Hi,
I just fell asleep in class with the camera off and when the professor called my name to make sure my group was ready to present I immediately woke up to say that I was in the lecture and almost had a heart attack because missing this specific lecture is an automatic fail. I wanted to ask anyone as to why we wake up if someone calls our name even when we’ve been asleep for 10+ minutes, but don’t wake up when hearing other people’s names or the lecture content.
In: Biology
Cocktail Party Phenomenon. Most people are conditioned early in life to respond to their own name through positive reinforcement (e.g. parents cooing an infant’s name, then being especially tender when the child reacts).
Your name might very well be the first word you ever truly understand, and is important simply because it is how you identify yourself. This wasn’t always the case. Prior to germ theory, infant mortality rates were so high that it was not uncommon for a child to be 4-5 years old before being christened with a name. My own great grandfather named himself Abraham Lincoln McKenzie, after the Great Emancipator when his family emigrated to the USA in the mid-19th century. He was five at the time and (correctly) thought Lincoln was the cat’s pajamas.
At any rate, our platonic senses are at all times bombarded by stimuli that is largely irrelevant b-roll stock information. Our conscious mind tends to tune almost all of it out, but it does not go unnoticed by our subconscious mind (apologies if I am using outdated nomenclature). But certain stimuli sponsor greater alertness, because they hold a greater position of importance (like seeing a spider in your periphery).
In a cocktail party setting, the din of voices becomes background to the conversation you are engaged in. But hearing your name from across the room immediately heightens your awareness, because it is the most primitive and important word you know.
Latest Answers