Everything related to consciousness

• Cognitive neuroscience

the interdisciplinary study of brain activity linked with cognition (thinking, knowing, remembering, and communicating). 

• Social-cultural perspective

is an approach that examines how cultural and social contexts influence an individual's thoughts, behaviors, and perceptions of consciousness.

• Conscious awareness

is the state of being aware of and able to think about one's own existence, thoughts, and surroundings.

• Dual processing

 The principle that information is often simultaneously processed on separate conscious and unconscious tracks. 

• Parallel processing 

Processing multiple aspects of a stimulus simultaneously. 

• Unconsciously takes care of routine behavior automatically and quickly

• Selective attention

pciking when u want to pay attention

• Sleep

a periodic, natural loss of consciousness — as distinct from unconsciousness resulting from a coma, general anesthesia, or hibernation

• Circadian rhythm 

our biological clock; regular bodily rhythms (for example, of temperature and wakefulness) that occur on a 24-hour cycle.  

• The different stages of sleep, what happens in each stage

NREM 1 is a brief stage, during which a person might experience hallucinations and hypnogogic sensations.  

NREM 2 is about 20 minutes long, and sleep spindles appear on the EEG.

Deep sleep, or NREM 3, is marked by delta waves. It is difficult to awaken people in this stage of sleep as the brain and body are deep in sleep.

• The different sleep disorders and what they are 

Insomnia→ recurring problems in falling and staying asleep.

Narcolepsy→ a sleep disorder characterized by uncontrollable sleep attacks. The affected person may lapse directly into REM sleep, often at inopportune times. 

• Disruptive 

Sleep apnea→ a sleep disorder characterized by temporary cessations of breathing during sleep and repeated momentary awakenings.  

• Stop breathing in your sleep

• Feel groggy and tired even if you slept the correct number of hours

REM sleep behavior disorder→ a sleep disorder in which normal REM paralysis does not occur; instead, twitching, kicking or punching may occur, often acting out one’s dream.

• Hallucinations and when they can occur 

false sensory experiences, such as seeing something in the absence of external visual stimuli. 

• How the hypothalamus is involved in sleep 

• The hypothalamus contains the suprachiasmatic nucleus (SCN), which acts as the body's internal clock. 

• What happens if you don’t get enough sleep 

• drained energy 

• Sleep deprived students report falling asleep in

• Can affect moods, aggressive behavior, depression, and suicidal thoughts

• Can influence weight gain because your metabolism is off 

• Immune system can decrease

• Slowed reaction time and decision making 

• What Freud thought of dreams 

• Where subconscious, unacceptable feelings could be projected

• Dreams have a surface storyline, manifest content, a hidden meaning, and latent content 

• REM Rebound 

the tendency for REM sleep to increase following REM sleep deprivation.

• How to locate a sound

Place theory→ in hearing, the theory that links the pitch we hear with the place where the cochlea’s membrane is stimulated (also called place coding).

• Top-down processing

 information processing guided by higher-level mental processes, as when we construct perceptions drawing on our experience and expectations. 

• Bottom-up processing 

nformation processing that begins with the sensory receptors and works up to the brain’s integration of sensory information.  

• Absolute threshold

• the minimum stimulus energy needed to detect a particular stimulus 50 percent of the time 

• Perception

the process by which our brain organizes and interprets sensory information, enabling us to recognize objects and events as meaningful.  

• Sensation 

the process by which our sensory receptors and nervous system receive and represent stimulus energies from our environment 

• Difference threshold

the minimum difference between two stimuli required for detection 50 percent of the time. We experience the difference threshold as a just noticeable difference (jnd).  

• Signal detection theory

• a theory predicting how and when we detect the presence of a faint stimulus (signal) amid the background stimulation (noise); assumes there is no single absolute threshold and detection depends partly on a person’s experience, expectations, motivation, and alertness.

• Sensory adaptation

• diminished sensitivity as a consequence of constant stimulation.

• The different parts of the eye and what they do 

Cornea: the eye’s clear, protective outer layer, covering the pupil and iris. 

• Protective outer layer 

Pupil: the adjustable opening in the center of the eye through which light enters. 

• Allows light into the eye 

Iris: a ring of muscle tissue that forms the colored portion of the eye around the pupil and controls the size of the pupil opening.

accommodation: the process by which the eye’s lens changes shape to focus images of near and far objects on the retina. 

Retina: the light-sensitive back inner surface of the eye, containing the receptor rods and cones, plus layers of neurons that begin the processing of visual information. 

Rods→ retinal receptors that detect black, white, and gray, and are sensitive to movement.

Fovea→ the central focal point in the retina, around which the eye’s cones cluster.

• The different parts of the ear and what they do 

Middle ear→  the chamber between the eardrum and the cochlea containing three tiny bones which concentrate the vibrations of the eardrum on the cochlea’s oval window.  

Cochlea→ a coiled, bony, fluid-filled tube in the inner ear; sound waves  traveling through the cochlear fluid trigger nerve impulses.  

Inner ear→ the innermost part of the ear, containing the cochlea, semicircular canals, and vestibular sacs.

• Accommodation 

• Trichromatic theory

the theory that the retina contains three different types of color receptors – one most sensitive to red, one to green, one to blue – which, when stimulated in combination, can produce the perception of any color.

• Opponent-process theory

the theory that opposing retinal processes (red-green, blue-yellow, white-black) enable color vision. For example, some cells are stimulated by green and inhibited by red; others are stimulated by red and inhibited by green. 

• Young Helmholtz theory

the theory that the retina contains three different types of color receptors – one most sensitive to red, one to green, one to blue – which, when stimulated in combination, can produce the perception of any color.

• Feature detectors

nerve cells in the brain’s visual cortex that respond to specific features of the stimulus, such as shape, angle, or movement. 

• Pitch

a tone’s experienced highness or lowness; depends on frequency.

• Frequency

the number of complete wavelengths that pass a point in a given time (for example, per second).

• What causes conduction hearing loss 

caused by damage to the cochlea’s receptor cells or to the auditory nerve; also called nerve deafness.

• Frequency matching theory 

in hearing, the theory that the rate of nerve impulses traveling up the auditory nerve matches the frequency of a tone, thus enabling us to sense pitch (also called temporal coding).

• Olfaction 

• our sense of smell. 

• Gustation

• Gustation→ our sense of taste.

• Anything about pain and how we experience it

• Kinesthesis  

• our movement sense; our system for sensing the position and movement of individual body parts.