Exploring Sleep, Dreams & Learning: Neuronal Activation, REM & Conditioning - Prof. Elizab, Study notes of Psychology

Download Exploring Sleep, Dreams & Learning: Neuronal Activation, REM & Conditioning - Prof. Elizab and more Study notes Psychology in PDF only on Docsity! 1. Review the lecture outline for sleep and dreams. 2. Sleep a) Describe the sleep stages. Awake, calm/drowsy, stage 1 sleep, stage 2 sleep, stage 3&4 sleep, REM sleep b) Describe the sleep cycle. - Lasts about 90 minutes for a complete cycle Shallow sleep – deep sleep – shallow sleep -- REM Stage 1, stage 2 – stages 3, 4, 3 – stage 2, REM c) How does the sleep cycle change over the course of a full period of sleep? -As the cycle is repeated, spend less time in deep sleep and more time in REM 3. What would you say to people who say they never dream? It may be difficult to recall dreams but everyone dreams 4. How can you improve sleep without medication? Pay attention to daytime habits (don’t nap, avoid stimulants like coffee or nicotine, engage in regular physical activity), create a pre-sleep ritual, and manage stress. 5. What is sleep debt? What is important to know about it? What are the effects of sleep deprivation? Sleep debt is the cumulative hours of sleep loss. It is important to know how quickly sleep debt can add up and how rested you feel after a regular night of sleep depends on your sleep debt. 6. Describe psychological approaches to explaining the cause and meaning of dreams. Discuss research evidence that is relevant to these approaches. Pattern of neuron activation that occurred during the day is replayed during REM. -Mimics neuron sequence from earlier activiries -Replay of memory traces in the hippocampus -Replay of patterns in the visual cortex 7. Describe basic facts about dreams. Most dream content is commonplace and familiar. -Continuation of daytime thinking -Consistent with ongoing concerns -Often includes the main people, activities and interests of one’s daily life -difficult to recall because hippocampus isn’t working as much 8. What are the benefits of sleep and dreams? How might bad dreams be helpful? Benefits of sleep & dreams: - improve attention, - consolidate memory (able to remember new facts better later on, if you memorize facts and then sleep, you will remember better because neurons active during sleep) -increase insight (sleeping on a problem will allow new insight when awake again) -increase creativity. Bad dreams could be helpful in providing the dreamer to play out and plan for if that situation did occur or provide an alternate ending. 9. What is REM? What is REM atonia? What part of the brain controls this? REM is the Rapid Eye Movement stage of sleep, the stage in which most dreams occur. Atonia is lack of muscle tone and muscle atonia during REM prevents people from acting out stories their dreams. The body is pretty much paralyzed because it lacks muscle tone and muscles have been relaxed. The release of certain neurotransmitters, the monoamines (norepinephrine, serotonin and histamine), is completely shut down during REM. This causes REM atonia, an almost complete paralysis of the body, due to motor neuron inhibition. 10. What is hypnosis? How does hypnosis affect people? What makes someone more likely to experience hypnosis? -Hypnosis is a systematic procedure that typically produces a heightened state of suggestibility. -People differ in how well they respond to hypnotic induction. About 10%-20% of the population doesn’t respond well at all. -When hypnotized people know that are in a situation in which they won’t be held responsible for their actions and this frees them to do something they would not normally do -While hypnotized people can experience dissociations: splitting of mental processes into two separate simultaneous streams of awareness (individual can be consciously telling a researcher that placing ones hand in ice-cold water isn’t painful while simultaneously tapping a button that indicates they are experiencing pain) -Someone is more likely to experience hypnosis if they are among the ‘hypnotic virtuosos’ who compromise the upper 10 to 15% of the distribution of hypnotizability. -Among those that are susceptible to hypnosis many interesting effects can be produced. Some of the more prominent hypnotic phenomena include: anesthesia, sensory distortions and hallucinations, disinhibiton and posthypnotic suggestions and amnesia. 11. What does the behavioral perspective emphasize? Elaborate on its similarities and differences in comparison to the cognitive, biological, and psychoanalytic perspectives? The behavioral perspective emphasizes a focus on observable actions and external causes. This perspective looks at past and present environment. In the behavioral perspective it is important to deny, ignore and downplay cognition. 12. What is the definition of learning? How is this definition different from what the general public might say is the definition of learning? The definition of learning= change in behavior due to experience. This definition is different from what the general public might say the definition of learning is because the general public may not associate learning with a change of behavior. 13. Compare and contrast classical conditioning and operant conditioning. - Immediate consequences usually have a stronger effect on behavior - Example: difficulty staying on a new diet or workout plan  Immediate consequences: hunger, no dessert, soreness, less sleep *Immediate consequences are aversive  Delayed Consequences: lose weight, gain energy, feel better *Reinforcing consequences can overcome stronger effects of immediate consequences b) Continuous and partial reinforcement? - Continuous is good to learn a new response - Example of continuous reinforcement is a vending machine which produces the same result every time - Partial increases persistence and resistance to extinction - Example of partial reinforcement is a slot machine that doesn’t always produce but has the opportunity to produce in big ways - Partial reinforcement helps to explain:  Supporting a team that has a losing record – every once in a while they win  Reinforcement every so often  Staying in a relationship that is abusive sometimes c) Fixed schedule of reinforcement? - Produces variable rate of behavior - Example: two exams on pre set dates, studying varies d) Variable schedule of reinforcement? - Produces steady rate of behavior - Example: unknown number of pop quizzes, fairly constant studying 21. What are some of the ways in which advertisers and political campaigns use classical conditioning to try to change our emotions? Politicians may exploit the principles of classical conditioning by associating themselves with cherished symbols (they visit a flag factory, take a ride in a tank, kiss a baby). In advertising, companies try to associate a celebrity with their product. 22. How common is observational learning? Compare and contrast observation learning and operant conditioning. Observational learning is very common. It is not unusual to learn vicariously through others and their experiences. Operant Conditioning focuses on a punishment or reinforcement for an individual person. With observational learning, you would see how this punishment or reinforcement affects another person and apply it to your own life. 23. What is metacognition? Awareness and understanding of one's own thought processes. Example: Marcus understands that in order to learn more while studying he needs to focus on one topic without distractions. 24. Describe the three structures and three processes of memory. . Sensory memory- very large capacity, very short duration (1/4 sec) - Large capacity because it needs to pick up input from all sense at any moment Short term memory {working memory} - small capacity (7 +/- 2 pieces of info), short duration (20- 30 sec with effort) Long Term Memory- very large capacity (may ne infinite), very long duration (all of your life) Encoding- input, transferring into memory Storage- maintaining and keeping info in memory Retrieval- output, getting info out of long term 25. Draw an accurate diagram of the Atkinson-Shiffrin model of the memory system. 26. What is known about the objective and subjective effects of divided attention on memory? In other words, how does it really affect memory (objective)? What do multitaskers believe about how divided attention affects their work and their memory (subjective)? Divided attention causes reduced encoding. There is an illusion of heightened productivity causing multitaskers to believe that that they are being more productive than they are in reality. There is an illusion of encoding making you believe you learned more than you actually did. 27. Describe effective ways of improving encoding. For each strategy, describe the strategy as well as research showing that the strategy is effective. What do all of these strategies have in common? Distributed rehearsal- how many times you go to the material to rehearse it. Spread out work over time; this will help with long-term retention, better than cramming Mnemonics: roygbiv, pemdas Visual Imagery- pictures, diagrams and graphs. Reconstructing drawings helps you to put in more detail. More than 50% of brain is dedicated to visual processing Deeper Processing- don’t just register the appearance and sound of something, think about the meaning (semantic) 28. You watched two Dr. Chew videos while taking the memory quiz. How does the information from these videos add to what you learned in lecture and the textbook about memory and how to improve your study techniques?  Intention to learn and depth of processing are both very important when trying to learn  If people used shallow study strategies, they did NOT learn the material, even if they wanted to learn.  Research on learning styles provides no evidence that it is necessary to match a learning style with a study strategy in order to learn, Effective students become good at learning in multiple ways, Although many people believe in learning styles, the research that has investigated them shows that they don't matter  You have to devote time to studying, but time alone will not make you successful. It depends on what you do during your study time.  The most important factor in successful studying is what you think about when studying 29. Why does it make sense to organize causes of forgetting by the three memory processes? 30. Describe in detail the main causes of retrieval failure. Fatigue, anxiety, interference and motivated forgetting Interference- desired info has trouble being retrieved from your long-term memory because related info gets in the way. This info that interferes is usually related to the desirable content in some way. Motivated forgetting- forgetting info we don’t want to think about or actively remember Suppression (motivated interference) - very common, deliberate, conscious, trying to forget one thing by directing attention to something else Repression- very rare unconsciously your mind is hiding something from you. Classic Freudian term 31. Which causes of forgetting are most common and help us to account for almost all everyday memory failures? - Decay theory: forgetting occurs because memory traces fade over time - Interference theory: people forget information because of competition from other material  Retroactive interference: new information impairs the retention of previously learned information  Proactive interference: previously learned information interferes with the retention of new information 32. Which causes of forgetting are relatively rare and don’t account for typical, everyday memory failures? Sigmund Freud’s theory of motivated forgetting, repression. Repression refers to keeping distressing thoughts and feelings buried in the unconscious. 33. What is emotion? Why is it appropriate to use perception terms to understand emotion? Emotions are complex perceptions created in your mind when you make sense of bodily feelings and sensations in a given context. c. Variety of food d. Learned preferences and habits e. How much stress you have 43. The textbook presents 10 factors that have been studied to determine how strongly they are related to happiness. List those 10 factors in rank order from most predictive of happiness to least predictive of happiness. 1. Most predictive of happiness: genetics and personality 2. Work 3. Love and marriage 4. Religion 5. Social activity 6. Health 7. Intelligence and attractiveness 8. Parenthood 9. Age 10. Least Predictive of happiness: Money 44. How do the topics of motivation and emotion help us to once again reflect on the themes of this course? Looking at motivation and emotion shows us once again that psychology is characterized by theoretical diversity, that biology and environment shape behavior interactively, that behavior is governed by multiple causes, that psychological processes are characterized by both cultural variance and invariance, and that psychology evolves in a sociohistoric context. 45. Why is it correct to say nature AND nurture? What does it mean to say there is a dialectical process between internal and external factors? Developmental outcome is the result of the interaction of internal and external factors. Saying there is a dialectical process between internal and external factors means that there is a constant dialogue exchange between the two sides. There is not a battle between the two sides; they are always cooperating going back and forth. 46. Compare and contrast essentialism and social constructionism as presented in the Hammack reading. The essentialist approach views sexuality as an internal property of individuals. The social constructionism approach, states that who you are is influenced by terms and categories made up by humans to label themselves and others. 47. Sexual desire exists on a continuum that is dimensional rather than categorical. What does this mean? Give other examples of traits that are dimensional. This means that there are more than just a few options, “this or that”. Instead, you’re answer can be on a gradation moving gradually from one side to the other. Other traits that are dimensional: eye color, skin color 48. Describe the cultural model of sexuality that currently exists in the US. What is “cultural press?” Cultural model of sexuality that currently exists in the US: you are either homosexual, bisexual, heterosexual. Cultural press is the way in which your culture's definition of sexual orientation is felt as a force moving you to identify with a particular category of sexual orientation 49. Summarize the main gender differences in the identity component of sexual orientation.  Compared to men, women's sexual identity is more influenced by whom they fall in love with and not simply whom they have sex with  Female sexuality is more greatly influenced by external factors.  Women’s sexuality is more flexible.  Women's sexual identity tends to be more tied to patterns in relationships rather than patterns in sexual behavior 50. There will not be any anatomical drawings on this exam. However, there might be graphs and diagrams on this exam. Sketch (don’t just look at the ones in the book and lecture outlines; actually draw them yourself!) graphs and diagrams that illustrate important information about a) Sleep b) Dreams c) Hypnosis d) Learning e) Memory f) Emotion g) Motivation h) Development Next to each drawing, write a paragraph to explain the concept that is illustrated by that visual aid.