Chapter 7: Altered States of Consciousness
Section 1: Sleep and Dreams
(Read Exploring Psychology)
- Sleep is vital to mental health
- If a person is deprived of sleep, they will develop psychological (and physical) symptoms
- Sleep is a state of altered consciousness, characterized by certain patterns of brain activity and inactivity
- Consciousness is a state of awareness.
- Can range from alertness to nonalertness
- The study of sleep has been aided by the development of the electroencephalograph (EEG0
- Why do we sleep?
- No one knows, possible reasons
- Characterized by unresponsiveness to the environment and limited physical mobility
- Maybe to restore our batteries
- Brain is recovering from exhaustion and stress
- Primitive hibernation
- We sleep to conserve energy
- An adaptive practice
- Kept humans out of harm’s way at night when we would have been most vulnerable
- To clear out minds
- Gets rid of useless information
- We sleep to dream
- Stages of sleep
0
Awake / Slows down, decreased muscle tension / Borderline wakefulness / Relaxation, mind wanders, awareness dulls / Heart rate, pulse, temperature and blood pressure slightly diminished.
1 / Eyes roll slowly on falling asleep, eyes quiescent in later stage 1 periods. Body movements slowed. / Light sleep, easily awakened, might deny being asleep if awakened. / Drifting thoughts and floating sensation. / Temperature, heart rate, pulse decline further. Regular breathing. May have hypnogogic hallucinations on falling asleep.
2 / Eyes quiet. Few body movements. Snoring is common. / Light to moderate sleep. Relatively easy to awaken. Eyes will not see if open. / Some thought fragments, memory processes diminished, may
describe vague dream if awakened / Decreased heart rate, pulse, blood pressure, temperature and metabolic rate, regular breathing with increased airway resistance.
3 / Occasional movement, eyes quiescent. / Deep Sleep, takes louder sounds to be awakened. / Rarely able to remember thoughts. A few vaguely formed dreams. Possible memory consolidation. / Metabolic rate, pulse, heart rate, blood pressure and temperature decrease further. Increased secretion of growth hormones.
4 / Occasional movement, eyes quiet. / Deepest sleep, very difficult to awaken. / Virtually oblivious, very poor recall of thoughts if awoken possibly involved in memory consolidation. / Continued decline in heart rate, temperature and metabolic rates. Increased secretion of growth hormone. (possibly to restore bodily tissues)
REM / Large muscles paralyzed. Fingers toes and facial muscles twitch. Erections, snoring uncommon. / Variable. If sound is incorporated into dream, then harder to awake. / 80 percent dreaming, good vivid dream recall, especially later in the evening. Possibly involved in unconscious conflict resolution. / Heart rate 5 percent greater than above stages. Pulse, temperature and metabolic rates increase. Irregular breathing one-half extra breath per minute.
- Stage 1
- Pulse slows and muscles relax
- Breathing becomes uneven and brain waves grow irregular
- “Just drifting” time
- Lasts 10 minutes or so
- Stage 2
- Eyes roll from side to side
- Lasts 30 minutes
- Stage 3
- Short periods of large delta waves
- Stage 4
- Deepest sleep of all
- Difficult of wake during this stage
- Disoriented if woken up
- Talking out loud, sleep walking and bet wetting can occur here, leaving no memory
- Important to physical and psychological well-being
- While muscles are more relaxed than before, eye begin to move rapidly – REM sleep
- REM sleep – time during which pulse and breathing become irregular, adrenal and sexual hormone levels rise, face and fingers twitch, large muscles in legs and arms are paralyzed
- Brain waves resemble those of someone who is fully awake
- Active Sleep
- Dreaming takes place
- Falling out of bed, hitting the ground, alarm clock inclusion examples
- People spend 75% of their sleep in stages 1 through 4
- How much sleep do we need?
- Humans spend 1/3 of their life sleeping
- Newborns – 16 hours, half in REM
- 16 year olds – 10 to 11 hours
- College – 8 hours
- 70 or older – 5 hours
- Adults 25% in REM
- Sleep Disorders
- Insomnia
- Insomnia is a prolonged and usually abnormal inability to obtain adequate sleep
- Causes – anxiety, depression, alcohol and drug overuse
- Sleep Apnea
- Sleep apnea causes frequent interruptions of breathing during sleep
- Snoring that leads to a stop of breathing, leads to a complete blockage of the breathing passage, choking the person. Ends when low levels of oxygen or high levels of carbon dioxide trigger the breathing reflex to start again
- Occurs in 1 in 100 people, usually older
- Narcolepsy
- Narcolepsy is characterized by a permanent and overwhelming feeling of sleepiness and fatigue
- Unusual sleep and dream patterns
- Hallucinations
- Feeling temporarily paralyzed
- Sleep attacks, falling to sleep anywhere, at any time
- Nightmares and Night Terrors
- Nightmares – frightening dreams, during the dream phase of REM sleep
- May frighten the sleeper, waking up with a vivid memory of a movielike dream
- Night Terrors – occur during Stage IV sleep (within an hour of sleep)
- Can last 5 to 20 minutes, involving screaming, sweating, confusion and rapid heart rate
- Sudden awakening or a persistent fear at night
- If woken up by the terror, the subject will not be “awake” and could continue with the terror
- Most will not remember the night terror at all
- Sleepwalking and Sleep Talking (Somniloquy)
- A disorder in which a person is partly, but not completely, awake during the night
- People may walk or perform other tasks and have no memory of it
- Sleepwalking mostly associated with children
- It is NOT dangerous to wake sleepwalkers
- Sleep talking can occur in REM or nonREM sleep
- Long sentences or just a couple of words
- You can engage a sleep talker in conversations occasionally
- Sleep Motor Starts
- A sudden, often violent, jerk of the entire body that occurs upon falling asleep
- Teeth Grinding (BRUXISM)
- Grinding teeth during sleep is a very common occurrence and little evidence suggests that teeth grinding is associated with any significant medical or psychological problems.
- Dreams
- Any mental activity that takes place during sleep is dreaming
- Everyone dreams
- First dreams are usually vague thoughts left over from the day’s activities
- As night goes on, dreams become longer, more vivid and dramatic
- Especially dreams taking place in REM sleep
- Last dream is usually the longest and the one people remember
- If you miss REM sleep, subsequent sleep will contain increased REM sleep
- Suggests that REM sleep is necessary
- Content of Dreams
- We often incorporate our everyday activities into our dreams
- Most occur in commonplace settings: home, car, streets
- Most involve either strenuous activities or passive events
- Most involve unpleasant emotions
- Dreams are in real time, not in a split second
- Dream Interpretation
- Freud believed that no matter how simple or mundane a dream, they contain clues to thoughts the dreamer is afraid to acknowledge in their waking hours
- Some say that dreams serve no function
- That it’s a by-product of stimulating brain cells during sleep
- Another says that dreaming allows people the chance to review and address some of the problems they faced during the day
- Another says dreams are the brain’s way of removing certain unneeded memories
- Daydreams
- Requires a low level of awareness and involves fantasizing but directed thinking while we are awake
- Serves purposes such as reminding us of or preparing us for events in our future
- May improve our creativity by generating thought processes
- Or to help us control our emotions
Section 2: Hypnosis, Biofeedback and Meditation
(Read Exploring Psychology)
- Hypnosis
- Hypnosis is a form of altered consciousness in which people become highly suggestible to changes in behavior and thought
- People can be made conscious of things that they are normally unaware of and unaware of things they normally notice
- May recall forgotten memories in detail
- Feel no pain from a pin prick
- Does not put people to sleep
- The trance makes people more receptive and responsive to internal and external stimuli
- Able to focus attention on minute details and ignore all other inputs
- They are conscious and aware
- Can be convinced to do things that they normally wouldn’t do (Note your book’s text here!!)
- BUT the hypnotist cannot make you do or say something that you normally wouldn’t do or say unless you want to
- The mind rejects undesired suggestions automatically
- Your will, morality and ethics will not allow it to happen
- Anyone can resist hypnosis by refusing to open their minds, you must be willing to be hypnotized
- Theories of Hypnosis
- A simple result of suggestibility
- Reveals that people have potential abilities that they do not use
- Uses of Hypnosis
- Posthypnotic suggestion – when a hypnotist suggests things for their participants to remember or forget when the trance is over
- Memory can be aided or enhanced through this type to hypnosis
- Helping people change unwanted behavior such as overeating and smoking
- To reduce pain
- Reduces the patients anxiety and encourages relaxation
- Combination of hypnosis and therapy can help people work through their problems
- Biofeedback
- Biofeedback – technique in which one learns to control their internal physiological processes with the help of feedback
- A light goes off when your heart rate goes above 80, you learn to keep your heart rate below 80 to keep the light off
- Can be used to teach people to control a variety of physiological responses such as
- Brain waves
- Heart rate
- Blood pressure
- Skin temperature
- Sweat gland activity
- Uses machines to give feedback on subtle, moment to moment changes in the body
- Meditation
- Meditation – focusing one’s attention on an image or thought with the goal of clearing the mind and producing relaxation, or inner peace
- Transcendental meditation – mental repetition of a mantra or phrase
- Sitting with eyes closed and meditating for 15 to 20 minutes twice a day
- Mindfulness meditation – from the Buddhist tradition, focusing on the present moment
- Moving one’s focus throughout the body while paying attention to areas that cause pain
- Breath meditation – concentrating on one’s respiration, inhaling and exhaling
- Most people would benefit from this type of relaxation
- Lowers blood pressure, heart rate, and respiration rate
Section 3: Drugs and Consciousness
- Psychoactive drugs – drugs that interact with the central nervous system to alter a person’s mood, perception and behavior
- Examples: caffeine, depressants (alcohol), marijuana and LSD
- How drugs work
- Carried by the blood and taken to tissues throughout the body
- Taken into the body from the outside
- Attach themselves to the ends of nerve cells (neurons) and send out their own chemical message
- Alcohol molecules tell nerve cells not to fire
- More and more cause a person to become slower and leads to unconsciousness
- LSD causes circuits in the brain to start firing together instead of separately causes hallucinations
- Marijuana
- In some cultures, is legally and morally more acceptable than alcohol
- Illegal for sale, possession and use is illegal in most states, but not legal by national law (becomes a constitutional issue over state vs. federal law)
- A subculture drug before late 1970’s and 80’s
- Active ingredient is THC (tetrahydrocannabinol)
- Made by drying the plant
- Hashish is the gummy powder made from the resin from the top of the female plant
- Usually smoked, but can be cooked with food and eaten
- Effects vary from person to person
- Depend on the setting its taken in, the mood the person is in and the users past experience
- Psychological Pleasant and Unpleasant Effects
- Sensory experiences are greatly augmented
- Music sounds fuller
- Colors look brighter
- Smells are stronger
- Food is more intense in flavor
- Users feel elated
- Ordinary events take on extraordinary significance
- Psychologically addictive and dependent
- Instill or heighten unpleasant experiences
- Those frightened, unhappy or depressed will have those emotions blown out of proportion
- Can bring on psychological disturbances in those unstable before using the drug
- Physical Effects
- Can cause lung disorders
- More damaging than cigarette use
- Holding in the smoke can hinder lung function
- Disrupts memory formation, making it difficult to carry out mental and physical tasks
- Can lead to long term dependence
- Lower IQ scores
- Hallucinations
- Hallucinations – perceptions that have no direct external cause (hearing, seeing, smelling, tasting, or feeling things that don’t exist)
- Caused by hypnosis, meditation, certain drugs, drug withdraw, psychological breakdown and sensory deprivation
- Can occur under normal conditions
- During dreaming
- When deprived of sleep
- High emotions
- Concentration
- Fatigue
- Daydreams
- Very much alike from one person to the next
- May be due to the way the drug affects the brain
- The part that responds to incoming stimuli is disorganized and the central nervous system is aroused
- More likely to involve color
- Hallucinogens
- Hallucinogens – drugs whose main effect is to produce hallucinations
- Found in plants grown throughout the world
- Used since the earliest recorded human history
- Create lost of contact with reality
- Create a false body image, loss of self, create dreamlike fantasies and hallucinations
- Examples
- LSD – most studied and most potent (LSD-25)
- One of the most powerful drugs known to man
- Synthetic
- Synthesized by Dr. Albert Hofmann in Switzerland in 1938
- Searching for medicinal properties of a fungus, contained lysergic acid
- Synthesized 24 prior lysergic acids before hand
- Noticed the hallucinogenic properties 5 years later while studying it
- Made himself a guinea pig
- A dose of a few millionths (that’s .000001) of a gram produces a noticeable effect
- 100 to 300 micrograms produces a “trip”
- Lasts 6 to 14 hours
- Distributed on strips of paper (tabs, blotters) or on sugar cubes
- Experiences
- Intense and rapidly changing perceptions
- The expectations, mood, beliefs and circumstances under which they take “acid” affect the experience
- Can be terrifying
- Perceptual hallucinations
- Progressive hallucination that evolve over time
- Senses intermingle: hearing visual stimuli and seeing sounds
- Dissociation with one’s self
- Distortions of time
- Single stimuli can become the focus for hours
- Impairs thinking
- Panic reactions abound
- Flashbacks
- “Remembering” the trip without the overt presence of the drug, stimuli from the senses present without physical stimuli
- Possible chromosome damage
- Counterculture of the 1960’s
- Dr. Timothy Leary
- For spiritual growth
- Turn on, tune in, drop out
- Professor at UC Berkley and Harvard
- Opiates
- Also known as narcotics
- Include opium, morphine and heroin
- Produce analgesia – pain reduction, euphoria – pleasurable state somewhere between wake and sleep, and constipation
- Leads to physical addiction
- Can lead to death from respiratory failure
- Alcohol
- Most widely used and abused mind-altering substance
- A disease? Or an addiction
- Encouraged throughout our society and traditions
- Up to debate
- Effects
- Immediate – loosening of inhibition
- More likely to engage in behaviors and actions one normally wouldn’t take part in (sexual, other drugs)
- A depressant that inhibits brain functioning
- Acting without social restraint or self-control
- Depends on the amount drank, frequency of drinking and body weight
- The more consumed in a quicker time period, the less function a person has increases
- Slurred speech
- Blurred vision
- Impaired judgment and memory
- Blackouts
- Long Term Effects
- Permanent brain damage
- Liver damage
- Change in personality
Progressive Effects of Alcohol
Concentration / Changes in Feelings
and Personality / Physical and Mental
Impairments
0.01 — 0.06 / Relaxation
Sense of Well-being
Loss of Inhibition
Lowered Alertness
Joyous / Thought
Judgment
Coordination
Concentration
0.06 — 0.10 / Blunted Feelings
Disinhibition
Extroversion
Impaired Sexual Pleasure / Reflexes Impaired
Reasoning
Depth Perception
Distance Acuity
Peripheral Vision
Glare Recovery
0.11 — 0.20 / Over-Expression
Emotional Swings
Angry or Sad
Boisterous / Reaction Time
Gross Motor Control
Staggering
Slurred Speech
0.21 — 0.29 / Stupor
Lose Understanding
Impaired Sensations / Severe Motor Impairment
Loss of Consciousness
Memory Blackout
0.30 — 0.39 / Severe Depression
Unconsciousness
Death Possible / Bladder Function
Breathing
Heart Rate
=> 0.40 / Unconsciousness
Death / Breathing
Heart Rate
- Drug Abuse and Treatment
- Drug abusers are those who regularly use illegal drugs or excessively use legal drugs
- Reasons for drug abuse
- Avoid boredom
- To fit in socially
- To gain self-confidence
- To forget about problems or cope with pain
- To relax or feel good
- Risks
- Death or injury due to overdose or accident
- Health damage
- Legal consequences
- Destructive behavior
- Loss of control
- Addiction