Casey - Delay Of Gratification

Question 1

Background, “cognitive control”

Answer 1

Psychologist believes that we use cognitive control to create strategies that delay gratification

Question 2

Give an example of a cognitive strategy

Answer 2

Cooling- directing your attention away from a hot or appealing features and focusing on the cold or cognitive ones

Question 3

Aim 1

Answer 3

To see if children with low self control became adults with low self control

Question 4

Aim 2

Answer 4

To see if the inferior frontal gyrus and the ventral striatum are involved in delaying gratification

Question 5

What kind of study is this? What’s the problem with it?

Answer 5

Longitudinal, subject attrition

Question 6

Starting sample number

Answer 6

562 children

Question 7

How many adults between 20’s and 30’s completed the self report?

Answer 7

155 from the original sample

Question 8

Sample number and qualities of experiment 1

Answer 8

59…

23 males and 36 females

Question 9

Sample number and qualities for experiment 2

Answer 9

27…

13 males and 14 females

Question 10

What was the initial experiment?

Answer 10

Children got given a cookie and got told if they wait till tea time they can have another one

Question 10

How were they classified at low and hugh delayers in the initial experiment?

Answer 10

If they could wait they were high delayers,

If they couldn’t wait they were low delayers

Question 11

What were the 2 versions of the go/no-go tasks?

Answer 11

Hot and cool versions

Question 11

What was presented in both the versions?

Answer 11

Photos of people and they were given a ‘stimulus/go/target’ gender

Question 12

What did they have to do when they saw the target stimulus?

Answer 12

Press the button

Question 12

How many pictures were there per run?

Answer 12

160

Question 13

How many runs did each participant do?

Answer 13

4, 2x2 factorial design

Question 14

How did the hot version differ from the cool?

Answer 14

Some of the pictures had fearful and happy expressions

Question 15

What was the cool condition?

Answer 15

No emotion in pictures

Question 16

What were the results for the ‘go’ trails?

Answer 16

No difference between types of delayers

Question 18

What were the results for the ‘no-go’ trails?

Answer 18

The low delayers pressed the button more often that high delayers

Question 20

Was there any difference in performance between the hot and cool versions?

Answer 20

Low delayers were significantly poorer for the hot version of the task than the cool

Question 22

What do the results of the hot condition show?

Answer 22

When we see a happy face we associate it with ‘go’ so we want to press the button more. The low delayers found it hard to resist.

Question 23

Why were there hot and cool conditions?

Answer 23

To explore the influence of alluring social cues on delayers

Question 24

What was the aim of the second experiment?

Answer 24

To see brain activity whilst doing the hot condition using an fMRI scan

Question 25

Which parts of the brain were looked at?

Answer 25

Inferior frontal gurus and ventral striatum

Question 26

Which condition was the second experiment?

Answer 26

Hot

Question 27

What designs were the trails?

Answer 27

2 x 2 x 2

Question 28

Was there a difference between the go and no-go trails in exp.2?

Answer 28

All did better at go trails compared to the no-go trials

Question 29

What did the activity of the inferior frontal gyrus show?

Answer 29

It’s involved in accurately withholding a response

Question 30

Who used their inferior frontal gyrus more?

Answer 30

High delayers

Question 31

Who used their ventral striatum more?

Answer 31

Low delayers

Question 37

For how long were the photos up for?

Answer 37

500 milliseconds, with a 1 second interval

Question 38

Conclusion 1

Answer 38

Resistance to temptation appears to be a relatively stable individual characteristic over time

Question 39

Conclusion 2

Answer 39

Cognitive control can be strongly influenced by contextual factors