Myers Ch 3
Brain States and Consciousness
o Consciousness: our awareness of ourselves and environment
Reflects what is happening
Altered by hypnosis, drugs, meditation
Helps us reach long-term goals
Cognition: mental processes
o Clinical impairments
In a coma
Still there is brain activity
Vegetative state
Ex: asked someone who could not move to imagine playing tennis
and her brain lit up where her arm movements would be
controlled
o Dual Processing
Simultaneous conscious and nonconscious processing streams
Blindsight
Responding to visual stimuli without consciously experiencing
them
Readiness potentials
Getting prepared to do something
When the brain signals an action before the conscious mind
perceives it and performs that action
o Attention
Selective attention
Focusing conscious awareness on one stimulus
Selective inattention
Unaware of most stimuli
o Focusing on one thing and ignoring the rest
Research studies
o Basketball
Asked to press a key every time someone in a black
shirt passed the ball
Completely missed a lady walk across the court
Repeated again with someone in a gorilla suit
He paused halfway through and now only
half of the research subjects failed to notice
him
o Deafness
Asked to pay attention to lady’s voice and missed a
man saying “Im a gorilla”
o Cancer
Brain States and Consciousness
o Consciousness: our awareness of ourselves and environment
Reflects what is happening
Altered by hypnosis, drugs, meditation
Helps us reach long-term goals
Cognition: mental processes
o Clinical impairments
In a coma
Still there is brain activity
Vegetative state
Ex: asked someone who could not move to imagine playing tennis
and her brain lit up where her arm movements would be
controlled
o Dual Processing
Simultaneous conscious and nonconscious processing streams
Blindsight
Responding to visual stimuli without consciously experiencing
them
Readiness potentials
Getting prepared to do something
When the brain signals an action before the conscious mind
perceives it and performs that action
o Attention
Selective attention
Focusing conscious awareness on one stimulus
Selective inattention
Unaware of most stimuli
o Focusing on one thing and ignoring the rest
Research studies
o Basketball
Asked to press a key every time someone in a black
shirt passed the ball
Completely missed a lady walk across the court
Repeated again with someone in a gorilla suit
He paused halfway through and now only
half of the research subjects failed to notice
him
o Deafness
Asked to pay attention to lady’s voice and missed a
man saying “Im a gorilla”
o Cancer
