Unit 3 Flashcards
Categorization (categorical perception)
abrupt change in perception across the boundary (better at telling apart sounds that fall on either side of boundary than sounds on the same side)
Discrimination advantage
can tell differences in sound more easily across boundary than within boundary
Spoonerisms
an error in speech or deliberate play on words in which consonants
Syntax
the rules according to which words can be combined; does not require meaning
Mutual Exclusivity Assumption
“Hand me the mafer” - children ~15 months don’t know the word, so they hand over the unknown object. Reluctance to give known objects new names.
Taxonomic Assumption
New words trigger taxonomic, not thematic, relations.
Whole object assumption
Infants assume new words refer to entire objects; problems for learning object names.
Executive Functions
Higher cognitive functions that allow people to perform flexible, adaptive, goal-directed behaviors.
Rule
any distinct mapping between 2 or more stimuli and 2 more more responses
Lateral Prefrontal Cortex
rule guided behavior, working memory, organization and planning
Ventromedial Prefrontal Cortex
emotion processing, motivation and reward
Perseveration Errors
repeatedly performing an action/strategy when it is no longer correct. (Ray-Lin and sorting task in video)
Prepotent Response
Responses that are fast and automatic, because they are highly overlearned or rewarded in the past.
Anterior Cingulate Cortex
May serve to detect one’s own errors. Sensitive to response conflict
Apraxia
impaired ability to perform single actions (severe), multiple action sequences (less severe). Results from damage to premotor cortex or parietal lobe.
Utilization behavior
Prefrontal damage. Inability to inhibit prepotent responses to use an object; action is appropriate for the object, inappropriate for the context
Alien Hand Syndrome
o Typically results from damage to supplementary motor area (SMA)
o Lesions of anterior corpus callosum (unintended behavior by non-dominant hand)
o Lesions of supplementary motor area (unintended behavior often by dominant hand)
Fitness
measured by likelihood that a gene, trait or behavior will be represented in future generations
Adaptation
an evolutionary process that selects some features of an organism, to improve fitness in the relevant environment
Exaptation
A characteristic, previously shaped by natural selection for one function (an adaptation), is coopted for a new use – (e.g., feathers for warmth or flight, hand vs. bat wing)
Homology
a structure, behavior or gene that has been retained from a common ancestor
Homoplasy
structures that look similar but do not come from a common ancestral origin, due to convergent evolution (e.g., bat wing and fly wing)
Theory of Mind
The ability to know and represent another’s mental state including their beliefs, goals, intentions, and emotional states
Components of emotion
Physiological arousal, expressive behaviors, and conscious experience
James-Lange Theory of Emotion
Experience of emotion results from awareness of autonomic physiological responses to emotion-arousing stimuli.
Cannon-Bard Theory of Emotion
Emotion-arousing stimuli simultaneously trigger physiological responses and subjective experience of emotion. (Cats sham rage experiment)
Schachter’s Two-Factor Theory of Emotion
Emotional experience requires both physiological arousal
and cognitive label of aroused state.
Zygomatic Muscle
Voluntary component of smiles, muscle in cheeks.
Orbicularis muscle
Involuntary component of smiles, muscle around eyes.
Kluver-Bucy Syndrome
Bilateral lesions of medial temporal cortex including amygdala. Led to unusual tameness and lack of fear, hypersexual behavior, impaired object recognition.
Patient S.M.
Bilateral amygdala damage; intact hippocampus. Impaired at recognizing fearful faces, experiences little/no fear.
implicit association test:
presumed to measure the strengths of automatic associations with categories. Based on response times in a classification task, involving two separate types categorical judgments.
Classical Conditioning
a conditioned stimulus is associated with reward (stimulus precedes response)
Operant Conditioning
if the action/response precedes delivery of reinforce, that response becomes more frequent (response precedes stimulus)
Mesolimbic Pathway Structures
Nucleus accumbens, ventral tegmental area, projects to the basal ganglia, striatum, frontal cortex.
Mesolimbic Pathway Functions
Reward/Salience Pleasure/Euphoria Motor function (fine tuning) Compulsion Perseveration
Ventral Tegmental Area
DA neurons encode a reward prediction error, reflecting the difference between expected reward and actual reward. Serves as a learning signal for the frontal lobe and basal ganglia.
Deficits from Orbitofrontal Damage
Change in personality Irresponsibility Lack of concern for present or future Reduced social awareness and empathy Lack of concern for social rules Impaired responses to emotional stimuli Sometimes leads to “Acquired sociopathy
Major functions of the Orbitofrontal cortex
Encoding the “hedonic value” of stimuli
Assigning learned values to stimuli based on their association with other +/- outcomes
Updating value of a stimulus based on experience
Ventromedial PFC input and connections
Activated by primary rewards
input: 5 senses, especially olfactory and taste
connect with amygdala, cingulate, insula, hippocampus
Ventrolateral PFC
Activated by secondary/cognitive rewards
Ventrolateral PFC damage
- difficulty “updating the value” of a stimulus or stimulus-response/perseveration (poor reversal learning)
- Impairments in social behavior
- Impaired extinction learning
Functions of DLPFC
- Cognitive regulation of emotional responses
2. Rational judgments and controlled rational behavior
Emotion related brain areas (ventromedial PFC, ACC, amygdala) are more active for
- Personal questions (pushing the man to save 5)
2. Non-utilitarian than utilitarian decisions
DLPFC is more active for
- Impersonal questions (problem about the switch)
2. Utilitarian decisions
William’s Syndrome
Low IQ (
Specific Language Impairment
– Disorder of gene FOXP2
– Normal intelligence and intact hearing
– Impaired speech and motor control, impaired
comprehension of complex syntax
– Impaired ability to repeat words and nonwords
Mental Lexicon
Stores all word-specific info
Relies on declarative, explicit memory system
Relies on temporal lobe structures
Rule-Based Grammar
System
Procedural knowledge of
grammar rules for syntax
and morphology
Relies on procedural/implicit memory system
Relies on prefrontal areas and basal ganglia
Broca’s Aphasia
Patients have difficulty speaking, even though
they can understand speech and can read
Agrammatism
problems with both producing and comprehending complex grammatical constructions,
especially function words
Anomia
problems with finding words
Articulation problems (dysarthria)
problems with pronunciation, slurred speech
Paraphasic Errors
production of unintended
syllables, words, or phrases during the effort to
speak
Wernicke’s Aphasia
- Can speak fluent, articulate gibberish with normal prosody
- Impaired language comprehension (Poor understanding of sentences/ words)
- Cannot convert thoughts into coherent words and sentences
Arcuate Fasciculus
Damage: conduction aphasia, impaired repetition (okay comprehension and speech production)
