Emotion & Consciousness (Chap 15 & 16)

Question 1

Affect

Answer 1

Specifically refers to an emotion displayed, but
– Has come to mean almost anything related to
emotion

Question 2

Emotion

Answer 2

Brief affective experience

Question 3

Mood

Answer 3

More chronic and pervasive emotion

Question 4

The main issues inherent in studying emotion and consciousness

Answer 4

• both are qualia - that is, they are individual instances of subjective conscious experience - it is unlikely that people’s experiences of either emotion or consciousness are exactly the same

Question 5

Other issues in studying emotion

Answer 5

Evidence mostly from vignette studies
1.Emotions are weak or not real
2.Appraisal is confounded by situation
3.Correlational: does appraisal cause
emotion

Question 6

Zajonc’s view of emotions and cognition

Answer 6

Cognition and emotion are separate
– (but they may interact!)

• Affective reactions can occur without extensive perceptual and cognitive encoding

Question 7

Smith & Lazarus (1993) six appraisal components

Answer 7

Primary: Motivational relevance and Primary: Motivational congruence Secondary: accountability Secondary: problem-focused coping potential Secondary: emotion-focused coping potential and secondary: future expetancy

Question 8

Appraisal theory and emotions

Answer 8

Appraisals cause emotional states rather than emotional states causing appraisals. However, most research is correlational and fails to infer causality

Question 9

Chartrand vanBaaren and Bargh (2006) automatic appraisal processes and emotional state

Answer 9

Showed that these automatic processes under the level of consciousness can effect emotional state. Participants receiving the negative words reported a more negative mood state than those receiving positive words.

Question 10

Ohman and Soares (1994) evidence for Zajonc

Answer 10

Spider and snake images below consciousness - those with spider phobia physiollogically relevant response, as with snake phobia (related images)

Question 11

Mood-state dependent memory

Answer 11

The finding that memory is better when the mood state at retrieval as that at learning when the two mood states differ (Bower and Gilligan - 1984)

Question 12

Mood Congruity

Answer 12

The finding that learning and retrieval of emotional material is better when there is agreement between learner’s or rememberer’s mood state and the affective value of the material

Question 13

Thought congruity

Answer 13

AN individuals free associations, interpretations, thoughts and judgements are thematically congruent with his/her mood state

Question 14

Pinker and three issues when understanding consciousness

Answer 14

Sentience, Access to information and self-knowledge

Question 15

Sentience

Answer 15

Our subjective experience or phenomenal awareness

Question 16

Access to information

Answer 16

Relating to ability to report the content of subjective experience but without the ability to report on the process producing that experience

Question 17

Self-knowledge

Answer 17

The ability to have conscious awareness of ourselves.

Question 18

Vegetative State

Answer 18

A condition produced by brain damage in which there is wakefulness but an apparent lack of awareness and purposeful behaviour

Question 19

What has Owen et al.’s research showed us about vegetative patients

Answer 19

That they may be consciously aware - e.g asked to imagine playing tennis (brain activity in the correct areas - similar to those of healthy participants)

Question 20

One of the main assumptions of Baars and Franklin’s global workspace theory

Answer 20

we are only consciously aware of a small fraction of the information processing going on in our brain at any given moment

Question 21

The three major assumptions of global workspace theory

Answer 21

1) there are very close links between consciousness and attention
2) Human information processing involves a large number of special purpose processors that are largely unconscious
3) Conscious contents evoke widespread brain activation

Question 22

Three major states that can occur when visual stimulus is presented (according to Dehaene et al. 2006) - Global Workspace and neural correlates

Answer 22

1) conscious state 2) Preconscious state 3) subliminal state

Question 23

Conscious state (Dehaene et al. 2006)

Answer 23

> much activation in areas in basic visual processing and neurons in parietal, frontal and cingulate associated with attention

Question 24

Preconscious state (Dehaene et al. 2006)

Answer 24

Sufficient basic visual processing to permit conscious awareness but there is insufficient top-down attention

Question 25

Subliminal State

Answer 25

Insufficient basic visual processing to permit conscious awareness regardless of the involvement of attention