Cognitive - psychology applications

Question 1

What are the ‘7 sins of memory’?

Answer 1

1. Transcience (i.e forgetting, transient information)
2. Absentmindedness
3. Blocking (e.g tip of the tongue feeling)
4. Misattribution (e.g in eye witness identification)
5. Suggestibility
6. Bias
7. Persistance (e.g intrusive thoughts, rumination

TAB-MiS-BiP

Question 2

Are memory distortions unfortunate artifacts of an otherwise good sysmtem, or something we could do without?

DO they have a purpose?

Answer 2

Our cognitive operations must be flexible in order to imagine the future and reconsider the past.

in many cases they are functional/necessary.

e.g in promoting positive current self-image/identity (temporal self-appraisal theory)

Question 3

What are the two reasons (Discussed in class) that rely on/require our cogitive processes to be flexible?

Answer 3

1. Imagining the future
2. Reconsidering the past.

Question 4

What is autobiographical memory (AM) and what are the two kinds of autobiographical memory?

Answer 4

Memory across the lifespan

Specific events (episodic)

Self-related information (semantic)

Question 5

What are the three functions of the autobiographical memory?

Answer 5

1. Social - allow communication and bonding
2. Directive - guide thoughts and behaviour
3. Self - maintain a positive self-concept and promte continuity and growth - self-presentation and protection from adversity.

Question 6

What are some of the social functions of the autobiographical memory?

Answer 6

Responding to oppourtunity to share own story.

To give information about self.

Update people about current events in one’s life.

Question 7

What are some of the directive functions of the autobiographical memory?

Answer 7

Direct decision making.

Role in both mundane and important decision:

e.g what movie should i rent? what career should i pursue?

Question 8

What is the self function of the autobiographical memory?

Answer 8

Self-identity, we are what we remember (william joans)

Question 9

What is the ‘temporal self-appraisal theory?’

Answer 9

that people have a tendency to maintain a positive evaluation of the current self by distancing their self-concepts from their negative selves and paying more attention to their positive selves.

In addition, people have a tendency to perceive the past self less favorably (e.g., I’m better than I used to be) and the future self more positively (e.g., I will be better than I am now).

finally, we tend to view our failures as temporarily more distant, likely to consider our ‘worst grade’ as being further away temporaly

Question 10

in regards to ‘temporal self-appraisal theory?’

describe how we might determine whether their is actual self-improvement or just a biased feeling that one has gotten better and is getting better (hint: experiment)

Answer 10

Earlier selves that feel temporaly ‘closer’ are enhanced over earlier selves that feel temporaly ‘distant’

…even if it is the same actual time, this can be manipulated via framing/suggestion in experimentation

by saying ‘remember SO LONG AGO when you did X’ vs. ‘remeber not that long ago when you did X’

where ‘X’ is the same event or time-frame.

Question 11

Why do people tend to evaluate their most current selves (and furture selves) better then their past selves?

Answer 11

shield from blame, credit for achievements.

Positive self-evaluation is adaptive.

Question 12

Apply the theory of temporal self-appraisal to marital satisfaction.

Answer 12

Marital satisfaction actually decreases in early years. BUT people tend to consider their current-selves better then their past selves and thus underestimate their previous contentment - resulting in an illusion of improvement

Question 13

Does remembering emotions tend to be a constructive/reconstructive process (i.e explicit), or a automatic emotional response (i.e implicit).

Answer 13

Usually explicit/reconstructive, though implicit/automatic can occur in intrustions (e.g in PTSD)

Question 14

Are people better at remembering facts or emotions?

Answer 14

Facts, emotions tend to be poor/insconsistent and exaggerated.

Question 15

What factors influence (mis)remembering emotions?

Answer 15

• Current appraisal (appraise based on current feeling)
• Cultural beliefs (i.e what it would or would not be appropriate to feel at certain times/events)
• Individual characteristics
• Emotion regulation stratergy
• Expectations (what one expects to feel in certain situations/events)
• Peak and end rule

Question 16

What is the ‘peak’ and ‘end’ rule of remembering emotional or physical pain?

Answer 16

When the ‘peak’ (i.e height) of the pain and the final moments at the end of the painful experience are the most influential parts in the memory of the pain.

E.g

2 groups of study participants are asked to put there hand in ice-water for 5 minutes.

One group gets an extra 30 seconds of hand in the ice-water, but during this time the water is warmed slightly

The group who spent longer in the ice-water is likely to report it as overall less painfull then the other group because the end was less painful, even though overall they would have experienced more total pain (owing to having their hand in cold wter longer.)

Question 17

Why is it good to be able to remember emotions? (i.e its functional features)

Answer 17

• Summarise significance of past event (e.g recommending a book without remembering specific detail)
• Guide decision making
• transmit culture.

Question 18

Why might it be good to forget emotional memories? (i.e what would it be maladaptive to remember)

Answer 18

• Earlier suicidal thoughts
• good current functioning predicted by poor recall of (high) pre-therapy distress
• People who remember how bad they reacted to a trauma later down the track usually have the worse symptoms/adapting

Question 19

What is the ideal/most adaptive shape of remembering and then misremembering emotion? (i.e ideally when should one remember and one forget emotions?)

Answer 19

The ideal functioning of remembering and misremembering emotions should be such as to minimise negative emotions.

Remembering emotions is good when an related issue is unresolved or the emotion is ‘fresh’ because it leads to goal-directed behaviour (toward resolving the problem or react better in the future) and mobalise appropriate coping resources.

when the memories are no longer ‘needed’ for these ends, then the better cognitive distortion to have are forgetting ones e.g positive illusions of growth (as in temporal self-appraisal theory)

Question 20

What is the ‘fading-affect-bias’?

Answer 20

Affective intensity of positive memories fade more slowly.

Question 21

In healthy people, how do memory distortions/bias promote self-enhancement? (e.g positive over negative)

Answer 21

• Fading affective bias: affective intensity of positive memories fade more slowly
• faster recall of positive memories
• recall more positive life experiences
• Detailed recall of positive memories

Question 22

Memory distortions serve to promote self-enhancement in healthy functioning people, when does it go wrong?

Answer 22

• PTSD
• Deppression
• Overgeneral memory
• Negative memory bias

Question 23

What unhealthy cognitive memory distortions arise from PTSD?

Answer 23

Intrusive remembering (Distress and vividness)

e.g nightmares, flashbacks and ‘re-experiencing’

Question 24

What unhealthy cognitive memory distortions arise from Deppression?

Answer 24

Rumination - repetitive but passive thinking about current depression symptoms and their causes, meaning and consequences

Associated with the onset and maintenance of deppression.

Question 25

What unhealthy cognitive memory distortions arise from Overgeneral memory?

Answer 25

Not good at remembering specific memories. leading to deficits in problem solving and imagining future. e.g (happy experience) "watching the sunset last thursday with X" vs. " I have never been happy"

Question 26

What unhealthy cognitive memory distortions arise from Negative Memory Bias? What is the Differential activiation hypothesis?

Answer 26

Tendency to preferentially recall negative information resulting in sad mood. Often with the emotional regulation stratergy of rumination. The Differential activiation hypothesis is: * sad mood activates negative thought * Cyclic effect among vulnerable people (i.e negative thought then causes sad mood)

Question 27

What are the legal and ethical implications of using drugs like propranolol to dampen emotional memories? adrenaline (improve encoding memory) adregenic (i.e inhibitors) reduce memory.

Answer 27

\*\*just think about it - no confidence rating\*\*

Question 28

People with deppression tend to be poor at processing positive information. in what particular ways are they poor at this?

Answer 28

* Poor at mood repair using positive memories * Poor ability to vividly imagine future positve events * Poor at recalling vantage point.

Question 29

Health behaviour is influenced by cognitive factors as well as demographic factors - what demographic factors influence health behaviour?

Answer 29

* Gender * Age * SES * Ethnicity

Question 30

What are barriers to good health behaviour?

Answer 30

* When there is no immediate effect of bad health behaviour * Enjoyment of competing bad behaviour (e.g smoking) * Lack of resourses * The degree of effort it would take * Fear --\> denial

Question 31

What three models seek to explain the role of attitudes and beliefs in the acquisition of health behaviours?

Answer 31

1. Health belief model 2. Theory of reasoned action 3. Theory of planned behaviour

Question 32

How does the "health belief model" explain the role of attitudes and beliefs in the acquisition of health behaviours? What is the limitation to this model?

Answer 32

Health behaviour = Degree of perceived health threat: general values, vulnerability and severity Versus. + Belief that a health behaviour will reduce that threat: probability, cost/benefit Limitation: does not consider what other people thing, societal pressures. Assumes ppl make rational choices.

Question 33

How does the "Theory of Reasoned action" explain the role of attitudes and beliefs in the acquisition of health behaviours? ## Footnote (Fishbein & Ajzen) What is the limitation to this model?

Answer 33

Norms + attitudes ----\> intentions ----\>behaviour Limitations: * Assumes the link between intention and behaviour. Assumes ppl make rational choices. * Assumes people use information they have about health in health decisions * Focus on individuals (e.g what if one is trying to lose weight, but their partner keeps buying cakes)

Question 34

How does the "Theory of Planned Behaviour" explain the role of attitudes and beliefs in the acquisition of health behaviours? ## Footnote How does it differ from the "Theory of Reasoned Action' model?

Answer 34

Norms + attitudes ------\> intentions + percieved control ----\> behaviour Remedies the link between intention and behaviour that suggests that percieved control influences the actual enacting of a behaviour.

Question 35

What types of people/situation are people more likely to seek health help? (help-seeking behaviour = recognising/intepreting health problems, likelihood of seeking health help)

Answer 35

* Psychological states (e.g anxiety/deppressed who are more aware of physical problems) * Mood (state) and self-reported health * Emotional reaction - more emotion = seeking health (e.g panic over a mole) * High health service uses (hyperchondriacs) * Expectations (e.g ideas about what would happen during a heart attack)

Question 36

How does perception of an illness's 'cause' affect health behaviour or beliefs/attitudes about the illness?

Answer 36

What kind of treatments wanted/used e.g if you think poor eating caused the illness, then you might want a dietary treatment.

Question 37

How does perception of an illness's 'symptoms' affect health behaviour or beliefs/attitudes about the illness?

Answer 37

What you think the symptoms of the illness are/should be, expectations.

Question 38

How does perception of an illness's 'timeline' affect health behaviour or beliefs/attitudes about the illness?

Answer 38

How long is the illness supposed to last, what is it's time course.

Question 39

How does perception of an illness's 'treatment' affect health behaviour or beliefs/attitudes about the illness?

Answer 39

What is the treatment, what do you think about the treatment

Question 40

How does perception of an illness's 'consequence' affect health behaviour or beliefs/attitudes about the illness?

Answer 40

what do you think the consequences of the illness will be.

Question 41

How does one's perception of an illness's symptoms, cause, timeline, treatment and consequences impact on their cogntiion and behaviour?

Answer 41

* Behavioural/lifestyle change * Emotional response * Treatment selection, engagement and adherance * Returnin to work, social and recreational activity.

Question 42

What is a Heuristic?

Answer 42

a mental shortcut

Question 43

What heuristics/bias influence the making of health decisions?

Answer 43

Representative heuristic Availability heuristic false consensus bias confirmation bia risk assessment (optimism vs. pessimism

Question 44

What is the representatieness heuristic and how does it influence health decisions?

Answer 44

The degree to wich an event is similar in essential characteristics to it's parent population. Can resilt in neglect of relevant base rates. might represents the stereotype you have about something like a pain etc. e.g that's just my period pain, when it could be something else. Example: Robert is a male from USA who is quiet, reads books and wears glasses - is he more likely a farmer or librarian? He represents a libarian - but is more likely to be a farmer on sheer numbers.

Question 45

What is the availability heuristics?

Answer 45

How easy something is to recall/think of is taken to mean it is more common or a higher probability. (Recalling many attributes or generating many reasons is more diYcult than recalling or generating only a few)

Question 46

What is false consensus bias? how does it affect health decisions?

Answer 46

The idea that 'lots of other people do it' e.g in deciding whether or not to stop smoking, might justify their smoking behavour by exaggerating the commonality/agreement of other people as smokers.

Question 47

How does whether one has a optimistic or pessimistic risk assessment strategy affect health decisions? draw a grid of percieved risk and actual risk to show pessimistic and optimistic bias. What is more common?

Answer 47

Whether or not they think something bad will happen to them. LOW ---------------------------HIGH LOW Accurate perception Optimism bias HIGH Pessimism bias Accurate perception Optimism bias is more common.

Question 48

What is confirmation bias?

Answer 48

looking for information that supports a preconcieved notion. (e.g medical student disease, mass psychogenic illness)

Question 49

Is it a good idea to 'dispell myths' by confronting people with 'contradictory evidence'when promoting health behaviour?

Answer 49

No, it is a bad idea, because later down the track people often remeber the things said to be myths - as true. i.e rumour transmission

Question 50

What i declarative information? Whatis experiental information? How do the two interplay in people's judgements/decisions?

Answer 50

what people think about, and on the inference rules they apply to accessible thought content. Human reasoning is accompanied by a variety of metacognitive experiences, which provide experiential information that people systematically use in forming a judgment. These experiences qualify the implications of accessible declara- tive information, with the result that we can only accurately predict people’s judgments by taking the interplay of declarative and experiential informa- tion into account

Question 51

What is processing fluency? Two parts: What is perceptual fluency? what is ceonceptual fluency?

Answer 51

Processing fluency refers to the ease or diYculty with which new, external information can be processed. Variables like figure–ground contrast, presen- tation duration, or the amount of previous exposure to the stimulus aVect the speed and accuracy of low‐level processes concerned with the identifi- cation of a stimulus’ physical identity and form; they influence **percep- tual fluency** Variables like the consistency between the stimulus and its context or the availability of appropriate mental concepts for stimulus classification aVect the speed and accuracy of high‐level processes concerned with the identification of stimulus meaning and its relation to semantic knowledge structures; they influence **conceptu- al fluency**

Question 52

When the subjective acessibility experience (one's metacognitions) is discredited OR when recall or thought generation is experienced as easy. what kind of judgement do people make?

Answer 52

Content congruent judgements. Based on declarative information.

Question 53

how does confidence about success change as a challenge draws nearer ? (e.g an exam, or how much one will get paid outside uni)

Answer 53

people are overconfident about their future success at a distance, but become more realistic as the moment of truth approaches. These diVerences presumably reflect a focus on success‐related thoughts at a temporal distance, which gives way to worries and awareness that one may not be as well prepared as one hoped as the moment of truth comes closer. distal confidence and proximal pessimismbut only when these thoughts are easy to generate.

Question 54

Distal confidence (3 weeks before exam) and proximal pessimism (4 hours before exam) was evident in both students asked to recall 3 reasons for failure (or 3 reasons for success) What happens when students had to list 12 thoughts? what does this suggest about confidence over time?

Answer 54

The pattern reversed because these thoughtswere difficult to generate. . In this case, listing success‐related thoughts undermined their confidence long before the exam, whereas listing failure‐related thoughts boosted their confidence right before the exam. In combination, this pattern of findings indicates that confidence changes over time are a joint function of thought content and the ease with which these thoughts can be brought to mind.

Question 55

What is hindsight bias? in reference to accessibility bias, how might hingdsight bias be eliminated (e.g for exam success/failure)?

Answer 55

Once people know the outcome of an event, they believe that it was relatively inevitable and that they ‘‘knew all along’’ what would happen **hindsight bias was successfully reduced when participants found it easy to think of (a few) reasons for alternative outcomes or found it diYcult to think of (many) reasons for the obtained outcome. ** asking successful students to think of three reasons why they might have failed eliminated their hindsight bias; so did asking failing students to list three reasons why they might have succeeded. Yet, generating 12 thoughts about alternative outcomes did not further attenuate hindsight bias Also, successful students who were asked to list 12 reasons for why they succeeded concluded that they would not have expected their success; neither did failing students think they would have expected their failure after listing 12 reasons for failing.

Question 56

What is the planning fallacy?

Answer 56

As a final example, consider the planning fallacy (Buehler et al., 1994; Kahneman & Tversky, 1979). At a temporal distance, people usually predict that task completion will need less time than is actually the case. Caused by a focus on acts that facilitate task completion at the expense of hurdles that impair it. increases when there are incentives.

Question 57

what is: 1. Accessible content 2. Subjective accessibility experience

Answer 57

1. Information you have access to - i.e content 2. The way you experience the content - how easy itis to process, how it makes you feel etc

Question 58

Is risk associated more with processing fluency or disfluency?

Answer 58

Disfluency - or difficulty in processing

Question 59

To types of processing information changes whether you use more accesible content, or subjective accessibility experience.

Answer 59

Systematic or Heursitic

Question 60

When does processing tend to follow heuristic versus. systematic type?

Answer 60

Follows heuristic (mental shortcuts) EXCEPT when there is a reason to (motivation to) attend with more concern i.e systematicall.

Question 61

What is the illusion of truth?

Answer 61

People think something is true when it is easier to process/more familiar feeling. i.e when it is: * easier to read * easier to pronounce * repetition * paired with a photgraph (even if the photo is not relevant)

Question 62

Memory and health: how does our autobigoraphical memory influence our understanding or health or our health-related behaviour?

Answer 62

* Remembering pain/emotions * Remembering risky behaviours and their consequences (e.g risky sexual behaviour * Remembering 'end-of-life' decisions.

Question 63

In reguards to the memory of pain experiences - do we relive pain or reconstruct it? how does the peak-end-rule apply to pain? What are the implications for promoting health behaviours?

Answer 63

Tend to reconstruct it. E.g ice-task, group1: hand in cold water for 5 minutes, group 2: hand in cold water for 5mins and 30 secs, with the last 30 seconds being slightly warmer and thus, less painfull. Manipulating the end of uncomfortable procedures could man people are more inclined to continue positive health behaviours.

Question 64

Does the memory for pain depend on the encouding? i.e whether the attention is focused on the pain, or on distracting oneself from the pain.

Answer 64

Distraction - delayed = most willing to accept future pain Distraction - immediate = least willing to accept future pain Sensation - delay = 3rd most willing to accept future pain Sensation - immediate - 2nd most willing to accept future pain (asked immediately after task, or after a delay) delay only really matters for distraction group. Distractions appears to influence the strong encoding of the event.

Question 65

When is it beneficial to remember pain, when is it beneficial to misremember pain?

Answer 65

Benefit to remembering: accurate view of negative consequences (e.g drug uses) Beneficial to misremember: when remembering negative experiences leads to avoidance of future treatment e.g preventative care (and child birth)

Question 66

are people good at remembering their sexual experiences?

Answer 66

No tend to overestimate how much sex they had. tend to overestimate condom as being used more often underestimated their number of different partners.

Question 67

What factors influence why people are poor at remembering their sexual experiences?

Answer 67

1. decomposition and availiability: subjects take the typical no. of times they engage in a certain behaviour during a short time period and multiplying to estimate incidence for longer period (not looking at/trying to remember each event) 2. Attitude change - subjects may have had a change in attitude towards risky sex behaviour between diary and memory period. 3. Social desirability - the need to look 'good'

Question 68

What is a Advance Medical Directive?

Answer 68

AMD, a 'living will' which specifies surrogates and treatments (making decisions) e.g for when: in a coma, dimentia, dialises, disease, stroke, paralysis, terminal illness, unable to feed/dress for certain treatments: cpr, antibiotics, feeding tube etc

Question 69

What are the (ethical) concerns surrounding advanced medical directives?

Answer 69

* Can peope comprehend serious and complex medical situations and how they would act? * Change in preference over time.

Question 70

What happened during the study of advance medical directive decisions/wishes over time? why?

Answer 70

* People often changed their decision (usually from wanting to nont-wanting) * People think that their decisions are consistent i.e falsely remember that their decision hadn't changed when it had. BUT, correctly remember that their decision hadn't changed, when it hadn't. Not due to old age! Why? = construct preference in the present and assume not change.

Question 71

What is the key idea behind placebo/suggestion effects?

Answer 71

What we expect changed how we think, fell, act and what we experience.

Question 72

What is the placebo effect?

Answer 72

Inert substance that you think causes some effect, resulting in the experiencing of that effect. i.e substance produced genuine psychological or physiological changes

Question 73

Outline a 'balanced' placebo study design (the grid)

Answer 73

Subject told Active -----------placebo got:Active ---- True --------- False------------ got :Placebo ---- False --------- True------------ new treatments compared against placebo.

Question 74

What are the theories regarding why the placebo effects occur? (just list them)

Answer 74

* Classical conditioning * Perception * Hawthorne effects * Mental arithmatic * Response expectancy

Question 75

What is the classical conditioning explanation for placebo effects?

Answer 75

* Conditioned response due to previous pairing of conditioned stimulus (e.g., a syringe) and the unconditioned stimulus (e.g morphine) * Prior experience with treatment - generalised to similar treatment (representativeness heuristic) PROBLEM: what if no prior experience?

Question 76

What is the perception explanation for placebo effects?

Answer 76

* The idea that placebos alter our perception of symptom, not an actual altering of the symptom itself. PROBLEM: does not explain effects on underlying bodily states (e.g airway dialation, bloodsugar, swelling, immunity)

Question 77

How might 'hawthorne effects' explain the placebo effect?

Answer 77

* Validation of being in the 'sick-role' * Expectations about improvement -----\> mobilisation of resources to help self

Question 78

how does mental arithmatic explain plabeo effects?

Answer 78

* People try to get their response to treatment to 'add-up' (i.e., make sense) * Expect change, evaluate results of treatment - i.e., CONCLUE that if their is no change that their problem must be particularly bad.

Question 79

what is 'response expectancy' and how does it relate to behavioural changes and the placebo effect?

Answer 79

Response expectancy is anticipation of one's own automatic reactions to various situations and behaviours * you expect something to cause outcome X * You execute a chain of behaviours to produce outcome X * you attribute outcome X to the substance instead of yourself.

Question 80

Where do expectancies come from? (3)

Answer 80

1. Internal: e.g luck-charms - people in the prescence of their lucky charms do better, but cannot boost performance past maximum capacity 2. Deliberate suggestion - Something about the 'mind-set' e.g with maids told they were meeting health criteria actually experienced positive health changes despite no change in activity. 3. Unintentional suggestion (e.g hawthrone effect) e.g Teachers who thought 1/2 the students were smarter and 1/2 were dumber (when it was not the case) illciited smarter behaviour in the 'smart' children then in the 'dumb' ones.

Question 81

What outcomes do expextancies afeect?

Answer 81

* Social behaviour * Evaluation and preferences (e.g same choc, told it as from either switzerland or china) * hormone response (e.g 'indulgent' versus 'guilt-free' phrasing regarding the same milkshake altered the grenlin hormone levels)

Question 82

Are some people more prone to placebo effects than others? i.e 'placebo responders'

Answer 82

There is little evidence for the existence of 'placebo responders' - it seems to be more about expectations at that time for that treatment and can happen in all people.

Question 83

What therapist factors influence the occurance of the placeb effect? (hawthorne effects)

Answer 83

* Authority * Relationship with patient * Expectations about treatment from overseer (i.e the therapist expecations) * Context effects

Question 84

What situational factors influence the occurance of placebo effects?

Answer 84

* Treatment administration * Treatment modality * Open vs. hidden * features of treatment

Question 85

are more serious or less serious 'treatments' (i.e fake treaments) more likely to illicit a placebo effect?

Answer 85

More serious

Question 86

What is a nocebo?

Answer 86

Also an outcome influence by what we expect (even if the treatment is inert), but a NEGATIVE OUTCOME e.g side effects.

Question 87

when we reconstruct memory is it like a tape recorder or is it coloured by current feelings/cognitions and what we expect.

Answer 87

It is coloured by current feelings/cognitions and what we expect.

Question 88

what is source monitoring (SM)?

Answer 88

The rocess of remembering information and attributing it to the correct source

Question 89

What is source monitoring error?

Answer 89

When information is attributed to the wrong source (e.g something imagined is confused with something real e.g false memories)

Question 90

What is the 'missinformation' effect?

Answer 90

tendency to incorporate misleading information from external sources