CLA Flashcards
Ochsner and Gross (2008)
Identified the areas in prefrontal lobes associated with active reappraisal of the emotional importance of the events
-Activation increases in the prefrontal cortex. More active the more successful the reappraisal
Conclusion: Biological factors do interact in emotion.
- Emotional states cannot arise in the absence of cognition
- Influence is often Biological Influences –> Cognitive Influences
Recognition of an emotion can occur at an unconscious level
-The more elaborate the emotion the higher the involvement of the deliberate conscious process
Speisman (1964)
To investigate the extent to which manipulation of cognitive appraisals could influence emotional experience (Genital mutilation)
Three types of soundtracks
- Trauma
- Intellectualization
- Silent Condition (control group)
Checked the participants with heart rate and galvanic skin response (sweat)
Participants in the trauma condition showed higher physiological measures of stress
Conclusion: support the appraisal theory- manipulation of participants cognitive appraisal did not have a significant impact in their physiological stress reactions
Trauma: reacted more emotionally
Appraisal Theory
Appraisals are evaluations related to how the situation will impact on one’s personal well-being
- Positive Emotions emerge if the appraisal assesses potential benefit
- Negative emotions emerge if the appraisal assesses potential harm
Lazarus (1975) Appraisal Theory
Cognitive factors can modulate stress responses
i.e. The physiological and psychological reactions involves in the experience
(Jaws Soundtrack)
Reliability of Memory
Memory is a reconstructive process of images, perhaps related to our social/cultural background, not being too reliable from times to times
3 Principles of CLA
- Humans are information processors and their mental processes guide behavior
- The mind can be studied scientifically
- Cognitive processes are influenced by social and cultural factors
Bruner and Postman (1949) [CLA Principle 1]
How expectations and perception influence what we “see”
Black and Red cards
Continuous red cards made a change to black look like purple or brown- a mixture of red & black
Conclusion: experiment shows how the way we process visual stimuli is dependent to a certain degree on our expectation (pre-stored information)
-Our brain is capable of fabricating illusions which are so realistic we believe they are true
War of Ghosts - Serial Reproduction
The effect of culture on memory.
Native American folk tale- recalling the story several times. European and Nat. American participants
Results: Changes show the alteration in culturally unfamiliar objects changed to culturally familiar. The study supports the principle that social and cultural factors affect cognitive processes- difference in participant stimuli (culture) affected mental representations (schemas)
Schema Theory- Bartlett
A cognitive structure that provides framework for organizing informations about the world, events, people and actions.
Shortcuts that our brain uses to identify and refer to cultural events or happenings
- Organize information in our brains
- Activated to increase information-processing efficiency.
- Enable the generation of expectations about objects, events and people.
- Regulate Behaviour.
- Relatively stable and usually very resistant to change; ensuring continuity so that we can process information and the ways we act. Schemas can also lead to distortions and mistakes when:
- Settings are unfamiliar.
- The wrong Schemas become activated
Schemas- Scripts
Provide information about the sequence of events that occur in a more-or-less un changing order in particular contexts. Ex- attending class or visiting the dentist
Schemas- Self Schemas
Organizing information we have about ourselves, information stored in our memory about our strengths and weaknesses and how we feel about them
Gauld and Stephenson (1967)
Replicated Bartlett’s (1932) study
Schemas- Social Schemas
(Stereotypes) represents information about groups of people.
Ex-Women can’t drive
Bransford and Johnson (Balloon Picture Schema)
2 groups
One was given a paragraph and another a picture and then the paragraph - (made more sense to the participants)es
Picture as a schema help structure our information, and then we select what we can remember from it. Without this structure we cannot select thus remember.
Schemas encode information
Bransford and Johnson (Laundry)
3 groups
- One third just heard the paragraph
- Another third were told that the paragraph was about doing laundry (made perfect sense and remembered it
- Other third learned the topic of the paragraph after they were given the paragraph, it didnt make too much sense to them- the topic served to activate the relevant schema
The topic helped the participants to work out the structure of the paragraphs and allowed them to remember more about it
Macrae et al (1994)
Participants were shown images of people labelled doctor, artist, lawyer, skinhead etc.
- They were given the stereotype consistent and stereotype inconsistent personality traits for each label.
- Participants remembered more stereotype consistent personality traits
Demonstrating that we are cognitive misers, we rely solely on our stereotype when we don’t have time for systematic processing or lack cognitive resources to think carefully and accurately