boost mood moderates hunger & obesity helps immune system resets biological clock helps organs
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The effects of sleep deprivation Teens should sleep for 8-9 hours Ranges from serious to subtle Car accidents to lower immune system Reduced: productivity Concentration Ability to remember, think critically and logically Creativity, vocabulary, and communication skills How long can humans stay awake? 8 to 10 days Can recover to relatively normal functioning with one or two nights of recovery sleep
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SLEEP DISORDERS Insomnia: recurring problems in falling or staying asleep Chronic if lasts for 3-4 weeks Anxiety, depression, situational stress, and stimulus overload cause about 50% of all cases Drugs (caffeine, alcohol, and nicotine ) account for 10% Narcolepsy: uncontrollable sleep attacks; may lapse directly into REM at inappropriate times Sleep Apnea: temporary cessations of breathing during sleep and repeated momentary awakenings Night Terrors: high arousal and appearance of being terrified; occur during stage 4 of sleep not REM—seldom remembered
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~ ~* DREAMS * ~ ~ Dream: a sequence of images, emotions, and thoughts passing through a sleeping person’s mind— notable for hallucinatory images and discontinuities. Lucid Dreams: When you are aware that you are dreaming Manifest Content: The remembered storyline from a dream (says Freud) Latent Content: underlying meaning of a dream (says Freud)
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What do we dream about? 8 in 10 dreams involve negative emotions Commonly dream of: Repeated failures Rejections Experience misfortunes Events of our daily lives
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Why do we dream? -- Dream Theories To satisfy our own wishes To file away memories To develop and preserve neural pathways The make sense of neural static To reflect our cognitive development
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HYPNOSIS Hypnosis: a social interaction in which one person suggests to another that certain perceptions, feelings, thoughts, or behaviors will spontaneously occur. FACT v. FICTION All of us are somewhat susceptible to suggestion 20% of people are highly susceptible Also very imaginative, likely to be easily absorbed in a vivid novel, lead fantasy lives
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Hypnosis (cont’d) Can hypnosis enhance recall of forgotten events Can hypnosis force people to act against their will? Can hypnosis be therapeutic? Posthypnotic suggestions: actions intended to be carried out once the person is not hypnotized Can hypnosis relieve pain? Yes! Can reduce fear thus reducing hyperactivity to pain Dissociation: a split in consciousness which allows some thoughts and behaviors to occur simultaneously with others.
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Is Hypnosis an Altered State of Consciousness? Hypnosis is a combination of Biological Influences Distinctive Brain activity unconscious info. processing Psychological Influences Focused attention expectations Social-Cultural Influences Authoritative figure and the need to play your role “be a good subject”
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