attention, hypnosis, and meditation

What is consciousness?

Our awareness of ourselves and our environment. Psychology was initially very focused on consciousness but it can be very difficult to study scientifically. Advances in neuroscience have furthered this effort

It also relates to attention

What is attention?

Focusing on one thing at the expense of another. It is a selective process - you choose what you are focusing on and consequently miss a lot of other stuff because we are limited

Attention as a resource:

It is a limited resource and our ability to divide it depends on the number and complexity of tasks

What is the cocktail part effect?

We unconsciously monitoring lots of auditory information but are not attending to it, but still we are unconsciously processing things that we aren't aware of. Cocktail party effect - hearing your name even if your attention is directed elsewhere because you were unconsciously processing and it (your name) grabbed you

What is change blindness?

Decreased ability to notice "irrelevant" changes. We conserve resources to focus on relevant information. (think of the guy giving directions video)

What is inattention blindness?

Missing entire events or objects due to lack of attention. Any activity using attention will affect other attention demanding tasks

What are the effects of hypnosis?

Temporary sensory and perceptual changes - blindness, deafness, or loss of sensation in some body part

Posthypnotic suggestion - person will carry out that suggestion post hypnosis

Posthypnotic amnesia - subject unable to recall specific info or evens that happened before or during hypnosis

What are the limitations of hypnosis?

Can't be hypnotized against your will, can't make you act against morals, can't make you stronger or more talented, can't access a forgotten memory (can make you make up a memory and think it was a forgotten one)

What are the benefits of hypnosis?

Can increase self confidence, can help modify problematic behaviors (if also other things like therapy alongside it), can help with pain

What is The State View of hypnosis?

It is a unique, different state of consciousness. Dissociation occurs, consciousness is split into two simultaneous streams of mental activity

What is The Non-State View of hypnosis?

It is due to ordinary psychological process are. Subjects are responding to social demands, acting how good hypnotic subjects are supposed to, and conforming to expectations.

What is The Imaginative Suggestibility View of hypnosis?

Emphasizes individual differences in imaginative suggestibility. The degree to which a person is able to experience an imaginary state of affairs as if it were real. Consciousness is linked to visual imagery. Our neural activity coincides with what we are imagining rather than the real image

What is meditation?

Techniques that focus attention and heighten awareness

What are the two categories of meditation?

Focused attention techniques and Open monitoring techniques

What are focused attention techniques?

Involves focusing awareness on something specific like an object, sensation of breathing, mantra, mental image, etc. It is very difficult

What are open monitoring techniques?

State of open, non-reflective awareness involving monitoring your experience moment to moment. Basically breathing and noticing, much more common.

What is mindfulness?

An open monitoring technique - nonjudgmental focus on present experience. Is popular in clinical and research settings.

What are the benefits of meditation?

Can improve:

- cognitive abilities

- emotional control and well being

- anxiety and depression symptoms

Can reduce stress and minimize its physical effects

What are some cons of meditation?

It is hard to study empirically. Some of our takeaways may be questionable because of the fact that people that are good at meditation tend to be more good than usual at other stuff too (wellness in general)