Psychology: Sleep and Drugs

States of Consciousness

• Conscious Level
• Non-conscious Level
• Preconscious Level
• Sun-conscious Level

Sleep

• Sleep is a state of consciousness
• We are less aware of our surroundings
• Circadian Rhythms

Sleep Cycle

• Use an EEG machine to measure stages of sleep
• When you are the onset of sleep, you experience alpha waves
• Produces mild hallucinations, like a feeling of falling

Stage 1

• Kind of awake and kind of asleep
• Lasts a few minutes and experienced once a night
• Brain produces Theta waves

Stage 2

• Theta waves get slower
• Begin to show sleep spindles...Short bursts of rapid brain waves

Stage 3 and 4

• Slow wave sleep
• Produce Delta waves
• Vital for restoring; body's growth hormones, and good overall health

REM Sleep

• Rapid Eye Movement
• Often called paradoxical sleep
• Brain is active
• Dreams usually occur in this state
• Body is essentially paralyzed

Sleep Disorders

Insomnia

• Persistent problems falling asleep
• Effects 10% of the population

Narcolepsy

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

Sleep Apnea

• A person stops breathing during their sleep
• Wake up momentarily, gasps for air, then falls back asleep
• Wake up screaming, and don't know why

Sleep Walking (Somnambulism)

• Sleepwalking is a sleep disorder affecting an estimated 10% of all humans at least one in their lives
• Sleep walking most often occurs during non-REM sleep
• Sleep (stage 3 or 4)early in the night

Dreams

Freud's Theory of Dreams

• Dreams are a roadway into our unconscious
• Manifest Content (story-line)
• Latent Content (underlying meaning)

Activation Synthesis Theory

• Our cerebral cortex is trying to interpret random electrical activity we have while sleeping
• That is why dreams sometimes make no sense
• Biological Theory

Information-Processing Theory

• Dreams are a way to deal with the stresses of everyday life
• We tend to dream more when we are more stressed

Hypnosis

• Altered state of consciousness? 

Hypnotic Theories

• Role Theory
• Hypnosis is NOT an altered state of consciousness
• Different people have various states of hypnotic suggestibility
• A social phenomenon where people want to believe 
• Works better on people with richer fantasy lives
• State Theory
• Hypnosis is an altered state of consciousness
• Dramatic health benefits

Dissociation Theory

• By Ernest Hiilgard
• We voluntarily divide our consciousness up
• Ice Water Experiment
• We have a hidden observer, a level of us that is always aware

Drugs

• Our brain is protected by a layer of capillaries called the blood-brain barrier
• The drugs that are small enough to pass through are called psychoactive drugs

Drugs are either

• Agonist 
• Antagonists
• Reuptake inhibitors

• If a drug is used often, a tolerance is created for the drug
• Thus you need more of the drug to feel the same effect
• If you stop using the drug, you can develop withdrawal symptoms

Stimulant

• Speed up bodily processes
• More powerful ones (cocaine) give people feelings of invincibility

Depressants

• Slow down bodily processes
• Ex. Alcohol

Alcohol

• More than 86 billion spent annually
• It is involved in 60% of all crimes
• It is involved in 70% of all sexually related crimes

Opiates

• Hes depressive and hallucinogenic qualities
• Agonist for endorphines
• Derived from poppy plant
• Morphine, heroin, methadon, and codene
• All are teratogens