social attention Flashcards
Flashcards
Card 1: Social Attention Definition
Q: What is social attention?
A: Attention guided by others’ focus, using cues like eye-gaze, head orientation, and body orientation to infer goals, intentions, and actions.
Card 2: Social Brain Hypothesis
Q: What is the “social brain” hypothesis proposed by Brothers (1990)?
A: The primate brain contains specialized circuits for social perception and action, emphasizing its role as a social brain
Card 1: Social Cues for Attention
Q: What are the three key social cues used to guide attention?
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A:
Eye-gaze – Indicates the direction of focus.
Head Orientation – Refines the direction of attention.
Body Orientation – Provides additional context for focus
Card 2: Inferences from Social Attention
Q: What three types of inferences can be made based on social attention cues?
A:
Goals – Understanding what someone is trying to achieve.
Intentions – Interpreting the reasons behind their focus.
Actions – Predicting behaviors based on their attention focus
Flashcards:
Card 1: Salience of the Human Eye
Q: Why is the human eye particularly salient in guiding attention?
A: Its unique features, like sclera contrast and directionality, make it highly effective for detecting gaze and inferring focus.
Card 2: Eye-Gaze and Social Attention
Q: How does eye-gaze contribute to social attention?
A: Eye-gaze serves as a nonverbal cue for sharing attention, predicting actions, and understanding social intentions.
Card 3: Evolutionary Role of Eye Salience
Q: What is the evolutionary significance of the human eye’s salience?
A: It enhances cooperative behavior and social bonding by enabling clear communication of attention and intentions
Card 1: Evolutionary Importance of Social Attention
Q: Why is social attention evolutionarily important?
A: It enhances survival by detecting threats and opportunities, and it supports group living through cooperation and cohesion.
Card 2: Developmental Role of Social Attention
Q: How does social attention support development?
A: It aids in learning (e.g., language), understanding others’ intentions, and developing Theory of Mind, as seen in gaze-following behavior.
Card 3: Social Networks and Brain Structure
Q: What brain regions are linked to social network size in Sallet et al.’s (2011) study?
A: Superior Temporal Sulcus (STS), amygdala, and dorsal/anterior prefrontal cortex.
Card 4: Social Brain Hypothesis
Q: What developmental behaviors support the social brain hypothesis?
A: Infants spend more time viewing eyes by 2 months and exhibit gaze-following behavior by 14-18 months.
Flashcards:
Card 1: Superior Temporal Sulcus (STS) Function
Q: What are the main functions of the STS in social cognition?
A: Perception of faces, human motion, understanding others’ actions and mental states (ToM), and language processing.
Card 2: Gaze Sensitivity and STS
Q: How does the STS contribute to gaze sensitivity?
A: Specialized cells in the STS detect small deviations in eye-gaze, crucial for understanding focus and intentions.
Card 3: STS and Prosopagnosia
Q: What STS-related impairment is observed in prosopagnosic patients?
A: Difficulty detecting small deviations in eye-gaze, affecting social perception.
Flashcards:
Card 1: Role of Gaze Direction in Social Attention
Q: How does gaze direction function as a cue in social attention?
A: Gaze direction indicates where an individual’s attention is focused, as people tend to look at what they are attending to.
Card 2: Social Understanding through Gaze
Q: How does attending to another person’s gaze facilitate social understanding?
A: It helps us infer what they are thinking, feeling, and intending, enhancing our social perception.
Card 1: Theory of Mind (ToM)
Q: What is Theory of Mind and how does it develop?
A: Theory of Mind is the ability to understand that others have beliefs, intentions, and desires different from one’s own. It develops in children, but is delayed in those with autism
Card 2: Social Brain Modules
Q: What are the key modules in the brain responsible for social understanding?
A:
Eye Direction Detector (EDD) – Detects eye gaze and attention.
Intentionality Detector (ID) – Recognizes goals and desires.
Shared Attention Module (SAM) – Tracks joint attention between self and others.
Card 4: Cognitive Mechanisms for Mindreading
Q: What are the three cognitive mechanisms for mindreading as described by Baron-Cohen?
A:
Eye Direction Detector (EDD): Detects where another person’s attention is focused.
Intentionality Detector (ID): Recognizes others’ goals and desires.
Shared Attention Module (SAM): Tracks joint attention, determining if two individuals are focused on the same object or event.
Card 5: Eye Direction Detector (EDD)
Q: What is the role of the Eye Direction Detector (EDD) in mindreading?
A: The EDD helps detect the direction of someone’s gaze, providing cues about what they are attending to and indicating their focus or intentions.
Card 6: Intentionality Detector (ID)
Q: What is the function of the Intentionality Detector (ID) in social cognition?
A: The ID helps in recognizing others’ goals and desires, enabling us to understand their intentions and actions based on what they want to achieve.
Card 7: Shared Attention Module (SAM)
Q: How does the Shared Attention Module (SAM) contribute to mindreading?
A: The SAM helps identify when two individuals are attending to the same event or object, facilitating joint attention and shared understanding.
Card 8: Mindreading Development in Children
Q: How does mindreading develop in children?
A: Mindreading develops as children grow, enabling them to attribute mental states to others. However, children with autism may experience delays in developing this ability.
Card 10: Social Implications of Mindreading
Q: Why is mindreading crucial for social interaction?
A: Mindreading allows individuals to predict others’ behaviors, understand intentions, and form meaningful social connections, which is essential for navigating social contexts.
Card 12: Theory of Mind vs. Mindreading
Q: What is the difference between Theory of Mind (ToM) and mindreading?
A: Theory of Mind refers to the understanding that others have beliefs and intentions different from one’s own, while mindreading is the ability to interpret and predict these mental states in other
Card 11: Social Cues in Mindreading
Q: What role do social cues (such as gaze) play in mindreading?
A: Social cues, like eye gaze, provide important information about others’ focus and intentions, allowing individuals to adjust their behavior and responses accordingly.
Card 1: Intentionality Detector (ID)
Q: What is the function of the Intentionality Detector (ID)?
A: The ID is a perceptual mechanism that interprets self-propelled motion (e.g., animals moving) in terms of their desires and goals (e.g., a cat chasing a mouse).
Card 2: Eye Direction Detector (EDD)
Q: What does the Eye Direction Detector (EDD) do?
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A: The EDD detects the presence of eyes or eye-like stimuli, computes gaze direction, and attributes the mental state of “seeing” to an agent whose eyes are focused on another object or person
Card 3: Shared Attention Module (SAM)
Q: What is the role of the Shared Attention Module (SAM)?
A: SAM identifies when the self and another person are attending to the same object or event, enabling joint attention, which is critical for social interactions.
Card 4: Theory of Mind (ToM)
Q: What is Theory of Mind (ToM)?
A: ToM is the ability to infer a wide range of mental states (beliefs, desires, intentions) from observable behavior, allowing us to explain and predict others’ actions.
Card 5: Development of Mindreading Mechanisms
Q: At what age do the main components of the mindreading system begin to develop?
A:
Eye Direction Detector (EDD) begins around 9 months.
Shared Attention Module (SAM) develops between 9-18 months.
Card 1: Objective of Friesen and Kingston (1998) Study
Q: What was the main objective of Friesen and Kingston’s (1998) study on eye gaze and attention?
A: The objective was to investigate whether eye gaze shifts attention and how gaze direction affects reaction times in detecting, localizing, and identifying targets.
Card 2: Experiment Design - Stimuli
Q: What stimuli were used in Friesen and Kingston’s (1998) study?
A: Cartoon faces with eyes pointing left, right, or straight ahead were presented on a computer screen. Targets appeared randomly to the left or right, unrelated to the gaze direction.
Card 3: Tasks in the Study
Q: What were the tasks participants performed in the Friesen and Kingston (1998) study?
A:
Detection Task: Detecting the presence of a target letter.
Localization Task: Localizing the position of the target (left or right).
Identification Task: Identifying whether the target letter was F or T.
Card 4: SOA Conditions in the Study
Q: What were the different cue-to-target delays (SOA) used in the study?
A:
105 msec
300 msec
600 msec
1005 msec
These different delays helped to examine how eye gaze shifts influenced attention over time.
Card 1: Reaction Time (RT) Results
Q: What were the key results regarding reaction times (RTs) in Friesen and Kingston’s (1998) study?
A: RTs were faster on cued trials (when gaze direction matched the target location) than on neutral or uncued trials. RTs slowed down as the cue-target interval (SOA) increased.
Card 2: Conclusion of the Study
Q: What was the conclusion of Friesen and Kingston’s (1998) study regarding gaze direction?
A: The study concluded that gaze direction shifts covert attention and improves performance in tasks like detection, localization, and identification.
Card 1: Experiment Setup
Q: What were the conditions in Driver et al.’s (1999) study on gaze and reflexive attention?
A: Photos of real faces with eyes pointing left, right, or straight ahead were used. In non-predictive trials, gaze direction was 50:50 valid/invalid, and in counter-predictive trials, the target appeared in the gazed-at location only 20% of the time.
Card 2: Key Findings
Q: What were the key findings of Driver et al.’s (1999) study on gaze direction?
A: RTs were faster for congruent gazed-at targets, even when gaze was counter-predictive (20% valid). This demonstrates that eye-gaze automatically triggers attention shifts.
Card 3: Conclusion
Q: What did Driver et al. (1999) conclude about eye-gaze and attention?
A: Eye-gaze produces an automatic reflexive shift of attention, unaffected by learned expectations of target location.
Card 2: Experiment Stimuli
Q: What stimuli were used in Driver et al.’s (1999) study?
A: Photos of real faces with eyes pointing left, right, or straight ahead (neutral).
Card 3: Congruent vs. Incongruent Trials
Q: What are congruent and incongruent gaze trials in Driver et al.’s study?
A:
Congruent (valid): Gaze direction matched the target location.
Incongruent (invalid): Gaze direction pointed away from the target location.
Card 4: Non-Predictive Condition
Q: What was the gaze-target relationship in the non-predictive condition?
A: Gaze direction was non-predictive, with a 50:50 chance of being valid or invalid.
Card 5: Counter-Predictive Condition
Q: What was the setup for the counter-predictive condition?
A: Gaze direction was valid only 20% of the time and invalid 80% of the time.
Card 6: Key Results - Non-Predictive Trials
Q: What were the results in the non-predictive condition?
A: Reaction times (RTs) were faster for congruent gazed-at targets, indicating reflexive attention shifts.
Card 7: Key Results - Counter-Predictive Trials
Q: What were the results in the counter-predictive condition?
A: RTs were still faster for congruent gazed-at targets, even though subjects knew the target was more likely elsewhere.
Card 8: Conclusion on Eye-Gaze
Q: What did Driver et al. (1999) conclude about the role of eye-gaze in attention?
A: Eye-gaze triggers an automatic reflexive shift of attention, unaffected by learned probabilities.
Card 9: Importance of Eye-Gaze in Social Attention
Q: Why is eye-gaze important for social attention?
A: It conveys what people are thinking, feeling, and intending, and helps facilitate social understanding by guiding attention.
Card 10: Reflexive Orienting by Gaze
Q: What happens when gaze direction is observed?
A: It produces an automatic orienting response that shifts attention to the gazed-at location.
Card 11: Implications of Reflexive Gaze Shifts
Q: Why is the automatic shift of attention to gaze direction significant?
A: It demonstrates the power of social cues in guiding attention, even when they contradict learned expectations.
Card 1: Emotional Impact on Gaze Cueing
Q: What was the main finding of Tipples (2006) regarding fearful faces?
A: Fearful faces produced a larger cueing effect (26 ms) compared to neutral faces (15 ms), showing that fear enhances attention shifts.
Card 2: Reflexive Shifts of Attention
Q: What did Kuhn & Kingstone (2009) find about eye-gaze and arrow cues?
A: Both cues cause automatic reflexive shifts of attention.
Card 3: Social vs. Non-Social Cues
Q: How do social and non-social cues differ in their effects?
A: Social cues (like eye-gaze) differ from non-social cues (like arrows) in complex environments, where social cues have a unique impact.
Card 4: Relevance of Fearful Expressions
Q: Why are fearful expressions significant in attention studies?
A: They amplify reflexive attention shifts, showing that emotional context influences how cues are processed.
Card 5: Practical Implications of Gaze Studies
Q: Why is studying gaze and attention important?
A: It provides insights into how social and emotional cues guide attention, with implications for understanding social interactions and disorders.
Card 1: Study Design - Tipper et al. (2008)
Q: What cues were used in Tipper et al. (2008)’s study, and how were participants instructed?
A: Ambiguous arrow/eye-gaze cues were used. Participants were periodically told to interpret the cues as either arrows or eyes, and the direction was not predictive of target location.
Card 2: Reaction Time Results
Q: What did Tipper et al. (2008) find regarding reaction times?
A: Reaction times were faster in the cued direction for both eyes and arrows, regardless of cue predictability.
Card 3: Neural Network Activation
Q: What neural networks were activated by eye-gaze and arrow cues in Tipper et al. (2008)?
A: Both cues activated similar dorsal and ventral fronto-parietal regions, with larger responses in some frontal areas for eye-gaze cues.
Card 4: Social Cues and Brain Networks
Q: Do social cues (like eye-gaze) involve a unique brain network?
A: No, social cues do not involve a unique brain network but may amplify responses in specific frontal regions.
