Other Neuroscience and Neurobiology Commons^™

Eugene Taylor: An Appreciation, Simon Senzon

CONSCIOUSNESS: Ideas and Research for the Twenty-First Century

By sharing Professor Taylor’s impact on me with you in this way, I hope to offer a glimpse of the depth he pointed us to. Rather than just tell you his stories and his theories, I am sharing layers of my own experience both in similar synchronicities from my own personal mythology and also the meaning I make for myself as I go deeper in understanding what he was really teaching. If you can see that I am sharing something beyond the words themselves, then you know what he meant by soteriological writing. The words are used to help you …

Beyond Perennialist And Participatory Spiritualities: Transformation And Culture, Joanne Burtch

CONSCIOUSNESS: Ideas and Research for the Twenty-First Century

A comparison of perennialism, participatory spirituality, and Gebser’s structures of consciousness demonstrates how deeper inquiry is required to understand how perennialism and participatory spirituality would address the relationship between individuals and culture with regard to how transformation happens. By reviewing how each of these philosophies approach context, the interpersonal, transformation, cultural relativity, pluralism, and multiplicity, the article identifies ambiguities that offer perennialism and participatory spirituality scholars the opportunity to explore their suppositions about spirituality more deeply.

Thoughts On Consciousness And The Original Photons, Henryk Skolimowski

CONSCIOUSNESS: Ideas and Research for the Twenty-First Century

No abstract provided.

Reembodying, Human Consciousness In The Earth, John Briggs

CONSCIOUSNESS: Ideas and Research for the Twenty-First Century

For the last 20,000 years or so the dominant mode of human consciousness has been one that divides reality into subjects and objects, and focuses on human desires and needs. This anthropocentric mode of consciousness has invented religions, built civilizations, amassed knowledge, and developed technology and science. It has also disembodied us from the Earth and led to the Anthropocene Era. Still with us is another mode of human consciousness that arguably once existed in a balance with the anthropocentric mode during our long hunter-gatherer, Paleolithic sojourn. This holistic, integrative mode of consciousness experiences the Earth as a mother, and …

Sarath, Edward W. (2013). Improvisation, Creativity, And Consciousness: Jazz As Integral Template For Music, Education, And Society. Albany, Ny: State University Of New York., Lynne Roff

CONSCIOUSNESS: Ideas and Research for the Twenty-First Century

No abstract provided.

On The Significance Of Psychodynamic Discourse For The Field Of Consciousness Studies, Robin S. Brown

CONSCIOUSNESS: Ideas and Research for the Twenty-First Century

Despite the obvious confluence of concerns between psychodynamic psychology and the emerging field of consciousness studies, the extent to which psychodynamic thinking has factored into the consciousness literature has been limited. With widespread interest in “the unconscious” having significantly diminished, the present paper asks what might be implied in the shift towards the notion of “consciousness”—what about this cross-disciplinary designation has come to attract attention not only within the academic world, but also in the popular press? That the term does indeed invite contributions from a variety of disciplines makes the field both a meeting space, and a battleground. It …

Premises Of A Natural Science Of Consciousness, Ervin Laszlo

CONSCIOUSNESS: Ideas and Research for the Twenty-First Century

According to the mainstream of modern science, there cannot be a natural science of consciousness because consciousness does not actually exist in nature. It is a product or by-product of the workings of the brain. There is a natural science of brain and the nervous system, for these are bona fide elements of the world, but there cannot be a natural science of a phenomenon of which the very existence is in question. In the prevalent view con2sciousness is something that happens when neurons fire in the brain. This is said to be confirmed by experience. There is no consciousness …

Consciousness Studies – An Overview, Allan Combs

CONSCIOUSNESS: Ideas and Research for the Twenty-First Century

This essay is a survey of the field of consciousness studies, its history, scope, and a little about its future. It’s principal focus is on Western thinking about consciousness beginning in classical times and continuing down to the present. It highlights and briefly describes major streams of thought including ideas from ancient Greece, German Idealism, British Empiricism, 20^th century European phenomenology, and important contemporary areas of research and scholarship. These include American pragmatism, developmental psychology, transpersonalism, analytic philosophy, computationalism, neural networks, and physics. The essay also briefly explores possible future trends in the study of consciousness.

Design, Programming, And User-Experience, Kaila G. Manca

Honors Scholar Theses

This thesis is a culmination of my individualized major in Human-Computer Interaction. As such, it showcases my knowledge of design, computer engineering, user-experience research, and puts into practice my background in psychology, com- munications, and neuroscience.

I provided full-service design and development for a web application to be used by the Digital Media and Design Department and their students.This process involved several iterations of user-experience research, testing, concepting, branding and strategy, ideation, and design. It lead to two products.

The first product is full-scale development and optimization of the web appli- cation.The web application adheres to best practices. It was …

Electrophysiological And Behavioral Working Memory Differences Between Musicians And Non-Musicians, Benjamin P. Richardson

All Master's Theses

The current study examines the P300 brainwave and working memory differences between musicians and non-musicians. Differences in aspects of recorded electrical brain activity have been used to quantify differences in updating processes of working memory possibly related to differences in amount of music experience. The current study is designed to partially replicate and enhance a method previously implemented in research describing how music experience may be associated with differences in visual processing as well auditory working memory and executive function. Behavioral data were collected using six standardized subtest measures of the TOMAL – II, followed by ERP recordings during a …

The Phenomenon Of Abstract Cognition Among Scholastic Chess Participants: A Case Study, Brent C. Laws

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

A qualitative investigation was conducted to explore the phenomenon of abstract cognition among a purposive sample of 5 secondary scholastic chess club participants. The case study enabled the researcher to explore the faculties of abstract cognition among students of contrasting skills and abilities in playing chess. The study also allowed for the consideration of potential visual-spatial, logical, academic, social competency and life benefits of chess play. Through analysis of interviews, chess simulations, blindfold chess play, and narration of chess lines and sequences, the investigator was able to extract meaning and code schemata into a holistic understanding of the phenomenon of …

Getting A Grip On Memory: Unilateral Hand Clenching Alters Episodic Recall, Ruth E. Propper, Sean E. Mcgraw, Tad T. Brunyé

Department of Psychology Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

Unilateral hand clenching increases neuronal activity in the frontal lobe of the contralateral hemisphere. Such hand clenching is also associated with increased experiencing a given hemisphere’s “mode of processing.” Together, these findings suggest that unilateral hand clenching can be used to test hypotheses concerning the specializations of the cerebral hemispheres during memory encoding and retrieval. We investigated this possibility by testing the effects of a unilateral hand clenching on episodic memory. The hemispheric Encoding/Retrieval Asymmetry (HERA) model proposes left prefrontal regions are associated with encoding, and right prefrontal regions with retrieval, of episodic memories. It was hypothesized that right-hand clenching …

The Neuroscientific Study Of The Self: Methodological And Theoretical Challenges, Cynthia J. Najdowski, Samuel E. Winer

Psychology Faculty Scholarship

Neuroscientific research methods, such as brain imaging techniques, have increasingly been applied to social cognitive research efforts and, in particular, to the study of the self. In this essay we discuss the ability of such research to shed light on the emergent, dynamic psychological phenomenon of self. Although neuroscientific tools can be useful for gaining general knowledge about associated underlying structures, a careful consideration of the methodological and theoretical issues discussed herein is necessary to avoid simplifying or reifying the self.