States of Consciousness

The first state of consciousness is waking consciousness. This is the state of consciousness that we are in all day while awake. We also spend most of our time in this particular state. A behavior associated with this is your daily life in general. It is the things that you do while you are awake.

The next three are what is considered altered states of consciousness. The second is the sleeping state. The sleeping state is when you are sleeping. This one is pretty self-explanatory as far as definition goes. There are five stages of sleep. Stage 1, stage 2, stage 3, stage 4, and REM sleep. There is also a kind of sleep called Non-REM sleep. You also dream while you sleep. This is a behavior that is associated with the sleeping state.

The third state of consciousness is the hypnosis and meditation state. Hypnosis is “A

trancelike state of heightened susceptibility to the suggestions of others.” (pg.137-McGraw Hill,2010) A behavior associated with this is when someone hypnotizes you and you do things under their suggestion. There is also meditation. Meditation is a technique learned to help you relax and have better focus. Some behaviors associated with this are being able to concentrate better and being more calm and relaxed.

The fourth state of consciousness is a drug induced state of consciousness. This is where you are under the influence of mind altering drugs such as narcotics, depressants, stimulants or hallucinogenics. A behavior commonly associated with these is drug abuse.

The tutorial itself was very helpful because it described all of the states of conscious and went into specific detail for each one. I really liked the charts and graph as well showing the sleep patterns and the five stages of sleep. It also gave specific examples of sleep problems such as night terrors, sleep walking, sleep deprivation, narcolepsy and sleep apnea.

It also talked about hypnosis and what can and cannot happen in a hypnotic state. I had actually heard in the past...