Project 5.1 The UX of Consciousness
- Chun Li
- Jan 4, 2020
- 3 min read
Updated: Jan 9, 2020
Brief: Explore the shift between unconscious, subconscious and conscious
Group Partners: Ling Wu, Ivy Wang, Carol Chen, Hannah Qu, Chun Li
What is conscious?
The definition of conscious, unconscious, and subconscious was clearly showed through Freud's Iceberg mind. (Mcleod,2018)
During the meeting, our group members talked about a lot of circumstances, whether they were under conscious or unconscious mind.
e.g, daydreaming, self-defense mechanism, decision making, implication, anesthesia, do animals have a conscious mind
After a long time discussion, we chose two topics which interesting and practicable.
Anesthesia
Two of us had local anesthesia before, it was a magical experience. I was having the wisdom teeth surgery. During the surgery, I can feel everything the dentist did in my mouth, suppose to be painful, but I felt nothing. Ivy did a double eyelid surgery, she was still able to open and close her eyes, she can feel the doctors cutting, but she cannot feel the pain.
Do animals have a conscious mind?
Dolphins, apes, and humans are able to recognize themselves in the mirror, nowadays, researchers found out elephants can do too. (Choi, 2006) Scientists believe that it's a sign of self-awareness. What would an elephant's consciousness be?
Between those two topics, we finally decide on picking anesthesia. Compare with the consciousness of animals, it's closer to our daily life and most people have experienced it.
When people having local anesthesia, we are fully conscious but lost part of our body's senses. For general anesthesia, how would people's consciousnesses shift between fully conscious and unconscious? Or even we do not need to put any drug but still can experience the shift between the unconscious, subconscious, and conscious?
Artefact Analysis:
The Couch (Gois, 2013)
(picture source from the website, link to https://www.allangois.co.uk/blog/whats-corner-use-couch-psychoanalytic-psychotherapy/)
Material:
The couch usually well-knit and with a soft surface, so that psychotherapists can contain it for years. There is no benchmarkers for the texture or size of the couch.
Aesthetic:
The idea of “therapy couch” was originally provided by Freud, in order to create a better environment for both patients and psychoanalysis. Freud did not set the couch on purpose, during the process of psychoanalysis, the more patients he saw on the couch, the more realization he had of the fluency of conversation which happened on the couch. Due to that, psychotherapists continuous the idea of "therapy couch.”
Interactive:
Patients would feel protected and supportive when they sit or lie on the couch. By the time they speak to the psychotherapist, they started to relax and trying to express themselves. Lots of people would have strong antipathy or refusion to talk about their thoughts, but a soft, calm, and supportive environment would lead them into a free-association period.
Mindful Painting
(Leo Balzano, Mindful Painting)
Material:
Painting, photographing, art writing, journaling can all be mindful. There is no limit on the materials; the critical point is how to express freely.
Aesthetic:
Based on the mindfulness-based cognitive theory, the patient would be more logical and getting more wisdom when they took a period by doing nothing, not learning or thinking, but just observing and looking with no judgment. The idea mindfulness is to let people get away from preemptive but to look into the truth and fact.
Interaction:
Mindful painting allows people to draw like a child, without any training courses, draw what they see and find. During the process of free drawing, people would be able to express directly what they’ve seen and what they reflect by what they have seen. Mindfulness has a similar function with meditation, which could help people to be more creative, getting more concentrate, also having inner peace and calm.
Reference:
Freud's iceberg theory
Mcleod, S. (2018). What are the most interesting ideas of Sigmund Freud? | Simply Psychology. [online] Simplypsychology.org. Available at: https://www.simplypsychology.org/Sigmund-Freud.html [Accessed 3 Jan. 2020].
Do animals have a conscious mind?
Choi, C. (2006). Elephant Self-Awareness Mirrors Humans. [online] livescience.com. Available at: https://www.livescience.com/4272-elephant-awareness-mirrors-humans.html [Accessed 5 Jan. 2020].
Couch
Gois, A. (2013). What’s that in the corner? On the use of the couch in psychoanalytic psychotherapy - The Psychotherapist Blog. [online] The Psychotherapist Blog. Available at: https://www.allangois.co.uk/blog/whats-corner-use-couch-psychoanalytic-psychotherapy/ [Accessed 3 Jan. 2020].
Picture:
Mindful Painting
Ann, W. (2017). Mindful Art. [online] Art of Mindfulness. Available at: https://www.artofmindfulness.org.uk/ [Accessed 3 Jan. 2020].
Picture:
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