A - Social Cognition Flashcards
What is social cognition?
definitions differ according to the researcher
Frith, 2008 - social cognition refers to various psychological processes that help us interact in the social world and emit certain social signals and cues back to others
Brother, 1990 - social cognition is the processes involved in working out what others are thinking - also known as having theory of mind
Gobet et al., 2011 - process involved in social interactions
Empathising-systemising model
Baron-Cohen, 2002/2003
general framework of understanding sex differences in the brain
two dimensions for ‘male’ and ‘female’ brain types
looks at our ability to understand and predict the law-governed inanimate universe (S) and the social world (E)
can help investigate and understand autism - referred to as extreme male brain
this model generates 5 different brain types
argued to show reliable sex differences in general population
Empathising
the ability to understand the thoughts and feelings of others and to respond with appropriate emotion
underlies a ‘real’ communication with others
on average, females spontaneously empathise to a greater degree than males
Systemising
the drive to analyse the variables in a system
finding the underlying rules that govern the behaviour of a system
drive to design and build systems
allows prediction of behaviour of a system and control of it
on average, males spontaneously systemise more than females
The E-S model - support
Evolutionary perspective
- ES model has evolutionary benefits
- females more empathising because benefits offspring and their nurturing abilities
- males more systemising because enables them to become better hunters
Strength:
- as a 2-factor model it can explain the cluster of both social and non-social features of ASD
Extreme Male Brain - theory of autism
Baron-Cohen’s work on E-S theory led to investigation of whether higher levels of FT explain the increased prevalence of ASD in males (behaviourally diagnosed psychiatric disorder that develops -3)
hypothesised that autism shows an extreme of the typical male brain - as those with autism are thought to have decreased empathising abilities (socio-emotional deficits are hallmark behaviours)
boys are 4x more likely than girls to develop autism
one explanation is that girls develop a protective factor against autism i.e. more developed language repertoire and grater empathy skills
Support for extreme male brain
Baron-Cohen, 1999
- girls develop empathy faster than boys
- those with autism develop empathy even slower than the typical boy
Baron-Cohen - research into foetal testosterone
Baron-Cohen - those with autism more likely to work in technical areas
Jolliff and Baron-Cohen, 1997
- on the embedded figures test males are typically faster than females
- those with autism are even faster than the typical males
- highlights the extreme male brain
Criticism for extreme male brain
all the baron-cohen studies have limited samples - usually looking at engineers so cannot apply it to everyone
Empathising model
Baron-Cohen, 2004 different aspects make up empathy - emotion detection - intentionality detection - eye direction detection - shared attention mechanisms - empathising system - theory of mind mechanism
Development of empathising
from early life we begin paying attention to others
then we begin noticing and understanding basic relevant social signals
then we begin understanding the behaviours of others in terms of higher-level processes
there is some evidence to suggest there are sex differences in the drive and ability for these
Is face processing innate?
this links to empathy and sex differences in this ability - preference for faces over objects means higher empathy
Johnston and Morton, 1991
- new-borns orient to faces more than other objects, including face-like patterns - this effect emerges at birth
- new-borns show early discrimination for faces - potential link to development of empathy- can this highlight that it may be nurture that leads to increased empathy in girls over boys?
Connellan et al., 2000
- looked at social preference in human neonates
- compared looking times of new-borns to either a real face or to a mechanical mobile matched to relevant variables
- males looked for longer at mobile (object perception)
- females looked longer at the face (face perception)
- demonstrates sex differences in person perception are biological in nature - rules out the nurture aspect mentioned in above
important to note that these sex differences are often only small
Eye direction detector
eyes are a key social cue for understanding others
Baron-Cohen, 1995 - window to the soul
Walker-Smith et al., 1977 - 70%+ fixations to the face by adult viewers are devoted to the eyes
gaze direction is essential for human social communication
gaze direction can tell us the focus of someone else’s attention
Eye direction detector - Batki et al., 2000
had neonates look at two different pictures and measured their looking times
results showed early sensitivity to eye direction
even at this early age this eye direction indicates slight empathy development - looking for social cues
Eye direction detector - Farroni et al., 2002
behavioural and ERP (event-related potential) studies in new-borns and 4 month-old babies
showed attentional and neural differences to direct vs averted gaze
reveals there is a neural basis to this early sensitivity to gaze
Eye direction detector - Bayliss et al., 2005
looked at reflexive orienting of attention to the gaze direction of others in males and females (also included AQ)
found that females showed a stronger cuing effect from the gaze of others vs males (females = higher empathy)
higher AQ scores was associated with a reduced magnitude of the cuing response to the gaze of others (suggests that those with autism have reduced empathy)
supports basis of extreme male brain for those with autism
