Emotions Flashcards
(20 cards)
Emotion vs feelings
emotions are outwardly expressed and seen by others, feelings are internal things we are consciously aware of. sometimes the emotion we display for people to see is not always what we are feeling
Darwins Emotional taxonomy
Emotions are measurable and public; feelings are private
Common feature expressions of emotions (blushing is expressed similarly across people)
James Lange theory
-Says that there is an event in the world that causes an increase in heart rate and blood pressure and we interpret those physiological symptoms as a emotional or feeling response
I-n other words, physiological symptoms are what cause us to feel an emotion
-Bottom up processing
Common Sense theory
We experience an event that causes emotion and because of that emotion we experience physiological symptoms
Cannon-Bard
-Says that a person experiences an event and then subcortical brain areas give rise to conscious feeling and autonomic arousal
-Top-down processing because information about the emotion spreads from the brain to the body
two factor theories
emotions do not need to be either top-down or bottom-up emotions could involve combination of both theories
what does epinephrine do when injected in the body
-epinephrine is essentially adrenaline
-when injected some people report that they “feel as if” some emotion is happening to them (as if they are anxious, scared, etc) and some report physiological symptoms (increased heart rate)
Schacher and Singer
An experiment where a group receives epinephrine or saline, everyone is told they are getting vitamins. They are either told the effects of epinephrine (true or untrue) or nothing at all. They then wait in a room with somebody who acts happy
what is the result of the Schachter and Singer experiment
Epinephrine Saline
Epi.Inform Low Low
Epi. Misinform. High Low
None Medium Low
When subjects are given epi and are misinformed they have the highest likelihood of also feeling happy. This is because they are not focused on the symptoms they are feeling because they are not feeling what they were told. Informed Epi subjects are focusing on all the symptoms of the drug such as increased heart rate
Misattribution of Arousal
if not thinking about WHY sympathetic arousal is present in the body, we can take it and attribute it to something else that’s there
What is responsible for homeostatic drives and internal states
The hypothalamus and the amygdala
the hypoT contain many different nuclei that influence Homeostatic: hunger, thirst, etc.
Agonistic: predation, offensive aggression, etc.
Reproductive: parenting, reproduction, etc.
Pituitary Gland
A part of the hypothalamus receptors in the bloodstream monitor the composition of the blood and report that to the hypothalamus. Made of the anterior and postierior lobes
The hypothalamus releases hormones, the pituitary gland receives it and secretes another hormone into the bloodstream and those hormones carry signals
Hypothalamus output pathways
The autonomic output pathway stimulates the sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous systems.
The neuroendocrine pathway regulates hormone levels throughout the body.
The motivational pathway stimulates the forebrain to generate complex plans.
HPA Axis & Stress Response
Hypothalamus sends corticotropin-releasing hormones to the anterior pituitary and the anterior pituitary releases adrenocorticotropic hormones to the adrenal cortex which releases cortisol
What area of the brain is critical for conditioned fear learning? (what structure is most important in fear response?)
The amygdala
Signals of a stimulus is being sent to the amygdala which drives our responses in nervous system
Lesions to what brain structure would cause a weakened fear response?
Amygdala
What was the Iowa Gambling task
there were two decks of cards, one that had primarily bad cards and one that had primarily good cards. Subjects were told they would draw 100 cards. Healthy subjects learned to only draw cards from the good stack while subjects with vmPFC lesions could not distinguish between the good and bad decks
Emotional Reappraisal
understand what’s happening physiologically so you can figure out how to think about it
In healthy people, the vlPFC increases activity in the vmPFC which decreases activation of the amygdala
In Depressed people the vlPFC and vmPFC increase amygdala reactivity
Need to treat amygdala so SSRI’s decrease activation of the amygdala
Emotion regulation and lesions
Lesions in different brain areas can cause varying levels of depression. In a study subjects with a lesion in the vmPFC showed 100% low or no depression amounts while subjects with lesions in the dmPFC showed 80% high depression amounts.
GABA and anxiety
GABA is a very common neurotransmitter inhibitor in the brain, medications like benzodiaphrapine increase GABA in the brain causing anxiety levels to decrease
