Attention Flashcards
What is latent inhibition?
Describes how preexposure of a CS with a consequence impaired the subsequent ability of the the same CS to enter a conditioned association
What is the effect of amphetamine during the condioting period on latent inhibition? Why?
Attenuates LI so that the CS is able to enter a conditioned association beucas eit changes animals ability to use previously acquired information
What is the effect of haloperidol on latent inhibition?
Reverse the effect of amphetamines
LI = dopamine dependant
What is kamin blocking?
Conditioning of one CS (CS1) to a US retards the subsequent conditioning to a second CS (CS2) presented as a compound with CS1. CS are of equal salience
I.e. Preconditioning with CS1 and US will attenuate the association of CS2 with the US and thus not produce the CR
Why does kamin blocking occur?
Perhaps conditioning with the second CS provides no extra information. This mean on presentation of CS2 alone the CR will not be produced
What is the effect of amphetamines of Karin blocking?
Will attenuate Karin blocking i.e. What was considered irrelevant is now relevant
What is overshadowing?
When conditioning with CS1 and CS2 the activation will be made with the more salient of the two CS.
What is pre pulse inhibition?
The response to a startling stimuli is attenuated when the stimulus is preceded by a similar stimulus of lower intensity
What is the effect of amphetamines on pre pulse inhibition?
Cause a loss of PPI
What is the effect of haloperidol in PPI?
Will reverse the effect of amphetamines
What does PPI measure?
Sensory gating
What is the effect of dopamine agonists on kamin blocking and latent inhibition?
It does not effect them. Therefore, because amphetamines attenuate both they must have different mechanism. Perhaps amphetamines amplify use dependant signals
What is the effect of dopamine agonists on PPI?
Attenuates PPI similar to amphetamines
What is the effect of dopamine on selective attention procedures?
Disrupted by increased dopamine
Enhanced by decreased dopamine
What is the different between a novel and salient stimuli
Novel = interesting and new Salient = important stimuli
In terms of attention span when is the progression from small to large?
Hypodopaminergic
Normal
Hyperdopaminergic
What does an increase in dopamine do to attention span?
It will increases it = more things would be considered salient and novel compared to a normal individual. E.g.normally latent inhibition would lead the preexposed CS would become ‘unimportant’. However, in a hyperdopaminergic system the CS will still be considered something of importance and something worth noting - why an association is able to from (falls under attention radar).
What are the 3 main symptoms of attention deficit and hyperactivity disorder (ADHD)
Impulsiveness
Hyperactivity
Inattention
What does ADHD mean for someone’s attention?
They are overly focused on certain stimuli tot he detrimental of other stimuli.
This focus may be placed on unimportant things but patients percieve them to be salient
What is the deficit in ADHD?
Dopamine and noradrenaline in frontal striatal pathway
What is the treatment for ADHD and why is it used?
methlyphenidate (acts to block the uptake of na/Da similar to amphetamines
Broadens their attention to a normal range so that other salient/novel stimuli can be focused on
What affect does schizophrenia have on sensory gating and selective attention?
Loss of latent inhibition (learn equally about pre exposed stimulus to non preexposure stimulus)
Show disrupted kamin blocking (learn about both elements of a compound CS)
Disrupted pre pulse inhibition (pre pulse fails to attenuate strake response to main stimulus)
What does the disruption in sensory gating and selective attention mean for schizophrenics?
All information coming in is focused upon and there is not enough cognitive power to process everything
Do schizophrenic used pre learned information to guide their attention?
No, proved by loss of LI and Karin blocking
These are restored to normal by dopamine antagonists
If dopamine is associative with euphoria/reward what would be expect schizophrenics to behave like?
We would expect them to be euphoric - this is not the case
What is dopamine susceptible to be linked to? How does this link to schizophrenia/
Rise in dopamine within the NAc suspected to be due to the salience of a stimuli (whether that its good or bad) or stimuli associated with a salient stimuli. Dopamine overactivity would = formation of spurious salience attribution.
What is spurious salience attribution thought to contribute to in schizophrenia?
Formation of delusion perceptions. Something which would normally not be considered salient will be given salient significance (spurious association)
