Motivation Lab
This lab explores one aspect of the relation between mind and body, the particular focus being on how mental processes that lead to arousal can affect autonomic nervous system activity . There are three parts to this lab, consisting of three activities you will do in order to investigate their effect on autonomic arousal.

In order to do this lab you will need the following:

  1. one friend to experiment on,
  2. a stopwatch (preferable) or watch with a seconds hand (because the arousal measure you will use is heart rate)
  3. a sheet of paper to record and graph the results on.
You should tell your friends that this is a ten minute long experiment that is investigating mind-body relations.  Have the subject sit in a comfortable chair and read the following instructions to them:

This is a short ten-minute experiment which will examine the mind-body relation. When I say “begin” you should close your eyes and relax. After one minute, I will record your pulse.When I say “increase physical activity” you should think about doing a strenuous physical activity which requires a lot of effort. I will record your pulse again while you visualize the activity. When I say “relax” you should stop thinking about the strenuous activity and focus on relaxing. When I say “increase mental activity” you should think of something that is exciting but that does not involve a lot of physical activity.This could be a fearful experience, preexamination anxiety, etc.Now, try to clear your head of the activities you just imagined. Ready?

Instruct them to close their eyes, relax and be comfortable. Call this start time, time zero (all subsequent times will be related to this start time). Then do the following sequence of activities/measurements. Note that times are in fractions of a minute (ex. .25 min. = 15 sec.) and that all pulse readings are to be done for 15 seconds, then multiplied by four to get the pulse rate.
 
 
TIME (after start time)
Instructions:
1 Minute  (One minute after they begin relaxing)
Record the pulse (heart rate) for 15 seconds. (You can do a wrist pulse or else on the side of the lower neck-all pulse readings are for 15 seconds.) 
1.5 Minutes
Instruct the subject to think about doing some strenuous physical activity that involves a lot of effort for the next minute and a half. Encourage him/her to really visualize doing the activity. 
2 Minutes    (Thirty seconds into the exercise visualization)
Record the pulse.
2.5-2.75 Minutes   (A minute into the exercise visualization)
Record the pulse and then instruct the subject to relax.
3.25-3.5 Minutes  (Thirty seconds into the relaxation)
Record the pulse.
3.75-4 Minutes  (A minute into the relaxation)
Record the pulse.
4 Minutes
Tell the subject to increase his/her mental activity, that is to visualize something that is very exciting (but does not involve physical exercise) for the next minute and a half. (A great date, an outing, getting a 4.0 qpa, could be examples of this.) 
4.5-4.75 Minutes    (Thirty seconds into the mental activity)
Record the pulse. 
5-5.25 Minutes   (A minute into the mental activity)
Record the pulse and then tell the subject to relax.
5.75-6 Minutes   (Thirty seconds into the relaxation) 
Record the pulse.
6.25-6.5 Minutes    (A minute into the relaxation)
Record the pulse.
6.5 Minutes
Tell the subject to either do jumping jacks or jog rapidly in place for thirty seconds. 
7-7.25 Minutes
Record the pulse and have the subject resume the exercise for another 30 seconds. 
7.75 Minutes
Record the pulse.

Table:
 
TIME NUMBER OF BEATS x 4 = Beats/minutes
1 min

2 min

2.5 min

3.25 min

3.75 min

4.5 min

5 min

5.75 min

6.25 min

7 min

7.75 min

Questions:

  1. What is the major conclusion you can reach from your study about the effect of the mind on the body?
  2. What part of the nervous system is involved in the phenomena you observed in the above exercise?
  3. What part of the endocrine system is involved?
What to Turn In:
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