Social behavior Flashcards
Delay gratification
withholding from an immediate reward for the purpose of achieving a longer-term goal
stronger delay gratification is correlated to
with higher SAT scores, lower rates of obesity and substance use, etc
stronger delay gratification is related to which part of the brain
PFC development
Delay discounting
the diminishing value associated with an outcome that is temporally distant (e.g. in the future)
Frontal cortex can be divided up into three major regions
Motor/premotor
Paralimbic
Heteromodal
Paralimbic
associated with social behaviour, and includes the anterior cingulate and caudal orbitofrontal regions (which corresponds roughly with the vmPFC
Motor/premotor
involved in planning and organizing movements and actions
Heteromodal
a region that receives input from multiple sensory or multimodal areas
vmPFC damage is associated with what has been termed
psudopsycopathy’ and ‘acquired sociopathy’
It has been proposed that Theory of Mind (ToM) involves two essential steps
- Must represent another person as an individual
2. Must represent that person’s mental state
step two on ToM is sometimes referred to as mentalizing which involves
representations associated with thoughts, motivations, emotions, knowledge, etc. of another
what tests ToM
false belief test
ToM is sometimes taken as a
developmental milestone Abnormal ToM has been hypothesized to play a role in Autism
damage to the anterior paracingulate cortex can result in a variant of
Frontotemporal dimentia dementia involving a decline over control over social behaviour, decision making, and emotion
the anterior paracingulate cortex roughly corresponds to
medial PFC
temporoparetal junction (TPJ)
supports ToM
TPJ vs anterior paracingulate cortex
They found evidence that the TPJ is recruited for ToM judgments, while the anterior paracingulate cortex may get recruited for more general judgments involving mental state concepts
damage to the TPJ often results in
hemispatial neglect
Hemi neglect
characterized as a failureto attend to objects/information on one side of your visual field
Alternative Account of the TPJ
TPJ activity noted by others could be more generally explained as a result of a task requirement to break a current attentional set,
TMS in a control area
deliver actual stimulation to another region
Pro to TMS in a control area
actually controls for more generalized effects that might result from that kind of stimulation
Con to TMS in a control area
choice of where to stimulate is not always straightforward
Sham stimulation
create the illusion of delivering stimulation (e.g. simulate with sound, etc.)
Pro Sham stimulation
do not risk introducing a confound related to stimulating a different region
Con Sham stimulation
does not control for the possibility of more generalized effects that might result from any (non-specific) electrical stimulation of the cortex
Results from TMS stimulation of the TPJ
For trials in which there was malicious intent but no harm occurred, TPJ, applying TMS resulted in judgements that endorsed the notion that the protagonist was acting more permissibly In other words, the intentions of the protagonist no longer seemed to be factored in as heavily, while the outcome seemed to be more influential
TMS stimulation of the TPJ results suggest
that the TPJ might be particularly relevant when marking moral judgments in more ambiguous situations
Autism spectrum disorder and intention
ASD and controls made similar judgments in terms of intentional harm and accidental harm however ASD participants’ responses were less affected by (i.e. less sensitive to) information related to intention
Activation in the TPJ while judgement making for individuals with ASD and control
Higher activation in TPJ for controls making judgments involving accidental (rather than intentional) harm, but not in the ASD group
Experiential learning
based on direct experience (e.g. getting reinforced for a choice you make)
Observational learning
based on indirect experience (e.g. seeing someone else get reinforced for a choice they make
Action prediction error
gauges degree of mismatch between what the participant expected the confederate would do and what they actually did
Action prediction error is associated with
dorsolateral PFC
Reward prediction error
gauges degree of mismatch between the expected and delivered outcome
Reward prediction error assocaited with
ventral striatum
Observational outcome prediction error
gauges degree of mismatch between what the participant predicted the outcome would be for the confederate, as compared to what was delivered
Observational outcome prediction error associated with
vmPFC and the ventral striatum
insular cortex is related to
processing of both interpersonal and physical warmth emotional unconsciousness
Dorsal anterior cingulate cortex (dACC)
be activated, in step with degree of subjective feelings of reported social distress
physical-social pain overlap hypothesis
suggests that overlapping regions of the brain are associated with both physical and socially-based pain
