PSY 1305 Chapter Notes - Chapter 7: Circadian Clock, Delta Wave, Sleep Deprivation
Document Summary
Consciousness: our awareness of ourselves and our environment. Conscious awareness enables us to exert voluntary control and to communicate our mental states. Occurs in normal states (seeing, hearing, reasoning, remembering) and altered states (sleep, hypnosis, chemically induced hallucinations). Psychology began as the study of consciousness then turned to study of observable behavior. Our consciousness lags behind our brain event, but this state or awareness enables us to perform voluntary acts. In unconscious processing, we perform familiar tasks automatically and our sensory systems and neural pathways register stimuli rapidly and simultaneously on multiple tracks (parallel processing). Includes annual cycles, twenty eight day (28) cycles, twenty four hour (24) cycles, and ninety minute (90) cycles. Circadian rhythm: the biological clock; regular bodily rhythms. Light tweaks the circadian clock by activating light sensitive retinal proteins. These proteins trigger signals to the brain"s suprachiasmatic nucleus, cluster of cells that control the circadian clock.
