1. CHAPTER 4: STATES OF
CONSCIOUSNESS
PSY 200
JSRCC

2. CONSCIOUSNESS
• Awareness of external events and internal sensations under a condition of
arousal
• All the feelings, thoughts, and aroused states of which a person is aware
• Many gradations of consciousness
• Altered states of consciouness

3. STREAM OF CONSCIOUSNESS
• Stream of consciousness
• Term used by William James to describe the mind as a continuous flow
changing sensation images, thoughts, and feelings

4. THEORY OF MIND
• Being aware of others having private thoughts and feelings

5. HIGHER- LEVEL CONSCIOUSNESS
• Involves controlled processing, in which individuals actively focus their efforts
on attaining a goal; the most alert stated of consciousness
• Examples
• Doing math or science problem
• Preparing for a debate
• Taking an at-bat in a baseball game

6. LOWER –LEVEL CONSCIOUSNESS
• Includes automatic processing that requires little attention, as well as
daydreaming
• Includes automatic processing that requires little attention
• Examples:
• Punching in a number on a cell phone
• Typing on a keyboard when one is an expert
• Gazing at a sunset

7. ALTERED STATE OF
CONSCIOUSNESS
• Can be produced by drugs, trauma, fatigue, possibly hypnosis, and sensory
deprivation
• Mental states that are noticeably different from normal awarness
• Examples
• Feeling the effect of having taken alcohol or psychedelic drugs
• Undergoing hypnosis to quit smoking or lose weight

8. SUBCONSCIOUS AWARENESS
• Can occur when people are awake, as well as when they are sleeping and
dreaming
• Examples
• Sleeping and dreaming

9. NO AWARENESS
• Freud’s belief that some unconscious thoughts are too laden with anxiety
and other negative emotions for consciousness to admit them
• Examples:
• Having unconscious thoughts being knocked out by a blow or anesthetized

10. CONTROLLED PROCESSES
• Most alert state of human consciousness, during which individuals activity
focus their effort to a goal

11. AUTOMATIC PROCESSES
• Require little attention/ conscious effort
• Don’t interfere with other ongoing activities
• Daydreaming
• Wandering thoughts
• Fantasy, imagination, rumination

12. CIRCADIAN RYTHMS
• Daily behavioral or physiological cycles that involve the sleep/wake cycle,
body temperature, blood pressure, and blood sugar level

13. SUPRACHIASMATIC NUCLEUS
• Suprachiasmatic Nucleus: The suprachiasmatic nucleus (SCN) plays an
important role in keeping our biological clock running on time. The SCN is
located in the hypothalamus. It receives information from the retina about
light, which is the external stimulus that synchronizes the SCN. Output from
the SCN is distributed to the rest of the hypothalamus and to the reticular
formation
• A small brain structure that uses input from the retina to synchronize its own
rhythm with the daily cycle of light and dark; the body’s way of monitoring
the change from day to night
• Supprachiasmatic Nucleus (SCN)

14. SLEEP STAGES
• Stage 1
• Only lasts a few minutes, and you usually only experience it once a nightour
brain produces theta waves
• Kind of awake and kind of asleep
• Light sleep, theta wave
• Stage 2
• Clearly asleep, sleep spindles
• More theta waves that get progressively slower
• Stage 3
• Transitional Stages, delta waves
• Stage 4
• Deep sleep, body maintenance and restoration

15. INSOMNIA
• Inability to get to sleep and/ or stay asleep
• Most common disorder- 50% of adults have insomnia at some point
• Associated with stressors, changes in schedule, physical ailments
• May be treated medically, but side effects and dependence are problem

16. NIGHTMARES VS. NIGHT TERRORS
• Nightmares
• Anxiety-arousing dreams occurring near the end of sleep, during REM sleep
• Night Terrors
• Abrupt awakenings from NREM sleep accompanied by intense physiological
arousal and feeling of panic
• Wake up screaming and have no idea why
• Not a nightmare
• Most common in children (boys) between ages of 2-8

17. NARCOLEPSY
• Suffer from sleeplessness and may fall asleep at unpredictable or
inappropriate times
• Directly into REM sleep
• Less than.001% of population

18. SLEEP APNEA
• Apnea-stops breathing while sleeping
• May feel sluggish, tired, irritable during day
• Increased chance when overweight, using alcohol; may have genetic basis
• Treatment may include weight loss, sleeping appliances
• 3 to 28% of population

19. DREAMS
• Dreams
• Everyone may not remember dreams, but all progress through dream states
• Similarities across cultures: dreams focused on basic needs (sex, aggression,
death)
• Other content specific to particular cultures
• Dream about what we know, influenced by culture
• Freud’s Psychodynamic Approach
• Royal road to the unconscious
• Dreams allow expression of fears and sexual, aggressive desires without censorship

20. MANIFEST VS. LATENT CONTENT
• Manifest Content
• According to Freud, the surface content of a dream, containg dream symbol
that disguise the dream’s true meaning
• Actual content of dream
• Storyline
• Latent Content
• According to Freud, a dream’s hidden content; its unconscious and true
meaning
• Symbolic interpretation
• Underlying meaning

21. THE ACTIVATION SYNTHESIS
THEORY
• Theory that dreaming occurs when the cerebral cortex synthesizes neural signals
generated from activity in the lower part of the brain and that dreams result from
the brain’s attempts to find logic in random brain activity that occurs during
sleep
• Consequence of aroused brain during REM sleep; cortex attempts to make
meaning out of neural impulses
• Our cerebral cortex is trying to interpret random electrical activity we have while
sleeping
• That is why our dreams sometimes makes no sense

22. USES OF PSYCHOACTIVE DRUGS
• Psychoactive Drug States- likely a changes in activation, awareness span,
self-awareness, and sensory dynamics
• Balanced metabolic system: can bring about changes in metabolic rate
•
• Moderate level of arousal: depressants decrease arousal; stimulants increase
arousal

23. PHYSICAL DEPENDENCE
• Physical Dependence
• Drugs that act on the nervous system to alter consciousness, modify perception,
and change moods
• Not physically addictive, but user has a psychological need to use the drug
• Stress-relieving drugs
• Tolerance
• The need to take increasing amounts of a drug to get the same effect
• Diminishing effect with regular use
• Withdrawal
• Discomfort and distress that follow discontinued use
• Psychological Dependence
• The strong desire to repeat the use of a drug for emotional reasons, such as a
feeling of well-being and reduction of stress

24. DEPRESSANTS AND ALCOHOL
• Depressants
• Psychoactive drugs that slow down mental and physical activity
• Slows down the body processes
• Alcohol
• Is a powerful drug
• Acts on the body primarily as a depressant and slows down the brain’s activates

25. BARBITURATES AND TRANQUILIZERS
• Barbiturates
• Depressant drugs, such as Nembutal and Seconal, that decrease central
nervous system activity
• Tranquilizers
• Depressant drugs, such as valium and Xanax, that reduce anxiety and induce
relaxation

26. OPIATES
• Opium and its derivatives; narcotic drugs that depress activity in the central
nervous system and eliminate pain
• Has depressive and hallucinogenic qualities
• Agonist for endorphins derived from poppy plant

27. STIMULANTS
• Stimulants
• Psychoactive drugs, including caffeine, nicotine, amphetamines, and cocaine, that
increase the central nervous system’s activity
• Caffeine
• is a stimulant and a natural component of the plants that are the sources of coffee,
tea, and cola drinks
• also is present in chocolate, in many nonprescription medications, and in energy
drinks such as Red Bull.
• Nicotine
• The main psychoactive ingredient in all forms of smoking and smokeless tobacco
• Amphetamines
• Are classified as and in the same class as nicotine and caffeine
• Drugs that stimulate neural activity, causing speeded-up body functions and
associated energy and mood changes
• Cocaine
• Illegal drug that comes from the coca plant, native to Bolivia and Peru

28. HYPNOSIS
• An altered state of consciousness or a psychological state of altered
attention and expectation in which the individual is unusually receptive to
suggestions
• Hypnosis- likely a change in activation awareness span, self-awareness, and
sensory dynamics
• Individuals who are highly vulnerable to suggestion are most easily hypnotized
• Hypnosis linked to increased awareness, lower activation, suggestibility

29. MEDITATION
• Involves attaining a peaceful state of mind in which thoughts are not
occupied by worry; the meditator is mindfully present to his or her
thoughts and feelings but is not consumed by them
• Meditation-Likely a change in activation awareness span, self-
awareness, and sensory dynamics
• Frequently associated with frontal lobe changes
• Increases sense of control over consciousness
• Activation: typically relaxed
• Awareness span: can range from wide to narrow
• Self-awareness: can range from absorption to dissociation
• Sensory dynamics: typically enhanced sensory experience