Social neuroscience Flashcards
Social skills are especially developed in ___.
Humans
SCN (Social Cognitive Neuroscience) investigates interactions across which 3 levels?
Social (motivational & social factors), cognitive (info processing mechanisms which give rise to social factors) & neural (brain mechanisms which give rise to cognitive level processes)
Cognitive psychology offers ___ ___ for integrating work in social psychology & neuroscience, though SCN provides a ___ scope of study than ___ psychology
Common ground. Narrower. Social
Who founded SCN & when?
Ochsner & Lieberman (2001)
Give 4 things which neuroscience can help social cognition research achieve
1) Clearer & simpler understanding of complex functions by identifying where & how X is achieved in the brain, 2) do similar mechanisms underlie different social phenomena?, 3) The dissociation of social phenomena into their constituent functions, 4) Determine the contribution of automatic vs. controlled factors to social cognition
SCN may also answer questions regarding ___ vs. ___. There is supposedly no attempt to unveil “___ ___” in the brain
Nature vs. nurture. Social modules
A pole shot through the __ ___ & ___ PFC of Phineas Gage’s brain. At the time most people attributed his personality change to…rather than…
Left orbital & medial. To the psychological trauma of the event rather than the brain damage resulting from the accident
Before the FFA was named the FFA, other researchers had found it to be specialised for processing faces e.g. Nobre who believes that…
the FFA may begin processing stimuli of expertise in an holistic manner but with age it becomes face tuned = an interesting H1 to suggest :)
The ___ ___ sulcus is lined with areas which are activated by social stimuli e.g. ___ ___ & ___ ___
Superior temporal. Biological motion & eye gaze
What did Phelps (2000) find re: social factors which influence face perception & the brain?
1) The amygdala was activated more by racial OG faces than IG faces. 2) That the difference between amygdala activity for white vs. black faces was correlated with the size of the IAT effect - but not for faces of famous black men & 3) That the startle eyeblink response was larger when viewing black (vs. white) faces
What did Walker (2000) find regarding the N170?
The N170 is an ERP component found when viewing faces. It is larger when viewing black OG faces & this effect is not due to the contrast or colour of these faces. The enlargement of N170 is moderated by outgroup contact & reflects reduced configural processing (tested by presenting upside down faces)
Where are mirror neurons found? What do these neurons do normally vs. as mirror neurons?
(Anterior) ventral premotor cortex (PMv) or area F5 of the macaque. Control goal-directed motor acts of the hand & mouth e.g. grasping vs. when another person is observed performing this action
Mirror neurons constitute one category of visuomotor neurons. The other type of visuomotor neurons fire to what?
Objects which afford a given action
Mirror neurons have also been discovered in the ___ ___ area. Mirror neurons are active even when…(2 things) demonstrating that they code for the end goal rather than action mechanics
Posterior parietal. 1) The final critical portion of an action is occluded from view & 2) The animal only hears the sounds associated with an action
Mirror neurons may enable action understanding and so ___ ___
Intentional attunement (tuning to a person’s intentions)
The same F5 mirror neurons fire when an animal must achieve goal A by…vs….& so…(Umilta, 2008)
Using pliers vs. reverse pliers & so completely different movements
Why is it difficult to determine whether or not mirror neurons exist in humans?
Because our reliance on imaging techniques of low spatial resolution means that the exact same cells may not be active during action & observation but just a population of intermingled cells
What is the chameleon effect? What function does it serve?
The tendency for two people to mimic each other’s postures, mannerisms & facial expressions when they interact. To smoothen interaction, increase partner liking & increase prosocial behaviour even in unrelated situations
Kilner (2003) found that observing humans (but not…. Similarly, Oberman (2007) found that preventing the use of facial muscles…
robots) performing an action interferes with our ability to perform an incongruent action (to that which the other person is performing). Interferes with the recognition of emotions which we use that particular muscle to express
The chamaleon effect, incongruent action effect & emotion muscle effect suggest from a non-neural perspective that…
Humans depend on mirror neurons, which may work only when observing other humans act
___ ___ parietal cortex as well as PMv was active during the execution and observation of the same action in humans
Anterior inferior (AIP)
Buccino (2001) found ___ activations of PMc & parietal areas when viewing actions. The latter was found only for…
Somatotopic. Transitive actions i.e. those directed towards others
Given that Broca’s area is in & around left ventral premotor cortex, we might suspect that the…. TSB Fadiga (2002) who found that listening…
Action-mirroring system is implicated in language perception. To speech increased motor evoked potentials recorded from the listener’s tongue muscles when presented with words which recruited the tongue in production
