States of Consciousness Numerous factors determine when and why you feel tired, full of energy, and hungry. A person's state of consciousness and awareness varies throughout the day and depends on a person's activity, environment, and time clock. As a human we have what is called circadian rhythms, which simply explains our daily highs and lows. An example of your basic up and down rhythm would be the sleep/wake cycle. Sunlight regulates the sleep/wake cycle by causing the suprachiasmatic nucleus to decrease its production of melatonin in the early morning and increase it in the evening. Melatonin is a hormone that if increased in blood levels makes an individual drowsy or tired and if decreased will make them more alert. Certain …show more content…
The two basic sleep theories are the evolutionary and restorative theories of sleep. The evolutionary theory of sleep suggests that our sleep patterns are based on or defined by evolution. The second theory simply offers that sleeping restores and rejuvenates the body through physiological processes. Sleeping disorders have a variety of effects on a person. Insomnia simply disallows an individual to actually fall into deep sleep and feel rested in the morning. Sleepwalking and night terrors are much more common in childhood then in the adult life and occur during the deepest stages of NREM sleep. When a person repeatedly stops breathing during his sleep it is called sleep apnea. This sleeping disorder usually tends to occur in older more heavy weight men. Another sleeping disorder is narcolepsy, which sends an individual in an instant phase of deep REM sleep regardless of where they are and whom they are with. Dreaming is yet another state of consciousness. A dream is simply an unfolding episode of mental images that involve characters and events. Dreams usually tend to occur during REM sleep but can occur during NREM sleep as well. We dream on a variety of topics, subjects, and individuals. No dream can be exactly interpreted or defined, therefore people have always been fascinated with what, why, and how we dream. An unpleasant and almost terrifying type of dream is a nightmare. This is a very vivid, almost real
Dreams are scenarios your mind creates which represents who you truly are, were and are destined to be. You 're mind creates illusions that either further enhance your knowledge on what your purpose in life is or could make you fear it. Dreams are essentially part of the foundation of a persons life. Rudolfo Anaya in the novel Bless me ultima uses the concept of dreams to demonstrate the growth and the loss of innocence Antonio faces from beginning to end.
The US National Library of Medicine defines a nightmare as, “a bad dream that brings out strong feelings of fear, terror, distress, or anxiety.” A dream, then, is a series of thoughts or images that happen during the rapid-eye movement (REM) stage of sleep. Research has shown that the biggest amount of common adult dreams are in a category known as “pseudonightmarish” dreams, which is essentially any dream of being in trouble or in danger, being alone and/or trapped, something you don’t have control over (like losing your teeth), or facing natural forces.
Circadian rhythm is another sleep disorder that has to do with our body functions. In this case, our body clocks are off, due an internal change or external factors like a change in time zones or regions where a midnight sun occurs during a 24-hour period. Bright lights in a room have a similar effect on sleep.
A dream is a succession of images, ideas, emotions, and sensations that usually occur involuntary in the mind during certain stages of sleep. Dreams can mean anything. They can mean something for anybody, someone else, or just imagination. What a person dreams in life is usually different than sleeping dreams. Shakespeare’s play, “Midsummer Night’s Dream” is represented of dreams in historical and modern theories.
Chapter Four: States of Consciousness in Understanding Psychology by Charles G. Morris and Albert A. Maisto helped significantly in expanding my knowledge of psychology specifically about the States of Consciousness. Although the chapter taught me a lot there was still some topics that I already knew. Such as how marijuana helps ease the pain of medical conditions. “Some evidence indicates that marijuana can relieve some of the unpleasant side effects of chemotherapy and can reduce suffering among terminal cancer patients” (Morris & Maisto, 2016, p. 148). I believe that if we have some way of helping the ill enjoy life a little more and a little longer, than we should help them. I’m a huge condoner for legalizing medical marijuana, I have
Dreams have been around as long as the first civilization came to be and have been a normal part of human existence. One third of your life is spent sleeping, and of that third, on average you will have spent a total of about six years of it dreaming. Most people dream on average two hours every night, but you can have anywhere from four to seven dreams in one night. According to research, the most common setting for a dream is in your own house. In our dreams we can do anything we want and be whoever we want to be. Our dreams are an escape from reality. While we dream we are unable to control our actions and choose our surroundings. We let our minds take over. Sometimes dreams can be understood in the context of repressed thoughts. Dreaming serves as an outlet for those thoughts and impulses we repress during the day. When we go to sleep at night and slip into our dream state, we feel liberated and behave in a manner that we do not allow ourselves to in our everyday life. Visions and ides can come from your dreams. Often, authors, screenwriters, and even poets turn to their dreams for inspiration. The think quest oracle library goes on to tell about the most well-known of the modern dream
A nightmare is a dream occurring during REM sleep that results in feelings of strong terror,
Dreams are series of thoughts, images, and sensations occurring in a person’s mind during sleep. Most of the time, they depart dramatically from reality. Dreams that reflect the day’s experience tend to single out sensory experiences or objects from walking life and mix them together. The content of dreams takes snapshots from the day rather than retelling the stories of what you have done or seen.
The Brain Plasticity Theory is one of the most recent theories on why we sleep. According to this theory sleep is directly related to the changes in the structure, and organization of the brain. This process is known as brain plasticity. At one point researchers thought that brain plasticity stopped after the childhood stage in life. The effects of this process is it reshapes your brain and moves information from damaged parts of your brain to new, undamaged
How do your chosen texts represent altered states of consciousness (e.g. dreaming, drugged states, trances, madness)? What does the representation of these states explore that the representation of normative states does not?
Dreams are a sequence of images, emotions, and thoughts passing through a sleeping person’s mind. In our dreams we can portray ourselves as anything, we can go anywhere and do anything. There are many types of dreaming methods such as, daydreams, recurring dreams, nightmares, epic dreams, prophetic dreams, and lucid dreams and so on.
There are many forms of altered consciousness, a state in which a person’s perceptions of sense are different than normal. Forms such as sleeping and dreaming, hypnosis, biofeedback, and meditation, can be used to help the body in various ways. Scientists are still researching, because the mind and consciousness has not been fully figured out.
I guess we should start with what is a nightmare. Nightmare is a frightening or unpleasant dream. Nightmares that occur frequently are a parasomnia (or a disorder characterized by abnormal or unusual behavior of the nervous system during sleep) dream state event, in which visual sequences unfold that often depict imagery or situations that are particularly disturbing or frightening to the individual experiencing them, and may often come from fears in their own subconscious.
A dream by definition is a series of thoughts, images, and sensations occurring in a person's mind during sleep.
Have you ever found yourself thinking about the different levels of consciousness? Consciousness is "the state or quality of awareness you have of your surroundings both internally and externally, and the understanding of what is happening to you." That is not anything I had considered before, but it was just taken for granted. Research shows that consciousness’s are separated into two major levels, wakefulness and sleep. There are many levels of consciousness that each person goes through, some of these levels occur while you are asleep; others while you are alert and concentrating on a task and some while you are daydreaming. While asleep there are five stages of consciousness that you go through. While you are awake and alert, responses