PSYC 135: General Psychology II

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PSYC 135General Psychology II

• Dr. Brett A. Steinberg
• Department of Psychology
• Room 172, W.A. Bousfield Hall
• Tel [phone] E-Mail brett.steinberg_at_ucon
  n.edu

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States of Consciousness
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Overview of Topic

• 1) Definition of consciousness
• 2) Physiologic bases
• 3) States of consciousness
• A) Sleeping and dreaming
• B) Hypnosis and priming
• C) Psychoactive Drugs

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Definition

• Q What is consciousness?
• Consciousness involves awareness of
• outside world
• own thoughts, feelings, and other mental
  processes
• metacognition (thinking about thinking)
• Arguably the most human of all characteristics

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Physiologic Bases

• Consciousness is a complex phenomenon that
  depends upon many brain regions and functions
• 1) Arousal and receptiveness to stimuli
  (brainstem and thalamus)
• If damage Coma
• 2) Sustained and selective attention (frontal
  cortex, parietal cortex, and midbrain)
• If damage Confusion
• 3) Language (left hemisphere)
• If damage Alien hand syndrome

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Physiologic Bases (Cont.)

• 5) Memory (hippocampus and thalamus)
• If damage Amnesia (H.M.)
• 6) Reality testing (frontal lobes)
• If damage Confabulation

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Sleeping and Dreaming

• Cycles of sleep and wakefulness regulated by
  daily (circadian) rhythms
• Pineal body secretes melatonin level varies
  during day (Descartes seat of soul)
• Environmental cues (zeitgebers, or
  time-givers) affect circadian rhythms via
  suprachiasmatic nucleus (SCN) of hypothalamus
  resets for 24-hour schedule

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Brain Regions Involved in Circadian Rhythms
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Sleeping and Dreaming (Cont.)

• Stages of sleep Electroencephalogram (EEG)
• Quiet Stages 1-4
• Active Rapid eye movement (REM)
• As sleep deepens during stages 1-4, frequency
  decreases, amplitude increases, and muscle tone
  decreases

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Sleep Architecture
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Sleep is Active State
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Sleeping and Dreaming (Cont.)

• Freuds dream theory Wish fulfillment
• Day residue Kernel of dream that is related to
  events of day
• Manifest content Overt/obvious meaning
• Latent content Covert/hidden (symbolic) meaning
  points to patients conflicts

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Antrobus Cognitive-Process Dream Theory
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Hypnosis

• Q Have you ever been hypnotized? If so, what
  was it like?
• Induction involves creation of state of
  relaxation and compliance with process
• Hypnotizability is necessary but not universal
• Cannot be made to do things against will

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Explanations of Hypnosis
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Response to Hot Water (Anterior Cingulate Cortex)
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Priming

• Means of increasing responsiveness to stimuli via
  exposure to previous (related) stimuli
• Stem completion Participant reads harp more
  likely to complete ha__ as harp than as
  hand or hard
• Semantic decision Decide whether stimulus is a
  word or nonword

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Unconscious Priming in Semantic Decision Task
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Psychoactive Drugs

• Substances that influence psychologic functioning
  by altering
• production,
• action, and/or
• elimination
• of one or more neurotransmitters

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Classes of Psychoactive Drugs
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Rates of Substance Use Among High School Students
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Psychoactive Drugs (Cont.)

• Two types of maladaptive use
• Abuse Use that causes problems in daily
  functioning
• Dependence Use that results in
• 1) Withdrawal symptoms Negative symptoms when
  drug wears off
• 2) Tolerance Require more of drug to experience
  same effects

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Tolerance
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Psychoactive Drugs (Cont.)

• Response to drug is influenced by
• expectancies regarding effects
• context in which taken

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Conditioned Responses
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Sample Test Question

• Dave is running a priming experiment in which he
  asks subjects to press different keys if pairs of
  words are related or unrelated. If car appears
  too quickly to be consciously seen, what should
  happen to reaction times to Mustang-Camaro?
• a) increased reaction time
• b) decreased reaction time
• c) no difference
• d) cant predict answer from information given