PSYC 100 Lecture Notes - Lecture 7: Reticular Formation, Brain Death, Operational Definition

• School: Queen's University
• Department: Psychology
• Course: PSYC 100
• Professor: Jordan Poppenk

Document Summary

Operational definition: a person is conscious when he or she is able to report his/her own mental state. Measured by the ability to remember a stimulus long enough to report it, giving a verbal report of the stimulus. Emphasizes the ability to remember and report back on what a person sees and observes. Distinguish among disorders of consciousness, and how brain imaging can help to differentiate these. Brain imaging can show if patients are willfully able to modulate their brain activity. Using brain imaging, metabolic activity of different regions can be monitored. Disorders of consciousness: brain death: when brainstem is no longer alive; metabolic function must be sustained by equipment. No brain activity detected: vegetative state: wakeful, but not aware (the person goes thru normal sleep and wake cycles like a normal individual, eyes open during wake cycle; however, there is no consciousness)