Lecture 5 - Cognition and Emotion Flashcards
What is the primary function of emotional stimuli in cognition?
Emotional stimuli automatically grab attention and are critical for survival and reproductive success.
What is the concept of “preparedness” in relation to emotional stimuli?
“Preparedness” refers to our evolved tendency to fear certain stimuli (e.g., snakes, spiders) that were threats in the natural environment, but not modern dangers (e.g., cars).
How did Winkielman et al. (2005) demonstrate unconscious emotional influence on behavior?
They showed that subliminally presented emotional faces (happy vs. angry) influenced consumption behavior, willingness to pay, and drink preferences, especially when participants were thirsty.
What type of behavior does unconscious priming (e.g., happy faces) influence, according to John Bargh’s research?
Unconscious priming influences behavior such as increased risk-taking, as shown in gambling behavior.
How does emotional stimuli influence attention, memory, and decision-making?
Emotional stimuli can cause automatic biases in attention, enhance memory for emotionally relevant information, and affect decision-making processes.
What is the Visual Search Task used to measure in cognitive psychology?
The Visual Search Task measures attentional bias by determining how quickly someone can detect a target stimulus, especially when surrounded by distractors.
How does the Emotional Stroop Task work and what does it measure?
The Emotional Stroop Task requires participants to name the color of words while ignoring their content. Slower responses to emotionally relevant words suggest an attentional bias.
What does the Dot-Probe Task measure in terms of attention?
The Dot-Probe Task measures selective attention by comparing response times to probes presented in the location of emotional vs. neutral stimuli.
What is attentional bias?
Attentional bias is a systematic tendency to focus on certain types of stimuli (e.g., negative or threatening) over others.
How does attentional bias manifest in individuals with anxiety disorders?
Individuals with anxiety show an attentional bias for threatening stimuli, responding faster to threat-related information.
What does research suggest about attentional bias in depression?
Studies suggest that individuals with depression maintain attention on sad stimuli and have difficulty disengaging from negative information.
How are attentional biases related to psychological disorders?
Attentional biases contribute to the development and maintenance of disorders like anxiety and depression by reinforcing negative or threatening thought patterns.
How can understanding attentional biases be useful in clinical settings?
Understanding attentional biases helps design interventions to modify maladaptive cognitive patterns, aiding in the treatment of disorders like anxiety and depression.
What is the role of the prefrontal cortex in emotional processing?
The prefrontal cortex is involved in early neuronal responses (100-120 ms) to emotional stimuli before identification (~170 ms).
How does the amygdala contribute to emotional processing?
The amygdala increases functional connectivity between itself and the visual cortex, and amygdala lesions can abolish the bias for emotional words.
What did Eimer and Holmes (2002) find regarding facial expression processing in the brain?
They found that emotional expression analysis occurs at around 120 ms, while the structural encoding of faces occurs at ~170 ms, with the N170 component linked to face processing.
How does emotional stimuli affect competition for processing resources in the brain?
Emotional stimuli can bias competition for processing resources by enhancing visual cortex responses, similar to how attention enhances visual processing
What is the path of visual information in the brain related to emotional stimuli?
Visual information flows from the primary visual area V1 to the temporal cortex and the amygdala, which then projects back to all visual areas, influencing processing based on the valence of the stimulus.
What is the “weapon focus” effect in memory?
The weapon focus effect is when attention is drawn to a weapon during a threatening event, impairing the ability to recall other details, such as the perpetrator’s identity.
How do emotional stimuli impact memory encoding and retrieval?
Emotional stimuli tend to enhance memory encoding and retrieval, with emotions like fear and desire narrowing attention and impairing recall of other details.
What is a flashbulb memory?
A flashbulb memory is a highly detailed and vivid memory of the moment an emotionally significant event was first learned, such as news of a major disaster.
How does the amygdala affect memory for emotional events?
The amygdala enhances memory for emotional events, with damage to the amygdala reversing the memory bias for emotional over neutral events.
How does selective memory work in the context of mood?
Selective memory, such as mood-congruent memory, means people tend to recall information that matches their current emotional state (e.g., recalling sad events when feeling sad).
How does depression influence autobiographical memory?
Depression can lead to over-general autobiographical memory, where individuals recall fewer specific events, potentially as a protective mechanism to avoid strong emotional responses.
What is mood-state-dependent memory?
Mood-state-dependent memory occurs when recall is better if the individual is in the same mood during encoding and retrieval.
How do antidepressants affect cognitive biases in memory and attention?
Antidepressants shift attention and memory biases toward positive stimuli, increasing recall of positive words and reducing recognition of negative emotional expressions.
What is the relationship between emotional biases and anxiety and depression?
Anxiety tends to have a stronger attentional and interpretive bias for negative stimuli, while depression is characterized by stronger memory biases for negative information.
What is cognitive bias modification?
Cognitive bias modification involves training individuals to shift their attention away from negative stimuli, which can reduce symptoms in anxiety and depression.
How can cognitive bias modification be applied to obesity?
Cognitive bias modification in obesity involves training individuals to focus away from unhealthy foods and towards healthy foods, reducing brain responses to high-calorie foods and promoting weight loss.
What is the role of appraisals in emotion regulation?
Appraisals start the emotion process, initiating physiological, expressive, behavioral, and other changes that make up the emotional state. They can be automatic or conscious and occur at different levels, such as primary, secondary, and reappraisal.
What is primary appraisal in emotion regulation?
Primary appraisal involves assessing whether a situation is positive, negative, or irrelevant to one’s well-being.
What does secondary appraisal involve?
Secondary appraisal involves evaluating the resources available to cope with a situation.
What is reappraisal in the context of emotion regulation?
Reappraisal involves reassessing a situation or coping strategies to modify earlier emotional responses if necessary.
What is the difference between proactive and reactive emotion regulation strategies?
Proactive strategies, like reappraisal, involve preparing to interpret information differently before experiencing it, while reactive strategies, like response suppression, occur after the emotional response has started.
How do culture and emotion regulation relate?
Emotion regulation strategies like expressive suppression may have different effects across cultures. For example, in Western cultures, suppression is often harmful, but in many Asian cultures, emotional control is encouraged.
What is the role of the prefrontal cortex (PFC) in emotion regulation?
The PFC, especially the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC), plays a key role in managing emotional responses, particularly by regulating the amygdala’s reaction to negative stimuli.
What happens in the brain during emotion regulation, specifically in the DLPFC and amygdala?
In emotion regulation, the DLPFC helps reduce the amygdala’s response to negative stimuli. When emotion regulation is successful, DLPFC activation is associated with decreased amygdala activation.
How is the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) involved in emotion regulation?
The ACC, particularly its ventral portion, plays a role in regulating emotional responses and overcoming interference from emotionally charged stimuli, like in tasks such as the emotional Stroop test.
How does emotion regulation differ in depression?
In depression, patients show a sustained amygdala response to negative stimuli and lack the proper DLPFC activation that would normally reduce emotional responses, leading to impaired emotion regulation.
What is selective attention in emotion regulation, and how does it relate to depression?
Selective attention is the ability to focus on certain stimuli while ignoring others. In depression, individuals show a bias toward negative emotional stimuli, linked to increased activation in the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC).
What is the role of the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) in depression?
In depression, the ACC shows increased activation when processing negative emotional stimuli, which is associated with a negative cognitive bias and poorer emotion regulation.
What is Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (TMS) and how does it help in depression treatment?
TMS is a non-invasive treatment that uses magnetic pulses to stimulate or dampen specific brain areas. It has been shown to reduce symptoms of depression by targeting overactive regions like the ventral ACC.
What did Mayberg et al.’s research on brain stimulation in depression reveal?
Their research found that stimulating the subgenual cingulate (BA 25) could significantly improve mood and reverse abnormal brain activity patterns in patients with severe depression.
How does Emotional Working Memory (eWM) training help with emotion regulation?
eWM training improves emotion regulation by enhancing working memory, reducing emotional distress, and increasing brain activation in areas related to emotion regulation, such as the sgACC.
What brain areas are involved in emotional working memory (eWM) training?
eWM training activates fronto-parietal regions (associated with working memory) and deactivates emotional regions like the amygdala and insula.
How does brain training improve emotion regulation performance?
Brain training, like eWM tasks, improves performance on emotion regulation tasks, such as the emotional Stroop test, and reduces emotional distress in response to negative stimuli.
What role does the ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC) play in decision-making?
The vmPFC is involved in emotional expression identification, decision-making, and regulating impulsive behavior. Lesions to this area can impair decision-making, cause disinhibition, and lead to difficulties in recognizing emotions in others.
What happened to Phineas Gage after his frontal lobe injury?
After his frontal lobe injury, Phineas Gage experienced a dramatic change in personality, becoming rude, impulsive, and antisocial. His ability to regulate his emotions and social behavior was permanently altered.
What does the Iowa Gambling Task (IGT) assess?
The Iowa Gambling Task assesses decision-making by having participants choose cards from different decks with varying reward schedules. It tests the ability to adapt to risky and safe choices based on experience.
How do patients with ventromedial prefrontal cortex lesions perform on the Iowa Gambling Task?
Patients with ventromedial prefrontal cortex lesions show impaired decision-making on the Iowa Gambling Task. They struggle to learn from feedback and fail to choose advantageous decks.
What is the physiological response observed in individuals with amygdala and ventromedial prefrontal cortex lesions during decision-making tasks?
Individuals with amygdala and vmPFC lesions fail to show the normal physiological arousal (skin conductance responses) when making decisions, such as in the Iowa Gambling Task, which affects their ability to anticipate the consequences of their choices.
What is the Somatic Marker Hypothesis proposed by Damasio?
The Somatic Marker Hypothesis suggests that emotions guide decision-making through bodily responses (somatic markers), which influence choices based on past emotional experiences. These bodily signals help individuals avoid risky decisions.
According to Damasio, what happens when an emotion is experienced in the context of decision-making?
When an emotion is experienced, the events leading up to it become associated with the emotion. This association creates a somatic marker, which helps guide future decisions by signaling the potential emotional consequences of actions.
What does the research on brain activation during risky versus safe choices in the Iowa Gambling Task suggest?
Research suggests that greater activation of the prefrontal cortex is associated with better decision-making. More prefrontal cortex activation correlates with making safer decisions and winning more money.
What are the levels of conscious knowledge in the Iowa Gambling Task based on participants’ awareness of the decks?
The levels are:
Level 0: No conscious knowledge of which decks are best.
Level 1: Conscious knowledge of a preferred deck but not the outcomes of the decks.
Level 2: Conscious knowledge of a preferred deck and the outcomes that support that preference.
How do participants’ conscious knowledge levels affect their performance on the Iowa Gambling Task?
Higher levels of conscious knowledge (especially level 2) are associated with better performance in the task, as individuals are able to make more informed decisions based on the outcomes of their choices.
