Week 9 Flashcards
Instincts
unlearned patterns of behaviour – biologically determined, not learned (e.g., babies crying/suckling, seeking out sexual partners)
Instincts provide the energy that channels behaviour in appropriate direction
Issues with instinct approaches
- Psychologists do not agree on what, or even how many,
primary instincts exist - Does not clearly explain why one specific pattern of
behaviour, and not others, has appeared in a given species - Due to how much of the variety and complexity of
human behaviour is learned, behaviour cannot be seen as instinctual.
What is drive reduction approach
Behaviour motivated by need to reduce internal tension caused by unmet biological needs
What is drive
motivational tension, arousal that energizes behaviour to fulfill a
need
What is negative feedback
unpleasant feeling until need is met
What are primary and secondary drives
Primary drives: drives related to biological needs
* Hunger
* Thirst
* Sleep
Secondary drives: are those that prior experience and learning bring about needs
* Knowledge
* Financial well-being
* Personal achievement
Challenges with drive reduction
- Overemphasizes biological needs (primary drives)
- Doesn’t account for nonhomeostatic behaviours
- E.g., curiosity or thrill-seeking
behaviours that increase
tension/arousal
Maslows hierarchy of needs
- Primary needs must be satisfied before higher order needs
- Base has basic needs (e.g., food, water) – fundamental to survive E.g., students perform better when basic needs are met!
- Sequential progression
- Intuitive, but difficult to falsify
- However there are times where people purposelly put their secondary needs before their primary ones
Incentive approach
- Motivation stems from desire to obtain valued external goals or incentives
- Desirable properties of external stimuli (e.g., grades, money, affection) account for individual’s motivations
- Explains why we may succumb to incentive (e.g., dessert) even though we lack internal cues (e.g., hunger)
Arousal approaches
- We strive to maintain certain levels of stimulation & activity, increasing or reducing as necessary People vary in optimal levels of
arousal - E.g., someone who loves extreme sports vs. someone
who loves calm activities
Overjustification effect
Occurs when providing excessive external rewards for an activity that is already intrinsically motivating leads to a reduction in intrinsic motivation
Motivation
people’s thoughts, expectations & goals (their cognitions)
Cognitive approach
Intrinsic motivation and extrinsic motivation
Intrinsic motivation: motivation driven by internal rewards or personal satisfaction (e.g., a physician working long hours because they love medicine)
Extrinsic motivation: motivation driven by external rewards or pressures (e.g., a physician working hard to make a lot of money)
Lepper, Greene & Nisbett
Lepper, Greene & Nisbett (1973)
* Preschoolers who enjoyed drawing either given (1) expected reward (2) unexpected reward (3) no reward
* Expected reward group showed significant decline in intrinsic motivation!
What are glucose levels monitored by ?
Biological basis of hunger
- Glucose levels monitored by hypothalamus (via weight set point?)
Biologoical basis of hunger
What would an injury to the hypothalamus cause (hunger)
Biological basis of hunger
- Injury to hypothalamus has radical consequences for eating behaviour
- Lateral hypothalamus (go)
- Ventromedial hypothalamus (stop
Biological basis of hunger
Ghrelin, Leptin and insulin
hormones
Hormones
* Ghrelin– increases eating (reduced after gastric bypass)
* Leptin – produced by fat cells, signals satiety, reduces hunger
* Insulin – secreted by pancreas, regulates satiety & food intake
What happens when you have an empty stomach
sends signals to brain to stimulate hunger
What do stretch rectors do
Detect fullness & send satiety signals to brain
How does the brain reward system play a role in the biological basis of hunger
Reward system – dopamine!
* Brain’s reward system plays a role – especially for highly palatable foods – release of dopamine reinforces behaviours
Environmental & psychological influences (sight, smell,
stress, etc.)
What does ozempic do
Lower hunger drive: Mimics (enhances) GLP-1
hormone – naturally produced to help regulate
blood sugar & appetite
- GLP-1 receptors reduces hunger signals, feel
fuller for longer periods
Reduced cravings: Ozempic also dampens brain’s response to food-related cues – makes eating less rewarding or pleasurable
* Slows gastric emptying
Social/environmental factors on hunger
Biological factors alone do not explain our eating behaviours!
* Culturally learned preferences & habits
* When, what you eat, stress-eating, comfort foods, etc
* Social norms/societal rules
* Food-related cues (appearance, odour, effort required)
* Stress - link between heightened arousal/negative emotion & overeating
Culture & food: Philadelphia vs. Paris (Rozin et al., 2003)
Portions much larger in Philadelphia
* Mean portion sizes in restaurants: 25% larger
* Mean item sizes (e.g., candy bar) 41% bigger
* Mean portion sizes in cookbooks
Time spent in MacDonalds
* Philly M=14.4 min
* Paris M=22.2 min
Americans 3x more likely to be obese than
French!
Eating in italy
- Limited take-out options
- Social norm is to stop and have your coffee – no rushing!
- Eating as social
- Antipasto/primo/secondo/aperitivo
- Certain foods/beverages reserved
for the specific times - Weekly markets, focus on in season
foods
Culture & hunger motivation
Social contexts, Group dynamics, Body ideals, Cultural norms, Emo eating
- Social Contexts: Hunger is influenced by psychological and social factors, including emotional fulfillment and societal norms.
- Group Dynamics: People eat more in social settings; meals with others can be up to 96% larger than eating alone.
- Body Ideals:Western media has shifted cultural preferences, influencing eating behaviors and body image.
- Cultural Norms: Collectivist cultures prioritize group norms over individual food choices, especially in social settings.
- Emotional Eating: Emotional states and cultural attitudes shape eating behaviors; some cultures link negative emotions to overeating.
Why the rapid increase in obesity
Adult obesity in Canada almost doubled from 1978 to 2005-over 63% of Canadians over 18 are overweight (almost ¼ at BMI cutoff for obesity
- Abundance of low-cost, varied high fat meals
- Habit of eating high calorie food on the run
- Rise in energy saving devices (cars, remotes)
- Types of leisure activities
- Canadians on average spend more time in cars than outdoors
Need for achievements
Social motives
Need for achievement: desire to accomplish goals by setting high standards and striving to meet them
* Seek out situations where they can compete – avoid unchallenging situations
* Low need for achievement – motivated by a desire to avoid failure
Need for affiliation
social motives
Need for affiliation: desire to have positive interactions with others and be in close, friendly relationships
Emotions
- Mental states or feelings associated with our evaluation of our experiences
- State of arousal involving facial & body changes, brain activation, cognitive appraisals, subjective feelings, and tendencies toward action
- All shaped by cultural rules
Cognitive component (subjective conscious experience)
Physiological component (bodily arousal)
Behavioural component (overt expressions)
What does the amygdala do
The amygdala links sensory input (like odours & facial expressions) to emotional and behavioural responses
What is dangerous for driving
chamomile, jasmine & lavender (too relaxed),
fast food wrappers, fresh bread, pastries (too hungry and in a rush!), fresh-cut grass, pine, flowers (memory lane, daydreaming & distracted!), leather (nostalgia), certain perfumes & aftershave (sexy thoughts?)
What is best for driving
Best: peppermint, cinnamon, lemon, coffee (improve concentration), new car smell (more cautious, improves concentration), sea ozone (relieve stess, calm)
Function of emotions
- Prepare us for action: act as a link between events in our environment and our responses
- Shape our future behaviour: act as reinforcement or punishment
- Help us to interact more effectively with others: act as a signal to observers, allowing them to better understand what we are experiencing and predict our future behaviour
What would basic emotions include
- Most researchers agree that basic emotions would include, at minimum, happiness, anger, fear, sadness & disgust
What did darwin believe about human emotional expression
- Darwin believed human emotional expression was shaped through evolution
Primary emotions
- Paul Ekman
- Pioneering work on facial expressions of
emotion - Six basic emotions recognized worldwide
- Biologically hardwired, not learned
- Also did work on microexpressions
These primary emotions are:
Happiness
Sadness
Fear
Anger
Surprise
Disgust
Ekman’s research showed that these emotions are biologically hardwired into humans and not merely learned through culture. This was groundbreaking because it suggested that emotional expressions are a universal language shared by all humans, transcending cultural differences.
What are microexpressions
- Occur in a fraction of a second
- Can they reveal a lie? Debated in literature
- What they want to show vs. what they want to concea
What is liar’s stereotype
- Liar’s stereotype – belief that when people lie, they show facial specific facial and behavioural cues
- Gaze aversion
- Raised eyebrows
- Pursued lips
- Etc.
Microexpressions (Ekman)
Paul Ekman’s insights into microexpressions are indeed fascinating. Here are a few key points from his research, as mentioned on his website:
Often Misinterpreted or Missed Altogether: Microexpressions are so brief that they can be easily overlooked or misunderstood, even by those with training.
Occur in 1/2 a Second or Less: These expressions happen incredibly quickly, often lasting just a fraction of a second.
Unconsciously Display a Concealed Emotion: They reveal emotions that a person might be trying to hide, providing a glimpse into their true feelings.
False expressions (Ekman)
Ekman’s work on false expressions sheds light on how emotional expressions can be manipulated to conceal true feelings. Here are some key insights from his research:
Falsified Emotional Expressions: People can fake their emotions to hide what they really feel. This can happen for various reasons, such as social niceties or intentional deception.
Asymmetrical Expressions: One hallmark of faked emotions is asymmetry. Genuine emotional expressions tend to be more symmetrical, involving both sides of the face equally.
Forehead Clues: The absence of forehead expressions can be a telltale sign of falsified emotions. For instance, if someone is pretending to feel fear or sadness, their forehead might not show the expected wrinkles or tension.
Gestural slip
A gestural slip is an unintended physical gesture that reveals a person’s true emotions, despite their efforts to conceal them.
Unilateral contempt
Indicate arrogance or feeling of moral superiority
Microfear
Effort to conceal fearfulness
Culture & emotions
Culture influences what people feel angry, sad, lonely, happy, ashamed, or disgusted about and how they express them
Theories of emotion
- James-Lange theory
- Cannon-Bard Theory
- Schacter-Singer two-factory theory
Capilano bridge study
the study involved an attractive female experimenter approaching single men who were crossing either a high, scary suspension bridge or a low, stable bridge.
The findings were fascinating:
Men on the scary bridge included more sexual content in their interviews.
They were also four times more likely to call the researcher afterward.
The study suggested that people are not always good at distinguishing between physical sensations associated with fear and those associated with sexual arousal. The heightened arousal from the fear of crossing the bridge was misattributed to attraction to the experimenter.
James Lange Theory : body 1st, emotion 2nd
- Your body reacts to something, then you feel the emotion based on that reaction
- Bodily events are interpreted by brain as emotional experiences
- We can influence our subjective feelings via physical sensations (e.g., Haka, “psyching up”)
Cannon-Bard Theory: body & emotion together
We experience emotions & physiological reactions simultaneously
* Physical reactions not dependent on emotions, or vice versa
* Event leads to thalamus transmitting signals to amygdala & autonomic nervous system, resulting in physical reactions
* A person’s cognitive assessment of an emotional situation work independently of any physical sensations that might occur (like the bridge study!)
Schachter-Singer Two Factory Theory: body + brain = emotion
Emotions arise from two factors:
* Physiological arousal
* Cognitive interpretation (labeling)
* General arousal leads to assessment, which it turn leads to subjective feelings
* Bridge study – male ps assessed their circumstances & attributed to sexual attraction
Facial feedback hypothesis
- Facial muscles send messages to brain about emotion being expressed
Strack et al., 1988
* IV pencil between lips or teeth
* DV cartoon funniness
Wagenmakers et al., 2016
* Failure to replicate in 17 studies!
Botox & reading emotions
Botox – prevents wrinkles via paralyzing muscles (also used for migraines, TMJ, etc)
* IV: treatment (botox, dermal filler)
* DV: identification of emotions
Results:
* Ps treated with botox performed
worse than filler group at correctly
identifying emotions
Theory of constructed emotion
Lisa Feldman Barrett (Canadian!)
* Emotions are concepts constructed by our
brains
* Our brains interpret our patterns of bodily
sensations as a particular emotion based on previous experiences (concepts) of emotion and the culture we live in
E.g., Imagine two people attending the same wedding:
Happiness according to the experts
- Mastery
- Being able to cause positive events, and be successful at them
- Many minor pleasures (vs. one intense thrill)
- Extraversion, self-esteem, individualism correlate with happiness
- Physical attractiveness & intelligence only weakly correlated
- Acting happy, seeking work & leisure that are engaging
- Close relationships, interdependence
- Maintaining short-term & long-term goals
- Healthy bodies, productive jobs, peace of mind, family & friends
