cognition and emotion 8 Flashcards
what is an emotion?
a reaction of the organism to an event that is relevant to: personal goals, beliefs/values
emotions are multifaceted:
- physiological= heart rate/ palms sweaty
-subjective=own individuality
-behavioural= act in a particular way as a result of emotion
-cognitive= thinking
extremely complicated
multiple aspects
what is functionalist theory of emotion?
emotions serve an adaptive purpose
not just a by product
what is cognitive psychological theory of emotion?
emotions are the result of info processing which relies on access to memory representations
what is the cognitive approach to emotion?
Stimulus (bear)appraisal (what does it mean for personal safety, goal- to survive)emotional reaction= impulse to action (running away)
what did richard lazarus suggest?
- a pioneer in the study of emotion and stress and the relationship to cogniton
- concept of appraisal
- Before emotionoccurs,people make anautomatic, often unconscious,assessment of what is happening andwhat it may mean for them or those theycare about
-From that perspective, emotion becomesnot just rational but a necessarycomponent of survival
cognitive appraisal- leads to emotional response – assessment of stimulus- emotion becomes a necessary aspect of survival- can’t have an emotional response without a type of appraisal, thinking what the stimulus means
what did zajonc suggest?
emotions are too quick for cognition to take place- emotion must happen then thinking- opposite to lazarus- emotions can happen unconsciously - emotions need only minimal info- emotion and cognition are two independant systems
what is the mere exposure effect, zajonc?
- In the 1st stage of the experiment participants are instructed to look ata series of previously unseen characters
-In the 2nd stage of the experiment participants are instructed to look ata series of such characters, but this time to pick the ones they ‘prefer’.
Mere exposure effect- unfamiliar with certain characters- look through many- second stage look at many, some you’ve seen before some haven’t, have to say some of them you like- can’t say if they’ve recognised them before, no conscious awareness- most characters they liked/preferred, they’d seen before- mere exposure- there is an emotional response without any conscious awareness
what is the ‘bad guy’, good guy’ effect?
-Tranel&Damasio (1993)tested a brain-lesionedpatient suffering from amnesia.He had only a very short-term memory and wasunable to learn newepisodes and faces.
-Question:Is his emotionalmemory intact? Is hecapable of emotionallearning despite beingincapable of “factual”,episodic learning?
- Methods: Patient was asked to interact with 3 different individuals: a “good guy”, a “bad guy” and a neutral person.
- Measures: Later, pictures of these 3 individuals are presented to the patient, and he is asked
(1) if he has seen one of these people before
(2) if he had to interact with one of these people, who would he choose?
- Results: The patient does not recognise the people he just interacted with BUT consistently chooses the “good guy” rather than the “bad guy”.
what was lazarus’ response to zajonc?
- emotion follows cognition
- Zajonchas a restrictive definition of cognition:Zajoncsuggested that cognition is necessarily conscious anddeliberate, whereas Lazarus has a broader definition,encompassing quick and unconscious processes onminimalinformation
-Cognition/appraisal cannot bedissociated fromemotion(appraisalISemotion)
what is flashbulb memory?
extremely vivid, long-lasting memories of distinctive events- emotional context- emotion= feels more vivid- experience- sets them apart from other memories.
what is mood dependent memory?
Recall is facilitated when the emotional state during encoding is similar to the emotional state at retrieval
Encoding = When information is first stored in memory
Retrieval = When information is accessed in memory (e.g. recall, recognition)
notoriously unreliable - unable to replicate it
what is bower et al’s experiment with mood dependent memory?
- stage one = 1. Participants go through a mood-elicitation procedure:
they watch a video that elicits sadness
2. They are given a list of words to read.
stage two= condition one:Filler task
Ps watch another video that elicits sadness
They have to recall as many words as possible from the list that they read in the first stage
condition two:Filler task
Ps watch another video that elicits happiness
They have to recall as many words as possible from the list that they read in the first stage
Question: In which condition will participants perform better?
Finding: Participants perform better in Condition 1 (sad-sad) because their mood at encoding was the same as their mood at retrieval
what is mood congruent memory?
When a person isin a particularmood,he/shewillhaveimprovedrecallformemories and contentsthat areassociated with that specific mood.
more reliable- frequently observed in cases of depression
what is gilligan and bower experiment in mood congruent memory?
stage one= Participants are given a list of words to read.
The list contains happy, sad and neutral words
stage two= condition one; Ps watch video that elicits sadness (mood elicitation procedure)
They have to recall as many words as possible from the list that they read in the first stage
condition two; Ps watch video that elicits happiness (mood elicitation procedure)
They have to recall as many words as possible from the list that they read in the first stage
Finding:
Participants in Condition 1 (who watched sad film clip) recalled more sad than neutral and happy words
Participants in Condition 2 (who watched happy film clip) recalled more happy than neutral and sad words
what is emotional enhancement of memory?
are we more likely to remember emotional material rather than neutral material
what did ferre experiment in emotional memory enhancement?
Ferre (2003) tested the prediction that emotional valence can affect memory performance even when participants do not intentionally pay attention to valence when encoding stimuli
She compared following conditions:
Shallow encoding where participants focus on physical features of the stimuli (count the number of vowels)
Deep encoding where participants focus on the emotional content of the stimuli (rate emotionality of words)
After encoding she used surprise free recall
More words were recalled in deep encoding condition, but effect of emotionality was present in both. Participants recalled more emotional words even when they were not paying attention to their meaning
what is the role of attention?
emotional info capture attention- the more we attend, more likely to remember- functional purpose, there for a reason
Easterbrook (1959):Attentionalresources are allocated to theemotional aspects of a situationwhich leaves fewer resources to process the non-emotional aspects of a situation
Easterbrook stated that an increase of arousal leads to a decrease in number of cues that can be utilised
When we are remembering an emotional situation, we have a very accurate memory for the central features of the situation, and a poor memory for the peripheral details
what did christianson and loftus experiment?
- remembering emotional events; the fate of detailed info
Condition 1:
Participants are shown a slide with a woman riding a bike
Condition 2:
Participants are shown a slide with the same woman lying beside her bike, bleeding from a head injury
For both conditions, there was a memory test about the contents of the slide some time afterexposure
Result:
In the emotional condition details associated with the central details (e.g. the colour of the woman’s coat) was better retained than in the neutral condition
In the emotional condition memory for peripheral details (the colour of a parked car) was poorer than in the neutral condition.
CONFIRMATION OF EASTERBROOK’S HYPOTHESIS
what is recollective experience and emotion?
our memories vary according to their phenomenal characteristics, number of sensory and perceptual details, and the type of subjective experience accompanying the act of recall.
what did ochsner experiement in emotion and recollective experience?
presented participants with positive, negative and neutral pictures and then gave them a recognition test
Findings:
1) Emotional pictures (negative + positive) are more richly recollected than neutral pictures
2) Negative pictures are even more richly recollected that positive pictures
Were emotional contents more richly recollected thannon-emotional events?
YES
Was there a difference in the richness of recollectionbetween positive and negative events?
YES
what impacts does neuroscience have on emotions and memory interaction?
-Amygdala – particularly important for the detection of danger, and other emotional-arousing stimuli
-Hippocampus – particularly important for memory encoding
what did cahill research about the amygdala and emotional memory?
Participant: Single-case study: the authors tested a patient (BP) with a rare degenerative disease that provoked a specific bilateral lesion of the amygdala (leaving the hippocampus largely intact)
Task: the patient is shown a slide show narrating a brief story with 2 stages:
In the first stage, a young boy walks in the street with his mother to visit his father atwork
In the second stage of the story, the characters are involved in an accident, the boy gets seriously injured and graphic pictures depict the event
After a long interval, the patient’s memory for the 2 stages of the story is tested
Results:
Neurologically healthy participants recall elements of the 2ndstage of the story (emotionalpart) much better than elements of the 1ststage
BP recalls the emotional element less well.He doesnot show any effect of emotional enhancement of LTM
