Language and Cognition Flashcards
What are the claims underpinning Psychoanalysis?
A person’s development is determined by often forgotten events in early childhood, rather than byinherited traitsalone.
Human behaviourandcognitionare largely determined by instinctual drives that are rooted in the unconscious.
Attempts to bring such drives into awareness triggersresistancein the form ofdefense mechanisms, particularlyrepression.
Conflicts between conscious and unconscious material can result inmental disturbances, such asneurosis, neurotic traits,anxiety, anddepression.
Unconscious material can be found indreamsandunintentional acts, including mannerisms andslips of the tongue.
Liberation from the effects of the unconscious is achieved by bringing this material into the conscious mind through therapeutic intervention.
What is behaviourism?
- Mental processes are not amenable to direct observation
- However, behaviours are amenable to direct observation
- The study of behaviour is therefore the only proper approach to study mental processes in science
What are the types of conditioning associated with behaviourism?
Classical:
-Association between stimuli
-Behavioural response occurs with either stimulus in isolation
Operant:
-Reward/Punish behaviours
-Behavioural responses train to the reward paradigm
What are the types of cognitive processes?
- Perception
- Attention
- Memory (coding, retention, recall)
- Reasoning (decision making, problem solving)
- Language
- Action (planning, executing)
Anterior visual pathways and the types of streams
- Photons in pupil, retina, electrical signal, to occipital cortex
- 2 streams of information flow= dorsal stream links occipital lobe to parietal lobe= fast, where in 3D space the objects are
- Ventral stream= what the object is, occipital lobe link to temporal lobe, energy demanding (bottom up perception)
- Anterior stream= so what, connected to prefrontal cortex and limbic, sufficiently interesting to invest energy of ventral stream
- Perceptron= neural networks
What are the executive functions?
Attention
Working memory
Reasoning
Problem solving
-Largely reflective of frontal lobe functioning (PFC)
-Dysfunction is key sign in delirium (Acute Confusional State)
What are the types of attention?
- Focused attention: The ability to respond discretely to specific visual, auditory or tactile stimuli.
- Sustained attention (vigilance and concentration): The ability to maintain a consistent behavioural response during continuous and repetitive activity.
- Selective attention: The ability to maintain a behavioural or cognitive set in the face of distracting or competing stimuli. Therefore, it incorporates the notion of “freedom from distractibility.”
- Alternating attention: The ability of mental flexibility that allows individuals to shift their focus of attention and move between tasks having different cognitive requirements.
- Divided attention: This is the highest level of attention and it refers to the ability to respond simultaneously to multiple tasks or multiple task demands. (may not be true)
What are the influences on perception?
- Bottom up: stimulus quality and accuracy of perceptron
- Top down: influence of attention (see what we’re looking for)
- Salience
What are the types of human memory?
- Sensory
- Short-Term (about 30 seconds) (RAM)
- Long-Term (Hard-drive)
What are the types of Long-Term memory?
- Explicit/ declarative
- Implicit/ procedural (playing instrument, riding bike)
What are the types of explicit long-term memory?
- Semantic (knowledge of facts)
- Episodic (holidays)
- Autobiographical (life)
- Visual
What is the Baddeley model of working memory?
- Sensory memory (visuospatial sketch pad= occipital lobe, phonological loop= auditory, Broca’s and Wernicke’s areas)
- Interplay between long-term memory and central executive (prefrontal cortex)= episodic buffer (parietal lobe)
Prefrontal cortex
- Critical role in integration of information from visuospatial sketch pad, phonological loop and episodic buffer
- Short term memory, decision to commit to long term memory
- Hippocampus
What is the hippocampus?
- Medial deep, temporal lope
- Gating for long term memory
- Anterograde amnesia is damaged
What structures are involved in procedural memory?
Basal ganglia and cerebellum
- Basal ganglia= repetitive movement, sequencing muscles
- Cerebellum= fine tuning, coordination , learning of skilled movement
Describe declarative memory
Not localised
- Library, memory stored diffusely throughout cerebral cortex
- Engrams (small memories) from hippocampus transferred to neocortex in distributive way
- Wide distribution reflected in loss of memory in dementia
Reasoning and problem solving
Reflection of highly developed prefrontal lobes in humans
Interpretation, plan for movement
To pre-motor cortex and primary motor cortex
What is Goal Setting?
-Self-propagation = affiliative desire = sexual desire -Self-maintenance = thermoregulation = thirst = hunger
Maslow’s Hierarchy
Bottom up -Basic needs =Physiological needs (food, water) =Safety needs -Psychological need =Belonginess and love =Esteem -Self-fulfilment =Self-actualisation
Describe the limbic system
Homeostasis= hypothalamus
Reward= nucleus accumbens, medial forebrain bundle, ventral tegmental area
Emotions (negative)= amygdala
Describe limbic dynamicity
Objects
-Useful tool= positive affect
-Not useful/ obstacle= negative affect
Goal setting interaction and attainment
What is Salience?
Limbic drive to invest perceptual resource in significant stimuli
- Bottom up= attention capturing stimuli
- Top down= to attain goal
How does the ventral stream activate?
Limbic system activates hippocampus= make memory about it
- Pathway to frontal lobe, attention control centre activated, signals ventral stream worth investing in
- Frontal lobe integrates, makes plan, sequence motor activity (pre central) and fire primary motor neurones
What are the implications of perception?
Learning= high positive/ negative limbic activation switches on hippocampus so we store engrams and subsequently commit to long-term memory
*Faulty= addiction
Guiding future action= present relevant in how it informs action in the future, model of what we think will happen and perform action
*Dysfunction= thought disorder
Describe how dynamic hypothesis testing (the Bayesian brain) is involved in planning
- A ‘best-guess’ about what reality currently is
- A commitment to some goal (Maslow’s hierarchy, top-down and bottom-up motivations)
- Hypothesis generation about how to achieve the goal (a prediction)
- Action in the world
- Dynamic monitoring of whether the goal is getting closer or further away
What are the prerequisites for making a ‘best-guess’ about what reality currently is?
-As perception builds complexity
=Entityfication (trying to distinguish something that is a coherent object in the world from other things in the background)
-Prefrontal cortex models
=Self vs other
=Agent (capable of action) vs object (subjection to physical laws of nature)
=Agent intentionality (theory of mind and narrative understanding- deficit= autism)
Describe agent intentionality
- Source= mirror neuron system
- Populations of neurones in parietal and frontal lobe activate when we observe other agents in the world acting, we mirror what we do in brain processing for insight into what they might be up to
What is the neural basis for committing to a goal?
Descriptive accounts= personality models
- Essentially unknown
- Top down= PFC influence, higher order volitions
- Bottom up= limbic influences (primary volitions), insights from addiction, compulsion and some personality disorders
How is hypothesis generation/ prediction necessarily Bayesian?
- In the absence of any knowledge, priors for all actions are equal (might work, might not).
- The only escape from this is to try something, see if it makes the goal closer, further away, or equidistant.
- Based on that ‘experiment’ you can then update your model about the predicted outcomes that your actions will achieve in the world.
What are the pathways of reward in the dynamic monitoring of goals?
Pathways specific to dopamine in reward systems 4 fold ij NS
- Mesolimbic & Mesocortical pathways: reward, PFC processing
- Nigrostriatal pathway: Relevant in iParkinsonsD
- Tubuloinfundibular pathway: control of prolactin production
Describe how dopamine works in the brain
Reward predication error coding
- Prediction
- Minor spike if expected, big spike if better than expected
What happens when dopamine goes wrong?
Schizophrenia
- Excess of dopamine to prefrontal cortex
What are the inputs to dynamic monitoring (PFC)?
3 inputs:
- Hippocampus= context (disrupted in dementia)
- Dopamine= mesolimbic/ cortical (reward/ novelty)
- Glutamate= amygdala (fear/ anxiety/ reduce reward)
What is the functional neuroanatomy of language?
Wernicke- Geschwind model
- Broca= production
- Wernicke (in PTO junction)= comprehension
- AF (arcuate fasciculus)= connects B and W
Where in the brain is the language centres?
85%= left hemisphere 10%= right hemisphere 5%= mixture of both
What are the associated aphasias of selective damage?
- Broca= “expressive” (inability to find the words)
- Wernicke= “receptive” (cannot understand)
- AF= “conductive” (subtle, unable to repeat something)
What is clinical aphasia?
Pattern of aphasia
Fluent (can speak a lot with or without meaning)= Wernicke or ‘phonological loop’
Non-fluent= Broca’s frontal, or output paths
What are the options for a clinical approach to testing cognition?
1) MMSE (mini mental state examination)– very limited value, poorly responsive other than in advanced dementia
2) Addenbrooke’s Cognitive Examination III – useful, takes c.20 minutes
Describe Addenbrooke’s Cognitive Examination
TOTAL ACE-III SCORE /100 Attention /18 Memory /26 Fluency /14 Language /26 Visuospatial /16
What are the advantages of the Addenbrooke’s Cognitive Examination?
Total score useful to chart decline over time
Pattern of impairments can be useful to make diagnosis of dementia subtypes
Can be a very useful starting point to recognise the need for specialist neuropsychology assessment.
What is Intelligence?
Performance over Process
The aggregate or global capacity of the individual to act purposefully, to think rationally, and to deal effectively with his environment
What is IQ?
Intelligence Quotient
Mental age divided by Chronological age
Describe the current model of structure of Intelligence
There are three levels (strata) of clustering for intelligence test performance Narrow abilities (Stratum I), broad abilities (stratum II) A general factor ‘g’ explains about 50% of variance (stratum III)
What are the broad abilities?
- Fluid reasoning
- Crystallised knowledge
- Visual processing
- Short-term memory
- Long-term storage and retrieval
- Processing speed
- Auditory processing
What are the points on the research agenda for intelligence?
Genetic and environmental determinants of individual differences
Changes over the life course
The neural basis of ‘g’ and broad abilities
Effect of disease states
Potential for use as a measure of disease severity (markers of cognitive function)
What is personality?
A characteristic set of: -Behaviours -Cognitions -Emotional patterns That are stable over time Temperament in children
What are the Big 5 Personality Indicators (OCEAN)?
- Openness (high= loves new, intellectually curious/ low= practical and rational)
- Conscientious (high= responsible, disciplined/ low= easy-going, relaxed)
- Extraversion (high= outgoing/ low= solitary)
- Agreeableness (high= cooperative and kind/ low= antagonistic and suspicious)
- Neuroticism (high= tense and anxious/ low= secure and not easily bothered)
What is the neural theory underpinning openness?
-Openness= High sensitivity to DA (dopamine) spikes in PFC?
strongly updated PFC priors with +ve RPE signalling
What is the neural theory underpinning conscientiousness?
High connectivity within PFC centres
More effective ‘top down’ influence on goal-directed behaviour?
What is the neural theory underpinning extraversion?
Good face recognition (VC) and connectivity to amygdala. High serum oxytocin
Reward from face recognition? (pro-social reward)
What is the neural theory underpinning agreeableness?
Good recognition of facial emotion expression, enlarged superior temporal gyrus
(good perception of others emotional states, able to use as pro-social tool)
What is the neural theory underpinning neuroticism?
High connectivity from amygdala to PFC.
Higher tendency for reward-minimisation (fear/anxiety increased across all settings)
How are the Big 5 clinically relevant?
Openness= Mixed reports of relationship to health
- Conscientiousness= Increased life success and subjective wellbeing, more likely to adhere with treatment schedules
- Extroversion= increased subjective wellbeing
- Agreeableness= increased subjective wellbeing
- Neuroticism= Increased risk of mood disorders, increased risk of substance misuse disorders
