PSY100H1 Chapter Notes -Circadian Rhythm, Sleep Deprivation, Theta Wave

• School: UTSG
• Department: Psychology
• Course: PSY100H1
• Professor: Ashley Waggoner Denton

Document Summary

Many brain regions are more active during sleep than during wakefulness. When people are awake, their brains" neurons are extremely active, as evidence by short, frequent, desynchronized brain signals known as beta waves. When people are sleeping, brain activity slows and becomes more synchronized, a pattern that produces alpha waves. Stages of sleep: as you drift off to sleep, you enter stage 1, and begin to experience theta waves, from which you can be aroused easily. After about 90 minutes of sleep, the cycle reverses, returning to stage 3, and then to stage 2. The eeg suddenly shows a flurry of beta wave activity that usually indicates an awake, alert mind. Accompanied by genital arousal in both sexes at all ages. 80% of the time when awoken from rem sleep, the sleeper reports being dreaming, compared with less than half of the time in other sleep stages. Over the course of the night, the cycle repeats.