Psychophysiology

Question 1

What did Richards and Casey’s (1991) study demonstrate about children’s changes in heart rate and interesting stimulus

Answer 1

Their heart-rate decreased when being presented with an interesting stimulus - Sesame Street

Question 2

Explain the result of Richards and Casey’s (1991) study on heart rate and interesting stimuli

Answer 2

Because the parasympathetic nervous system increases in activity to suppress distractors in order to pay attention to the interesting stimuli

Question 3

How was stress measured in Labuschangne et al’s (2019) study where the participant had to present in front of researchers

Answer 3

From saliva

Question 4

Explain how measuring stress can be adapted to children

Answer 4

Spit in a cup, cover the cotton in a flavoured saliva-inducing powder,

Question 5

What did Gunnar et al’s (2001) study on stress levels and institutionalised children show?

Answer 5

Children who were adopted after 4 months showed higher levels of cortisol during the day than those adopted before 4 months or non-institutionalised

Question 6

What confounds should we consider when using psychophysiological measures?

Answer 6

• ANS changes with development
• Controlling the environment; temperature, light etc.
• Food (e.g coffee), smoking and medications can change peoples reactivity and regulation

Question 7

How can you increase validity when measuring psychophysiology?

Answer 7

Mixed methods - can measure several things simultaneously e.g HR, pupil dilation and skin conductance

Question 8

How can you increase validity when measuring psychophysiology?

Answer 8

Mixed methods - can measure several things simultaneously e.g HR, pupil dilation and skin conductance

Question 9

Why may we need to make modifications for developmental studies?

Answer 9

equipment tolerance and sensors
Heart rate - fNIRS vs Electrodes
skin conductance/respiration - galvanic skin response

Question 10

What is the advantage to measuring psychophysiology

Answer 10

Can measure an infants mental state when they are unable to report it

Question 11

What were the results of Geangu et al’s (2011) study on baby’s response via pupil dilation when viewing other babies emotions?

Answer 11

At 6 months; babies show greatest arousal between 11-14s
At 12 months: show greatest arousal between 2-4 seconds

Question 12

What systems are activated in the brain during the presence of a threat?

Answer 12

Sympathetic Adrenomedullary (SAM) and Hypothalamus Pituitary Adrenal - Axis (HPA-Axis)

Question 13

What does the HPA-Axis do?

Answer 13

Release cortisol and shuts down the hypothalamyus

Question 14

What is the danger in the overproduction of cortisol?

Answer 14

Increased risk of diabetes
neural atrophy in the hypothalamus = reduced response to stress
Increased risk of arthritis

Question 15

How long does it take for cortisol to peak when the HPA-Axis is activated?

Answer 15

20 minutes

Question 16

Why did Johnson et al (2014) use pupillometry in their study?

Answer 16

To measure task engagement when encoding in a memory task

Question 17

What was the result of Johnson et al’s (2014) study on pupillometry and its relation to short term memory

Answer 17

The children’s pupils dilated only when encoding up to 6 numbers, beyond this their pupils constricted whilst the adults continues to dilate up until 9 numbers where they then stabilised

Question 18

How could Johnson et al’s (2014) study be improved?

Answer 18

Longitudinal study to see shape and change of when children begin to engage for longer strings of numbers
Look at neurodiverse populations

Question 19

What two measures did Stormark (2004) use to indicate if a child recognised their classmates?

Answer 19

Skin conductance and heart rate

Question 20

What was the result of Stormark’s (2004) study?

Answer 20

Verbal recognition; no significant difference in overt recognition of former playmates compared to unfamiliar children
Autonomic response: Heart rate decreased and increased skin conductance when presented former playmates
They can retain memories in an implicit form