Chapter 17 - Biopsychology of Emotion, Stress and Health Flashcards
1
Q
Darwin’s theory of the evolution of emotional expression (three ideas)
A
- Expression of emotion evolve from behaviours that indicate what an animal is likely to do next
- If the signals provided by such behaviours are beneficial, they will evolve in ways that enhance communicative function.
- Principle entithesis
2
Q
Principle anthithesis (definition)
A
Opposite messages are often signaled by opposite movements and postures
3
Q
James-Lange theory
A
- Emotion-inducing sensory stimuli are received and interpreted by the cortex.
- That triggers changes in visceral organs via the autonomic nervous system and in the skeletal muscles via the somatic nervous system
- The automatic/somatic responses trigger the experience of emotion in the brain.
4
Q
Cannon-Bard theory
A
- excite both the feeling of emotion in the brain
- The expression of emotion
(parallel processes)
5
Q
Differences betwenn the James-Lange (1) and the Cannon-Bard theory (2)
A
- Emotional experience depends entirely on feedback from ANS and SNS
- Emotional expereince is totally independet of such feedback.
6
Q
What is the modern biopsychological view?
A
The three factors in such emotional response influence each other:
1. The perception of the emotion-inducing stimulus
2. The autonomic and somatic response to the stimulus
3. Experience to the emotion.
7
Q
Sham rage
A
cats without a cortex respond aggressively to the slightest provocation
8
Q
Sham rage - abnormal in what two aspects?
A
- they are innapropriate and severe
- not directed at particular targets.
9
Q
What does the limbic system theory of emotion tell us?
A
- emotional expression is controlled by several interconnected nuceli & tracts- that ring the thalamus (limbic system)
- emotional states are expressed through the action of other structures of the circuit on the hypothalamus.
10
Q
Where is the the Klüver-Bucy Syndrome found?
A
- in monkeys whose anterior temporal lobes have been removed
11
Q
What are some behaviors of the Klüver-Bucy syndrome?
A
- the concumption of almost anything that is edible
- increased sexual activity that is often direxted towards inapproprite objects
- tendence to repeatedly investigate familiar objects (with mouth)
- lack of fear
12
Q
What does the James-Lange theory tell us about the specificity of the ANS?
A
- different emotional stimuli induce different patterns of ANS activity
- these different patterns produce different emotional experience.
13
Q
What does the Cannon-Bard theory tell us about the specificity of the ANS?
A
- all emotional stimuli produce the same general pattern of sympathetic activation
- prepares the organism for action
14
Q
What does experimental evidence tell us about the specificity of the ANS?
A
- lies somwehere in the middle of both extremes (total specificity and total generality)
15
Q
Polygraphy
A
- lie dector test
- methods of interrogation that employs ANS indexes of emotion to infer the truthfullness of a person’s response.
16
Q
Control-question technique
A
the physiological response to the target question is compared with the pyhsiological response to control questions
17
Q
Guilty-knowledge technique
A
the polygrapher must have a piece of information concerning the crime that would be know only to the guilty person.
18
Q
What are the primary facial expression?
A
- surprise
- anger
- sadness
- disgust
- fear
- happiness
19
Q
Facial feedback hypothesis
A
Our facial expressions influence our emotional experience.
20
Q
Two ways to distinguish true facial expression from false ones
A
- microexpressions
- subtle differences
21
Q
Microexpressions
A
- brief facial expressions of the real emotion breaking through
- they last only 0.05 secs (but can be detected with practice)
22
Q
Duchene smile
A
a genuine smile :)
23
Q
What are four implications of the current perspective regarding facial expressions?
A
- Primary facial expressions of emotion rarely occur in pure form
- The existence of other primary emotions has been recognized
- Body cues play a major role in expression of emotion too
- Ekman’s six primary facial expressions may not be as universal as believed
24
Q
What is fear?
A
- emotional reaction to threat
- motivating force of defensive behavior
25
What are defensive behaviors?
behaviors whse primary function is to protect the organsim from threat and harm
26
What are aggressive behaviors?
behaviors whose primary function is to threaten or harm.
27
On what 3 criteria are the categories of aggressive and defensive behaviors based?
- their topography
- the situation that elicit them
- their apparent function
28
What is the target-site concept?
aggressive and defensive behaviors of an animal are often designed to attack specific sites on the body of another animal while protecting specific sites on its own.
29
Humans as an exception to the involvement of testosterone in mammalian social aggreassion:
- aggressive behavior does not increase at puberty as testosterone levels in blood increase
- aggressive behavior is not eliminated by castration
- not increased by testosterone injections that elevate blood levels of testosterone.
30
Fear conditioning
- Establishment of fear in response to a previously neutral stimulus by presenting it (usually several times) before the delivery of an aversive pulse (unconditioned stimulus)
- after several pairing of the tone and the , the rat reponds to the tone with a variety of defensive behaviors
31
There are two pathways from the medial geniculate nucleus to the amygdala
- the direct one
- the indirect one via the auditory cortex
32
What happens when if one route is destroyed? (pathways from the medial geniculate to the amygdala)
And which routes can mediate simple vs. complex sounds?
- conditioning progresses normally (as both routes are capable of meaditing conditioning to simple sounds)
- BUT only the cortical route is capable of mediating fear conditioning to complex sounds.
33
What happens when sounds form the medial geniculate nucleus of the thalamus reach the amygdala?
- the amygdala assesses the emotional significance of the sound on the basis of previous encounters with it
- the amygdala activates appropriate response circuits.
34
What is cotextual fear conditioning?
process by which benign contexts come to elicit fear through their association with fear-inducing stimuli.
35
What is the lateral nucleus of the amygdala involved into?
- in the acquisition, storage, and expression of fear conditioning.
36
How are the prefrontal cortex and the hippocampus interacting with the amygdala (regarding fear conditioning?)
- the prefrontal cortext is thought to act on the lateral nucleus of the amygdala to supress conditioned fear
- the hippocampus is thought to interact with that part of the amygdala to mediate learning about the context of fear-related events
- the amygdala is thought to control defensive behavior via outputs from the central nucleus of the amygdala
37
Three points that have advanced in our understanding of the brain mechanism of emotion
- brain activity associate with each human emotion is diffuse
- there is always activity in motor and sensory cortices when a person experiences an emotion or empathizes with a person experiencing an emotion
- similar patterns of brain activity experiencing an emotion, imagines an emotion or sees somebody else experiencing that emotion.
38
Embodiment of emotions
re-experiencing related patterns of motor, autonomic, and sensory neural activity during emotional experiences
39
In what do amygdalae play an important role? (Two views)
1. More general role: appear to play a role in the performance of any task with an emotional component (can be positive and negative)
2. More specific role in fear
40
Urbach-Withe disease
- genetic disorder that often results in calcification of the amygdalae and surrounding anterior medial temporal-lobe structures in both hemispheres.
- leads to loss of ability to recognize facial expressions of fear
41
What evidence was found about the medial portions of the prefrontal lobes (regarding human emotion?)
- found evidence of activity in the medial prefrontal lobes when emotional reactions are being cognitively suppressed or re-evaluated.
42
Supression paradigms
participants are directed to inhibit their emotional reactions to unpleasant film or pictures.
43
Reappraisal paradigms
participants are instructed to reinterpret a picture to change their emotional reaction to it.
44
What does lateralization mean?
left and right cerebreal hemisphere are specialized to perform different emotional functions.
45
What are the two most prominent theories of lateralization of emotion?
1. The right hemisphere model
2. The valence model
46
The right hemisphere model
The right hemisphere model of the cerebral lateralization of emotion holds that the right hemisphere is specialized for all apsects of emotional processing (perception, expression and experience)
47
The valence model
- the right hemisphere is specialized for proessing negative emotion
- the left hemisphere is specialized for processing positive emotion.
48
What is the general consensus regarding neural mechanisms of human emotion?
amygdala and medial prefrontal cortex play a major role in the perception and experience of human emotion.
49
Four importatant points regarding neural mechanisms of emotion
- emotional situations produce widesprad increases in cerebral activity.
- all brain areas activated by emotional stimuli also also activate during other psychological processes.
- no brain structure had been invariably linked to a particular emotion
- the same emotional stimuli often activate different areas in different poeple.
50
Stress
when the body is exposed to harm or threat, the result is a cluster of physiological changes generally referred to as the stress response.
51
Stressors
- experiences that induce the stress response
- produce the same core patterns of physiological changes (psychological or physical)
52
Stress has a dual nature (Selye, 1950s)
1. Short term - produces adaptive changes that help the animal respond to the stressor
2. But in the long term produces changes that are maladaptive
53
What did Selye ignore (in his theory of stress)
the contribution of the sympathetic nervous system to the stress response
54
What happens when stressors activate the sympathetic nervous system?
increase the amouts of epinephrine and norepinephrine released from the adrenalin medulla.
55
What are two systems of modern theories of stress?
1. Anterior-pituitary adrenal-cortex system
2. Sympathetic-nervous system adrenal-medulla system (two-system view)
56
cytokines
- group of peptide hormones that are released by many cells
- participate in a variety of physiological and immunological responses
- stressors produce an increase in blood levels of cytokines
57
Subordinate stress
when conspecific threat becomes an enduring feature of daily life (studied with pecking orders)
58
Psychosomatic disorders
- medical disorders
- psychological factors play a causal role
- many adverse effects of stress on health
59
Gastric ulcers
- first psychosomatic disorder
- painful lesions to the lining of the stomach and duodenum
- occurs more commonly in people living in stressful situations
60
Psychoneuroimmunology
study of interactions among ...
- psychological factors
- the nervous system
- the immune system
61
The body has four lines of defense to keep the body from being overwhelmed ...
1. Behavioral immune system
2. variety of surface barriers
3. Innate immune system
4. Adaptive immune system
62
What is the behavioral immune system?
humans are motivated to avoid contact with individuals who are displaying symptoms of illness.
63
How does the innate immune system react?
- reacts quickly and generally near points of pathogens
- is triggered when receptors bind to molecules on the surface of the pathogen or when injured cells send out alarm signals
- one of the first reactions is inflammation (swelling)
- inflammation is triggered by the release of chemicals from damaged cells
- next destruction of pathogens by phagocytes (phagocytosis)
64
Phagocytosis
- destruction of pathogens by phagocytes
65
Adaptive immune system (differes from the innate immune system in which four respects?)
1. Evolved more recently
2. Is slower
3. Is specific (reacts against specific antigens)
4. has a memory
66
Lymphocytes
- produced in bone marrow and the thymus gland
- are stored in the lympathic system until they are activated
67
What two classes of Lympho,cytes are there?
1. Cell-mediated immunity (directed by T cells)
2. Antibody-mediared immunity (directed by B cells)
68
Cell-mediated immune reaction
- phagocyte ingests a foreign microorganism.
- phagocyte then displays the microorganism’s antigens (molecules, usually proteins, that can trigger an immune response) on the surface of its cell membrane
- this display attracts T cells
- Once a T cell with a receptor for the foreign antigen binds to the surface of an infected macrophage, a series of reactions is initiated ...
- Multiplication of the bound T cell, creating more T cells with the specific receptor necessary to destroy all invaders
69
Each T cell has two kinds of receptors on its surface (which two?)
1. One for molecules that are normally found on the surface of phagocytes (and other body cells)
2. and one for a specific foreign antigen
70
Anti-body-mediated immune reaction
- begins when a B cell binds to a foreign antigen (contains an appropriate receptor)
- causes the B cell to multiply and to synthesize a lethal form of its receptor molecules
- These lethal receptor molecules, called antibodies, are released into the intracellular fluid, where they bind to the foreign antigens and destroy or deactivate the microorganisms that possess them.
- Memory B cells for the specific antigen are also produced during the process.
71
What does memory of the adaptive immune system do?
is the mechanism that gives vaccinations their prophylactic (preventive) effect
72
Vaccination
- involves administering a weakened form of a virus
- if the virus later invades, the adaptive immune system is prepared to act against it.
73
Immunization
the process of creating immunity through vaccination.
74
The effects of stress on immune function are dependend on the kind of stress .... (Meta-analysis of Segerstrom and Miller, 2004)
- accute (brief) stressors - improvement in immune function
- chronic stressors - adversely affected the adaptive immune system
75
Distress vs. Eustress
1. stress that disrupts health or other aspects of fucntioning
2. stress that improves health or other aspects of fucntioning
76
How does Stress influence immune function?
- stress produces changes in the body
- there are behavioral routes by which stress can affect immune function
- the behavior of a stressed or ill person can produce stress and ilness in others
