Chapter 10 Flashcards
Drive Theories
Internal state of tension that motivates an organism to engage in activities to reduce this tension. When you experience a drive, you are motivated to reduce it (ex: hunger and eating)
Incentive Theories
External goal with capacity to motivate behaviour-Environmental
Expectancy Value Models
2 factors of ones motivation. 1) Expectancy about one’s chances of obtaining the incentive. 2) Value of desired incentive.
Evolutionary Theories of Motivation
Natural selection favours behaviour that maximizes reproductive success. Motivations of affiliation, dominance, sex drive, etc.
Biological Factors and Hunger-Stomach Contractions
Association between stomach contractions and hunger- Walter Cannon theorized that stomach contractions cause hunger, but people continue to experience hunger even after their stomachs have been removed.
Brain Regulation of Hunger
Hypothalamus-Lateral and ventromedial nucleus of the hypothalamus were brains on-off switches for hunger (Theory was disproven).
Arcuate and Paraventricular Nucleus
Important in hunger regulation-Arcuate is especially important as it contains nerves that are sensitive to oncoming hunger signals and another group for satiety signals.
Contemporary Theories of Hunger
Focuses more on neural circuits than anatomical centres.
Digestive and Hormonal Regulation
Stomach sends signals to the brain to inhibit further eating. (vagus nerve- indicates how stretched stomach walls are).
Ghrelin
Causes stomach contractions and promotes hunger when body is without food for awhile.
CCK
Released from upper intestine after food is consumed which delivers satiety signals to the brain and stops hunger.
Leptin
Contains information about bodies fat stores. High leptin=less hunger. Low leptin= more hunger. Communicates to hypothalamus.
Environmental Factors of Hunger
1) Availability of food, 2) Learned preferences and habits, 3) Stress.
Palatability
The better a food tastes, the more of it people and animals will consume.
Quantity
People tend to consume what’s put in front of them (bin model or bin heuristic).
Variety
People increase their food consumption when there is a variety available Value of food declines as you eat a specific food.
Presence of Others
Individuals eat 44% more when they eat with others. More people makes for more eating. Women eat aless in the presence of opposite sex whom they don’t know well.
Stress
Roughly 40-50% of people increase food intake while stressed, and also eat less healthy foods.
Herman and Polivy
Social norms around eating-exposure to pictures and written descriptions of attractive foods can cause an increase in food intake. Presence of others generally inhibits eating, but under specific conditions may increase it.
Learned Preferences
Preference for sweet tastes is present at birth. Preference for high fat foods may be genetic. Taste preferences are partly a function of learned associations and exposure.
Body Mass Index
Weight in kilograms/height in metres. BMI of 25.0-29.9 is considered overweight, 30+ is obese.
Obesity Stats in Canada
20.2% of Canadians over 18 were reported as obese in 2015. 40% of men and 27.5% of women were classified as overweight. Provinces with the lowest levels of obesity were Quebec and BC.
Theories of Obesity
Historically, humans lived in competitive environments and competed for limitiedd, unreliable food sources. This caused people to overreat when they could to store excess calories for future food shortages.
Genetic Predisposition
Twin Study-Identical twis reared apart had more similar BMI’s than fraternal twins reared together. Genetic factors account for 61%of variation in weight among men, 73% among women.
Eating and Exercise
Unhealthy foods are being consumed more and people also aren’t exercising as much. Children are not meeting current Canadian physical activity guidelines , especially vulnerable to this are girls aaged 12-17.
Set point
Body moniters fat cell levels to keep them and weight stable. Set point is each individuals natural point of stability for weight.
Why is it hard to lose weight and keep it lost?
People burn calories slower, reduced fat stores result in reduced leptin which increases hunger. Body has also been sculpted by evolution to defend against weight loss.
Dietary Restraint
Chronic dieters are restrained eaters-consciously work to control eating and feel guilty when they fail. However, when cognitive control is disrupted (alcohol, stress), they eat to excess.
Sex Statistics in Canada
30% of Canadian teens ages 15-17 have had sex, 70% at 18 & 19.
William Mastters and Virginia Johnson
Did ground breaking sex research in 1960s, 4 stages of sexual response- excitement, plateau, orgasm, and resolution.
Excitement
Level of physical arousal increases rapidly-both genders experience muscle tension, respiration, heart rate, and blood pressure increase.
Vasocongestion
Engorgement of the blood vessels (erection). Swelling and hardening of the clitoris, expansion of vag lips and lubrication.
Plateau
Physical arousal continues but slowly
Orgasm
Occurs when sexual arousal reaches peak intensity and is discharged with muscle contractions. Ages 35-39 had 78% of men and 28% of women reporting always having an orgasm.
Resolution
Sexual arousal subsides and men enter a refractory phase where they are largely unresponsive to stimulus for a certain amount of time.
Robert Trivers Parental Investment Theory
Species mating patterns depend on what each sex is able to invest to produce and nurture offspring. Sex that makes the smaller investement (men), will compete with sex that makes larger investement (females). Sex that makes larger investement is more discriminatory in selecting partners.
Clark and Hatfield’s Field Study on Gender and Sex
Average looking man approaches female college aged strangers and asks if they’d like to have sex with him. No females agreed. But when an average female approached males, 75% said yes.
Clark and Hatfield’s Study with People in Relationships
Among those not in relationships- 59% of men and 0% of women agreed. Among those in relationships- 18% of men and 4% of women agreed to casual sex.
Mate Preferences
Shown that men place more emphasis on women who are youthful and attractive (better reproductive health) whereas women place more emphasis on intelligence, ambition, education, income, and social status.
Baumeister and Twenge on Mate Preferences
Women may want males’ material resources due to cultural and economic limitations set on women in the past. Gender disparity may also be due to cultural processes that serve to supress female sexuality.
Sexual Orientation Stats
Orientation is viewed on a continuum. 1.7% and 1.3% of Canadians aged 18-59 said they were homosexual and bisexual. Self identification and behaviour are not the same things.
Biological Theories of Sexual Orientation
Plays a critical role in homosexuality (greater than environment). Has been shown that gay males process some information differently than straight males.
Bailey and Pillard Twin Studies
Found that idential twins had a 52% chance of both being gay, and fraternal was 22%. Also found that adoptive siblings where one sibling was gay had an 11% chance of the sibling being gay.
Prenatal Horomones and Homosexuality
Elevated rates of homosexuality were foound in women exposed to unusually high androgen levels in prenatal development.
Female Sexuality
Has more plasticity than male sexuality. Sexual orientation is more shaped and modelled by sociocultural factors in females.
Affiliation Motive
Need to associate with others and maintain social bods.
Baumeister and Leory’s Belongingness Hypothesis
Human beings have a pervasive need to form and maintain at last a minimum quantity of lasting, positive, and significant interpersonal relationships.
Ostracism
Being ignored and excluded by others in your social environment, creates increased activitiy in the part of the brain associated with physical pain.
Achievement Motive
Need to master difficult challenges, outperform others, and meet high standards of excellence.
David McClelland
Achievement motive is the most important, spark that ignites economic growth, scientific progress, inspirational leadership etc.
Thematic Apperception Test
Measures achievement and affiliation-projective test that requires subjects to respond to vague, ambiguous stimuli in ways that may reveal personal motives an traits. Uses photos of people in ambiguous scenes and asks people to write a story based on interpretation.
John Atkinson
Tendency to pursue achievement in a particular situatiobn depends on… 1) motivation to achieve success (stable), 2) Probability of success (varies from task to task), 3) Incentive value (tangible and intangible rewards for success).
Why do high achievers choose moderately challenging tasks over hard ones?
Moderately challenging tasks tend to offer the best overall value in terms of maximizing ones sense of accomplishment. Also, people who are high achievers do moderately challenging tasks to avoid failure.
What does emotion involve
1) Subjective, conscious experiences, 2) Bodily arousal, 3) Characteristic overt expressions.
Affective Forecasting
Efforts to predict one’s emotional reactions to future events-people reliably mispredict their feelings. Are accurate in predicting positive or negatibe reactions, but not intensity or duration.
Autonomic Nervous System Responses to Emotion
Physiological arousal associated with emotion, including sweating, heart rate, respiration and blood pressure.
Galvanic Skin Response
Increase in electrical conductivity of the skin that occurs when sweat glands increase activity.
Affective Neuroscience
Examination of neurobiology and emotions-hypothalamus, amygdala and adjacent limbic system structures are the seat of emotions in the brain.
Amygdala
Conditioned fears-emotions arrive in the thalamus and route themselves along 2 separate pathways. If the amygdala senses a threat, it triggers hypothalamus activity. Extremely fast, unconscious processing.
Paul Elkman & Wallace Friesen
Asked subjects to identify what emotion a person was experiencing on the basis of facial cues. Easily identified 6 fundamental emotions (happiness, sadness, anger, fear, surprise, and disgust). Identification of emotions from facial expressions tends to occur quickly and automatically, and facial expressions associated with basic emotions are recognized cross culturually.
Facial Feedback Hypothesis
Facial muscles send signals to the brain and these signals help the brain recognize the emotion one is experiencing. Development of depression treatment involving injection of botox to paralyze facial muscles responsible for frowning showed a significant reduction in depressive symptoms within 6 weeks.
Socially Engaging vs Disengaging Emotions
Friendliness, sympathy, guilt vs pride and anger. Some societies encourage these feelings moreso than others and tend to feel them more by consequence.
Display Rules
Norms that regulate the appropriate expression of emotions-varies from culture to culture.
James Lange Theory
Conscious experience of emotion results from ones perception of autonomic arousal. Different patterns of autonomic responses lead to the experience of different emotions.
Cannon-Bard Theory
Emotion occurs when the thalamus sends signals simultaneously to the cortex and to the autonomic nervous system. Directly opposes James Lange Theory.
Schachters Two-Factor Theory
Asserts that people look at situational cues to differentiate among alternative emotions. Experience of emotions depends on 2 factors: 1) Autonomic Arousal and 2) Cognitive interpretation of arousal
Evolutionary Theories
Emotions developed due to their adaptive value.
S.S. Tomkins and Robert Plutchik
Emotions are largely innate reactions to certain stimuli, thought plays a small role in emotional responses.
Fundamental Emotions
Fear, anger, joy, disgust, surprise. The many emotions people experience are produced by 1) blends of primary emotions 2) variations in intensity.
