Emotions, Aggression, & Stress Flashcards
(30 cards)
Define Emotion.
Emotion: A subjective mental state that is usually accompanied by distinctive cognition, behaviours, physiological changes
What is the cause of the physiological sensations we associate with emotion?
Autonomic Nervous system, both the parasympathetic (relax and restore) and sympathetic (fight or flight) divisions.
What is the Folk Psychology theory of Emotion?
Folk Psychology: feelings trigger autonomic reactions; the emotions cause the body to react.
There is a stimulus –> we interpret the stimulus –> we experience an emotion –> we have a physiological reaction.
We watch Marley and Me –> we think it is sad –> we feel sad –> our nose runs, our eyes water, we feel a cathartic reaction to crying etc.
What is the James-Lange Theory of emotion?
James-Lange: our autonomic reactions trigger our feelings; our bodily response evokes a particular emotional experience.
There is a stimulus –> we interpret the stimulus –> we have a specific pattern of autonomic arousal –> we experience an emotion
Someone starts insulting you –> we think that is rude and uncalled for –> our heart rate goes up, our muscles tense –> we feel angry.
What is the Cannon-Bard theory of emotion?
Cannon-Bard: we simultaneously experience emotions and autonomic reactions; the brain interprets the stimulus and decides which reaction is appropriate.
--> Autonomic Reaction Stimulus --> We interpret the stimulus
--> Emotion experience
We spill coffee on ourselves –> we notice we spilled coffee on ourselves in front of everyone –> our cheeks go red, our heart rate increases AND AT THE SAME TIME –> We feel embarrassed.
What is the Schachter + Singer Theory of Emotion
Schachter-Singer: We use emotional labels to describe feelings of physiological arousal. The emotion we feel depends on our cognitive systems that assess the context. Autonomic responses can intensify our experiences but our cognitive analysis affects which emotion we experience.
Stimulus –> Perception –> stimulus (general autonomic arousal) Combined with context –> Particular emotion experienced (–> which feeds back to affect our perception)
Strange noise outside –> notice the strange noises –> heart rate goes up, we feel jumpy, we perspire and feel tense PLUS Context (we are in a strange house at night with our friend, our friend is looking nervous) –> we feel afraid –> this feeling feeds back to our perception of the noise we hear which we now interpret as a “scary noise outside”.
What is the evolutionary perspective on emotions?
Emotions are evolved preprogramming that help us deal quickly and effectively with a wide variety of situations. E.g. we feel fear of small fast moving animals (like mice, snakes, spiders etc) to help us avoid potentially toxic encounters (e.g. spider/snake bites). We feel disgust about bodily fluids to help us avoid contacting the germs they might be carrying.
What are Plutchick’s universal basic emotions and how are they organized?
There are eight and they are organized into pairs of opposites
- Joy/Sadness
- Anger/Fear
- Affection/Disgust
- Expectation/Surprise
The emotions can vary in intensity which is part of what gives our emotional experience nuance.
What are the seemingly universal emotional facial expressions? What are the controversies here?
There are 8:
Joy, Anger, Sadness, Fear, Disgust, Surprise, Contempt, and Embarrassment.
This is different from Plutchik’s proposed eight (Contempt and Embarrassment instead of Affection and Expectation).
There is less evidence that surprise and disgust are actually universal expressions, it seems that they may be more culturally influenced than the others BUT
- methodological issues with this area of research makes it hard to know for sure about their universality as the expressions shown are often actors which means that the expression may not be genuine or may be exaggerated
What is the systematic process that takes place to turn emotion into facial expression?
There is a trigger –> we have universal facial expression motor control for each emotion –> individual cultural norms act on the universal programing to adjust it based on our own cultural expectations –> our facial expression is produced.
What physiological processes control facial expression?
Muscles, cranial nerves, and CNS pathways control facial expression.
- Superficial facial muscles attach to points on the facial skin and control more expression based facial movement (lip position, eye and nose movement, e.g. widening eyes or wrinkling nose)
- Deep facial muscles attach to skeletal structures and control larger movements (like chewing)
- The Facial Nerve innervates the superficial facial muscles
- The trigeminal nerve innervates the deep facial muscles.
What is Decorticate rage and Kluver-Bucy syndrome and what do they tell us about the brain and emotions?
Decorticate rage (AKA sham rage) is sudden intense bouts of undirected rage in dogs who have had their cortex removed. This suggests that the cortex is involved in inhibiting rage or anger.
Kluver-Bucy syndrome: is when there is bilateral amygdala damage which results in emotional changes similar to apathy, they is a lack of fear and anxiety. This suggest that the amygdala is significant in producing emotions like fear.
What does research on self stimulation tell us about emotions.
Self stimulation research found that people/animals would work to provide electrical stimulation to a particular region of the brain because the experience is rewarding. This gives indications to what regions may be involved in pleasurable feelings
Regions involved include: the medial forebrain bundle (an axon tract that ascends from the midbrain through the hypothalamus. Some of these axons end in the nucleus accumbens of the forebrain’s reward circuit.
What does Fear conditioning research tell us about emotion?
Fear condition is when a neutral stimulus is paired with an aversive stimulus until the neutral stimulus also elicits a fear response. Fear conditioning research demonstrated that the amygdala is key in the mediation of fear.
What the major structures of the limbic system?
Cingulate cortex Anterior Thalamus Mammillothalamic tract Fornix Basal Forebrain Nuclei Mammillary body Olfactory Bulb.
What is the pathway of the low and high road?
The low road: Stimuli enters through the sensory organs and travels to the thalamus. Thalamus sends information straight to the amygdala. This produces a more immediate reaction but bypasses conscious processing.
The high road: stimuli enters through the sensory organs and travels to the thalamus. The thalamus sends the information to the sensory cortex and hippocampus (higher cognitive areas) where it is processed before going to the amygdala.
An example of these roads in action: Watching a scary movie and then jumping when the monster jumps out at the camera (Low road processing, an immediate reaction without conscious processing, helps keep us safe from a perceived threat.). We then laugh and settle back onto the couch to keep watching the movie (High road processing, our conscious processing has recognized that the perceived threat is not real and there is no need for further alarm reactions.
Is the amygdala involved in the processing of all perceived threats?
No, internal threats (like lack of oxygen) are not processed by the amygdala. E.g. the panicked behaviour we exhibit when choking is not induced by the amygdala.
What is the neural activity of someone in love?
Love shows increased activity in the anterior cingulate cortex and in the Insula.
Loves shows decreased activity in the orbitofrontal region of the prefrontal cortex, the posterior cingulate cortex, and the amygdala.
What is the pattern of neural activity for different emotions?
There is overlap in the areas involved in different emotions. There is no one centre for each emotion (i.e. no “happy centre” or “angry centre”. Instead emotions evoke different patterns of activity across a network of regions that are implicated in emotion. There is overlap in these patterns between emotions.
Define Aggression. What is intermale aggression and why do we focus on it instead of other forms of aggression in brain and behaviour?
Aggression: behaviour that is intended to cause pain or harm to others.
Intermale aggression: aggression between males of the same species.
We study intermale aggression over other forms of aggression in brain and behaviour because it is the easiest and most obvious to observe. Intermale aggression is very common across species and the type of aggression used is often physical and therefore easier to track and observe.
What is the general relationship between Testosterone and Aggression? Is it the same for humans as it is other animals?
It appears that testosterone increases aggression in many species. Evidence of this:
- Intermale aggression rises at sexual maturity
- In seasonal breeding, intermale aggression increases during breeding season when testosterone levels are highest.
- Castrating males leads to reduced aggressive behaviour and adding testosterone increases aggression in castrated animals (but the aggression only lasts as long as the testosterone)
There may be confounding variables in this relationship:
- Experience: experience affects testosterone. Animals that lose aggressive encounters show reduced testosterone levels which calls to question the direction of the relationship
- Dominance: There are different forms of aggression; proactive aggression (defending status) or reactive aggression (defensive behaviour) could have different affects on testosterone/different relationships.
What neurotransmitters are related to aggression? What are their effects?
Serotonin: inhibits aggression; low levels of serotonin are correlated with higher levels of aggression
GABA: inhibits aggression; GABA slows down the nervous system
Dopamine: inhibits aggression; low levels of dopamine are associated with higher levels of aggression
What is the basic neural pathway of aggression?
The Medial amygdala integrates olfactory information (e.g. info about whether an animal is male or female) and then connects to the ventromedial hypothalamus (VMH). This controls the triggering of an aggressive response.
What are characteristics (both personality and neural) of a psychopath?
Psychopath: individuals who routinely engage in deception, violence, or other anti-social behaviour and have little capacity for empathy or remorse.
They are often intelligent people with superficial charm, poor impulse control, and a grandiose sense of self-worth. In experimental settings, they show blunted responses aversive cues and fear conditioning.
They often have reduced size and activity in the prefrontal cortex (explains poor impulse control).
