Chapter 4: Consciousness

Consciousness

• A person’s awareness of everything that is going on around him or her at any given time

  • Used to organize behavior including thoughts, sensations, and feelings

A set of action potentials in communication among neurons just sufficient to produce a specific perception, memory, or experience in our awareness

What is consciousness generated by?

Waking Consciousness

State in which thoughts, feelings, and sensations are clear and organized and the person feels alert

Altered State of Consciousness

• State in which there is a shift in the quality or pattern of mental activity as compared to waking consciousness

  • Fuzzy and disorganized thoughts, less alert (or sometimes more alert, under influence of stimulant), bizarre thoughts

  • May divide conscious awareness

    • Ex: Driving and then wondering how you got there

Controlled Processes

• Processes that require our conscious attention to a fairly high degree, such as driving, carrying on a conversation, or taking notes

  • Should only be done one at a time

Automatic Processes

• Processes that require far less of a conscious level of attention

  • You can do this and a controlled process at the same time

• Daydreaming, being hypnotized, or archiving a meditative state (and being under the influence of drugs and alcohol)

  • Most common is sleep

What are some forms of altered states of consciousness?

Biological Rhythms

• Natural cycles of activity that the body must go through

  • Ex: Sleep, menstrual cycle, heartbeat, blood pressure, body temperature

Circadian Rhythm

•  A cycle of bodily rhythm that occurs over a 24-hour period

  • People will experience several hours of sleep at least once during every 24-hour period

Hypothalamus

What controls the sleep-wake cycle?

Hypothalamus

Tiny section of the brain that influences the glandular system

Melatonin

A hormone normally secreted by the pineal gland

Suprachiasmatic Nucleus (SCN)

• An internal clock that tells people when to wake up and when to fall asleep

  • Deep within the hypothalamus

  • Controls body temperature—lower temperature = sleepier

  • Sensitive to changes in light

    • As daylight fades, it tells the pineal gland to secrete melatonin, which suppresses neurons that keep us awake

Jet Lag

A condition where the body’s circadian rhythm has been disrupted by traveling to another time zone

Arousal and sleep regulation

What is serotonin associated with?

7-8 hours

How many hours do most adults require?

Sleep is important for higher level cognitive skills such as reasoning, problem solving, and communication

Why do kids need more sleep?

Microsleeps

• Brief sidesteps into sleep lasting only a few seconds

  • Can be caused by sleep deprivation

Adaptive Theory

Theory of sleep proposing that animals and humans evolved sleep patterns to avoid predators by sleeping when predators are most active

Restorative Theory

• Theory of sleep proposing that sleep is necessary to the physical health of the body and serves to replenish chemicals and repair cellular damage

  • Brain plasticity is enhanced by sleep

    • Most bodily growth and repair occur during deepest stages of sleep

Forming memories

What is one of the most important things sleep helps us with?

Sleep Deprivation

• Any significant loss of sleep, resulting in problems in concentration and irritability

  • All nighters to study are counterproductive because they will lose more information than they gain

  • Symptoms: Trembling hands, inattention, staring off into space, droopy eyelids, and general discomfort

  • Also increased risk of insulin resistance, obesity, and Alzhiemer’s, depression of immune system, and delays of puberty

    • One common cause if disturbance of sleep-wake cycl

Rapid Eye Movement Sleep (R, REM)

• Stage of sleep in which the eyelids move rapidly under the eyelids and the person is typically experiencing a dream

  • Voluntary muscles are inhibited (moving very little)

Non-REM Sleep (NREM)

• Any stages of sleep that do not include REM

  • Spans from much lighter to much deeper and restful sleep

    • Body is free to move

Electroencephalographs

Allows scientists to visualize and record brain wave activity during waking tasks, or as a person passes through various stages of sleep

Beta Waves

Smaller and faster brain waves, typically indicating mental activity (wide awake)

Alpha Waves

Brain waves that indicate a state of relaxation or light sleep

Theta Waves

Brain waves indicating the early stages of sleep

Delta Waves

Long, slow brain waves that indicate the deepest stage of sleep

N1: Light Sleep

• Theta wave activity increases and alpha wave activity fades away

  • If people wake up during it, they wouldn’t know they were sleeping

    • May experience vivid visual events such as hypnogogic images or hallucinations

N2: Sleep Spindles

• Drift further into sleep and body temperature drops, heart rate slows, breathing more shallow

• Brief bursts of activity only lasting a second or two

• Sleep Spindles: Brief bursts of activity lasting only a second or two

  • May help stimulate neural areas where recent memories are stored, leading to better recall

    • Still theta waves, but people know they were sleeping

Sleep Spindles

Brief bursts of activity lasting only a second or two

N3: Delta Waves Roll In

• Deepest stage of sleep (slow-wave sleep–SWS or just deep sleep)

• Growth hormones from pituitary gland are released

  • Body growth occurs; growing children need more sleep

• Body at lowest level of functioning

• Hard to awaken

  • If awakened, causes confusion

R: Rapid Eye Movement

• Associated with dreaming (more vivid, longer, and bizarre)

  • Brain waves resemble beta waves, which are most often associated with alert wakefulness

Sleep Paralysis

The inability of the voluntary muscles to move during REM sleep

REM Behavior Disorder (RBD)

A rare disorder in which the mechanism that blocks the movement of the voluntary muscle fails, allowing the person to thrash around and even get up and act out nightmares

After a physically demanding day, people spend more time in NREM and people with an emotionally stressful day spend more time in REM

What stages do people who have a physically demanding or emotionally stressful day spend more time in?

REM Rebound

Increased amounts of REM sleep after being deprived of REM sleep on earlier nights

REM Myth

People deprived of REM sleep would become paranoid

They are forming new connections between neurons (and synpases)

Why do babies spend more time in REM than adults?

Nightmares

• Bad dreams occurring during REM sleep

  • Kids have more than adults because they are in REM more

Night Terrors

• Relatively rare disorder in which the person experiences extreme fear and screams or runs around during deep sleep without waking fully

  • A state of panic experienced while sound asleep

  • May sit up, scream, feel like it’s hard to breathe

    • Most don’t remember what happened, unlike with nightmares

Sleep Walking

• Occurring during deep sleep, an episode of moving around or walking around in one’s sleep

  • Hereditary

  • Occurs during deep sleep

  • May just sit up, or they may walk around

  • Typically don’t remember episode

  • Many grow out of it by adolescence

    • Has been claimed as a defense against criminal charges in some cases; if genuine, RBD may be a more viable explanation

Insomnia

The inability to get to sleep, stay asleep, or get quality sleep

Sleep Apnea

• Disorder in which the person stops breathing for 10 seconds or more

  • Can cause heart problems, poor sleep quality, depression, hallucinations

  • Associated with sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS)

    • Can be improved with CPAP

Narcolepsy

• Sleep disorder in which a person falls immediately into REM sleep during the day without warning

  • Can cause excessive daytime sleepiness, making driving and other tasks very dangerous

Cataplexy

Sudden loss of muscle tone

• Conflicts, events, and desires of the past would be represented in their dreams

• Unconscious “wish fulfillment”

• The true meaning of a dream was hidden and expressed in symbols

What did Freud believe about dreams?

Activation-Synthesis Hypothesis

Dreams are the result of the some areas of the cortex interpreting, or attempting to piece together, random signals from lower brain areas (Premise that states that dreams are created by the higher centers of the cortex to explain the activation by the brain stem of cortical cells during REM sleep periods)

Activation-Information-Mode Model (AIM)

• Revised version of the activation-synthesis explanation of dreams in which information that is accessed during waking hours can have an influence on the synthesis of dreams

  • Information that is accessed during waking hours can have an influence on the synthesis of dreams

Cognitive Theory of Dreaming

• Dreams are just another type of cognitive process that occurred during sleep

  • Most dreams reflect the events that occur in everyday life

Other men, outdoor and unfamiliar settings, weapons, cars, etc.

What do men typically dream about?

Males and females equally (mostly people they know), personal appearance concerns, and home and family issues

What do females dream about?

Hypnosis

State of consciousness in which the person is especially susceptible to suggestion

• 1.) Hypnotist tells person to focus on what is being said

• 2.) Person is told to relax and feel tired

• 3.) Hypnotist tells person to “let go” and accept suggestions easily

• 4.) Person is told to use vivid imagination

How is hypnosis induced?

A heightened state of suggestibility

What is the real key to hypnosis?

Hypnotic Susceptibility

• The degree to which a person is a good hypnotic participant

  • Makes use of ordered suggestions–the more responded to, the more susceptible they are

Basic Suggestion Effect

The tendency to act as though their behavior is automatic and out of their control

Hypnosis as Dissociation

• Divided state of conscious awareness

  • Hypnosis worked only on the immediate conscious mind, while part of that person’s mind (‘hidden observer”) remained aware of what was going on

    • Ex: Driving somewhere and wondering how they got there

Social-Cognitive Theory of Hypnosis

• Theory that assumes that people who are hypnotized are not in an altered state but are merely playing the role expected of them in the situation

  • Might think that they’re being hypnotized

    • May be such a good performance that the participants are unaware they are role-playing

Psychoactive Drugs

Chemical substances that alter thinking, perception, and memory

Physical Dependence

Condition occurring when a person’s body becomes unable to function normally without a particular drug

Withdrawal

• Physical symptoms that can include nausea, pain, tremors, crankiness, and high blood pressure, resulting from a lack of an addictive drug in the body systems

  • Occur because the body is trying to adjust to the absence of the drug

  • Some people take more of the drug to alleviate symptoms, which makes it worse (negative reinforcement)

    • Nausea, pain, tremors, crankiness, and high blood pressure

Contingency-Management Therapy

An operant conditioning strategy in which patients earn vouchers for negative drug tests

Cognitive-Behavioral Interventions

Change the way people think about the stresses in their lives to work toward more effective coping mechanisms

• Dopaminergic neurons in the mesolimbic (reinforcement) and mesocortical (judgment and behavior control) pathways

  • Make up mesocorticolimbic reward circuit that is heavily involved in drug use

What do drugs that lead to dependence activate?

Drug Tolerance

The decrease of the response to a drug over repeated uses, leading to the need for higher doses of drug to achieve the same effect

• Drugs enter brain’s reward pathway, causing release of dopamine and intense pleasure

• Brain tries to adapt by decreasing synaptic receptors for dopamine

  • More drugs now needed to achieve same pleasure response → drug tolerance

How does the brain play an important role in dependency?

Psychological Dependence

• The belief that a drug is needed to continue a feeling of emotional or psychological well-being

  • Any drug can cause it

Stimulants

Drugs that increase the functioning of the nervous system

Depressants

Drugs that decrease the functioning of the nervous system

Hallucinogenics

Drugs including hallucinogens and marijuana that produce hallucinations or increased feelings of relaxation and intoxication

Amphetamines

• Stimulants that are synthesized (made) in laboratories rather than being found in nature

  • Cause sympathetic division to go into overdrive

  • Won’t give people energy, but cause people to burn up the energy they have

  • Depress appetite

    • Often used to treat ADHD

Amphetamine Psychosis

Causes addicts to become delusional, is possible along with vomiting, high blood pressure, and strokes

Cocaine

• A natural drug derived from the leaves of the coca plant

  • Produces feelings of euphoria, energy, power, and pleasure; deadens pain and suppresses appetite

  • Can cause convulsions and death

  • Causes children to have learning disabilities, delayed language development, etc.

  • Causes mood swings into depression, tiredness, nervousness, inability to feel pleasure, and paranoia

    • Causes chemical changes in brain

Nicotine

• The stimulant found in tobacco

  • Toxic, produces a slight “rush” as it raises blood pressure and accelerates the heart

  • Provides sugar rush into bloodstream by releasing adrenaline and raising dopamine levels in reward pathway

  • Relaxing effect, seems to reduce stress

    • Physical withdrawal can be as bad as for alcohol, cocaine, or heroin

Caffeine

• A mild stimulant found in coffee, tea, and several other plant-based substances

  • Maintains alertness

  • Increases effectiveness of pain relievers

Barbiturates

• Commonly known as major tranquilizers, depressant drugs that have a sedative (sleep-inducing) effect

  • Overdoses can lead to death as breathing and heart action are stopped

Benzodiazepines

• Commonly known as minor tranquilizers, drugs that lower anxiety and reduce stress

  • Example: Valium, Xanax, Halcion, Ativan, and Librium

Rohyphnol

(“Date rape” drug) causes them to be unaware of actions but can still respond to directions or commands

Alcohol

• The chemical resulting from fermentation or distillation of various kinds of vegetable matter

  • Often mistaken for a stimulant, alcohol is actually a CNS depressant

  • Most commonly used and abused depressant

  • Health risks to liver, brain, and heart, but associated with loss of work time, loss of a job, and loss of economic stability

  • A depressant that gives the illusion of stimulation because the first thing depressed is natural inhibitions

    • Stimulates release of GABA, which slows or stops neural activity

Binge Drinking

• Drinking four or five drinks within a limited amount of time

  • Alcohol 4th leading cause of death in the U.S.

Opiates

• A class of opium related drugs that suppress the sensation of pain by binding to and stimulating the nervous system’s natural receptor sites for endorphins

  • Can have both positive and negative effects on a feeling of social connections

Opium

• Substance derived from the opium poppy from which all narcotic drugs are derived

  • Mimics effects of endorphins

    • Slows or stops endorphin production, so there’s no protection against pain when it wears off

Morphine

Narcotic drug derived from opium, used to treat severe pain

Heroin

Narcotic drug derived from opium that is extremely addictive

Opioids

• Synthetic drugs that mimic the pain-reducing effects of opiates and their addictive properties

  • Can be used to control withdrawal and treat opiate addiction

    • However, also very addictive

  • Examples include methadone, oxycodone, hydrocodone, and fentanyl

Hallucinogens

• Drugs that cause false sensory messages, altering the perception of reality

  • Alter interpretation of sensations and can produce sensory distortions

Hallucinations

False sensory perceptions

LSD (Lysergic Acid Diethylamide)

• Powerful synthetic hallucinogen

  • One of the most potent hallucinogens

  • People feel it helps expand consciousness

  • Real dangers may go unnoticed and can cause flashbacks

Hallucinogen Persisting Perception Disorder (HPPD)

An irreversible condition in which hallucinations and altered perceptions of reality can occur repeatedly, accompanied by depression and physical discomfort

PCP

• Synthesized drug now used as an animal tranquilizer that can cause stimulant, depressant, narcotic, or hallucinogenic effects

  • Can be different types of drugs depending on dosage

  • Causes people to feel no warning signal of pain

MDMA (Ecstasy or X)

• Designer drug that can have both stimulant and hallucinatory effects

  • Releases large amounts of serotonin and blocks its reuptake

  • Causes euphoria, energy, and emotional warmth

  • Damaged receptors lead to depression, severe dehydration, raised body temperature

Stimulatory Hallucinogenics

Drugs that produce a mixture of psychomotor stimulant and hallucinogenic effects

Marijuana

• Mild hallucinogen (also known as “pot” or “weed”) derived from the leaves and flowers of a particular type of hemp plant

  • Produces feeling of well-being, mild intoxication, and mild sensory distortions or hallucinations

  • Causes powerful psychological dependency, but not physical dependency

  • Affects reaction time and perception of surroundings