Deck 13: Social Cognition

Question 1

What were the circumstances under which Phineas Gage sustained his brain injury?

A) a 20-foot fall during construction of the Eiffel Tower that resulted in coup-contra-coup injury
B) a gunshot wound during the Battle of Gettysburg that penetrated his skull
C) an explosion while laying a Vermont railway that sent a tamping iron through his head
D) a shipwreck off the coast of Australia that deprived his brain of oxygen for 10 minutes

Answer 1

C

Question 2

Stanley Klein and colleagues found that after rating a personality adjective for self-descriptiveness, participants were to recall a time in which they exhibited the characteristic, suggesting that self-characteristics linked to recall of specific past behaviors.

A) faster ; are
B) slower ; are not
C) equally fast ; are
D) equally fast ; are not

Answer 2

D

Question 3

The self-referent effect refers to the phenomenon that

A) social judgments about oneself tend to be biased.
B) social judgments about oneself tend to be highly accurate.
C) information processed in relation to the self is distorted in memory.
D) information processed in relation to the self is enhanced in memory.

Answer 3

D

Question 4

One concern with interpreting fMRI studies employing a "resting state" for comparison with cognitive activities of interest is that

A) the brain uses considerably more blood and oxygen when it is "at rest."
B) many processes are engaged "at rest," including self-referential processes.
C) participants in experiments are particularly prone to movement artifacts when "at rest."
D) there is too little blood flow in the brain "at rest" for accurate measurements.

Question 5

Functional MRI and ERP studies suggest that the medial prefrontal cortex may be involved in tasks requiring

A) hierarchical processing.
B) self-referential processing.
C) emotional memory.
D) perceptual memory.

Question 6

People with retrograde and anterograde amnesia are to maintain a sense of self because our judgments about self-characteristics are recall of specific past behaviors.

A) able ; dependent on
B) able ; not linked to
C) not able ; dependent on
D) not able ; not linked to

Question 7

Studies using fMRI have found that neural activity in the medial prefrontal cortex when people make self-referential judgments compared to other judgments, suggesting that when we are "at rest" we are engaging in a number of self-referential processes.

A) increases more
B) increases less
C) decreases more
D) decreases less

Question 8

In what way might the self-referent effect and the depth-of-processing effect be related?

A) Information processed in relation to the self may benefit from the wealth of information about the self in memory.
B) Information processed in relation to the self may be skewed by our biased representations of our own personalities and traits.
C) The self is a special cognitive structure with unique mnemonic or organizational elements.
D) The self has elements that promote processing in a way that is distinct from other cognitive systems.

Question 9

Which of the following areas is least involved in social cognition?

A) ventromedial prefrontal cortex
B) inferior frontal gyrus
C) anterior cingulate gyrus
D) dorsolateral prefrontal cortex

Question 10

Which brain region is the most susceptible to coup-contra-coup injury?

A) the occipital cortex
B) the parietal cortex
C) the temporal cortex
D) the orbitofrontal cortex

Question 11

The most salient symptom in people who have suffered damage to the orbitofrontal cortex is

A) inappropriate social behavior.
B) aphasia.
C) profound mental retardation.
D) agnosia.

Question 12

When deciding whether an adjective describes , we rely on .

A) others ; memories of specific behaviors
B) ourselves ; memories of specific behaviors
C) others ; more global perceptions
D) Both b and c are true.

Question 13

Most children who are asked to sort a set of facial pictures will likely sort on the basis of , whereas autistic children will likely sort on the basis of .

A) emotional expression ; physical features
B) physical features ; emotional expression
C) eye gaze ; emotional expression
D) emotional expression ; eye gaze

Question 14

Which term describes the deficits associated with autism?

A) change blindness
B) faceblindness
C) blindsight
D) mindblindness

Question 15

In an experiment by William Kelley and colleagues, participants judged personality adjectives in relation to either themselves or the US president. The results suggested that memory for words processed in relation to the self was than that for words processed in relation to the US president, and that the former condition resulted in greater neural activity in the cortex.

A) better ; dorsolateral prefrontal
B) worse ; dorsolateral prefrontal
C) better ; medial prefrontal
D) worse ; medial prefrontal

Question 16

A traumatic brain injury in which impact causes the brain to bounce against the back of the skull and then rebound is known as a injury.

A) coup de foudre
B) coup de main
C) coup-contra-coup
D) coup d'oeil

Question 17

Which brain area seems to be the most important for selectively attending to positive self-relevant information, as opposed to negative self-relevant information?

A) the anterior cingulate cortex
B) the medial prefrontal cortex
C) the orbitofrontal cortex
D) the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex

Question 18

People with damage to the orbitofrontal cortex tend to be of their social mistakes in the moment, become embarrassed by them if they view a video of themselves after the fact.

A) aware ; and they also
B) aware ; but they do not
C) unaware ; but they do
D) unaware ; and they do not

Question 19

Which of the following resulted in the significant personality changes observed in Phineas Gage?

A) Parkinson's disease
B) temporal lobe epilepsy
C) orbitofrontal damage
D) limbic damage

Question 20

Phineas Gage, who suffered injury to the orbitofrontal cortex, experienced changes in all of the following areas as a result of his injury EXCEPT

A) inhibition of inappropriate social behavior.
B) performance on cognitive tests.
C) planning of complex behaviors.
D) personality and temperament.

Question 21

Tasks involving thinking about mental states often engage which region of the brain, in comparison to thinking about social background or life events?

A) the left inferior frontal lobe
B) the left precentral gyrus
C) the right temporoparietal junction
D) the right anterior cingulate

Question 22

Baron-Cohen has proposed that people with have impaired theory-of-mind abilities, coining the term mindblindness.

A) aphasia
B) agnosia
C) agraphia
D) autism

Question 23

What did Ami Klin find when autistic people watched the film Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?

A) They failed to understand the sarcasm in the dialogue.
B) They began to refer to an imaginary child like the characters in the movie.
C) They did not pay attention to the faces and eyes of the characters.
D) They mimicked the lines spoken by Martha but not George.

Question 24

To engage in joint attention, a child will pay attention to

A) the direction of your eye gaze.
B) the content of your speech.
C) your hand gestures.
D) your body language.

Question 25

The trolley problem and footbridge problem are ethical thought experiments involving life-or-death situations. Which of the following is true?

A) Both situations involve sacrificing one life to save multiple other lives.
B) The death in the trolley problem has greater perceived personal involvement.
C) Most people agree that it is unacceptable to act in either dilemma.
D) Thinking about the trolley problem results in greater emotional processing.

Question 26

When reading a series of statements such as "At the party, he was the first to start dancing on the table," the is more active when making a personality inference as opposed to remembering the order of the statements.

A) anterior insula cortex
B) dorsolateral prefrontal cortex
C) anterior cingulate cortex
D) medial prefrontal cortex

Question 27

The Sally-Anne task is used to test whether someone

A) understands that people can have different mental states.
B) possesses unconscious biases against women.
C) follows social conventions for appropriate behavior.
D) can form new declarative memories accurately.

Question 28

In a social faux pas experiment, participants are presented with a scenario in which one character accidentally says something impolite to another character. When people with orbitofrontal damage perform this task

A) they fail to understand that anything impolite has been said.
B) they understand that something impolite has been said but that it wasn't intended.
C) they believe that the impolite comment was intentional.
D) they begin to imitate the impolite comments, not realizing this is inappropriate.

Question 29

The term theory of mind refers to

A) the philosophical position that the mind is not reducible to the brain.
B) our ability to make inferences about the mental states of other people.
C) the argument that only humans experience self-awareness.
D) the notion that human cognition is deeply rooted in mental representation.

Question 30

Autistic children are likely to report that when performing the Sally-Anne task.

A) Sally will look in the location in which Anne has put the marble
B) Sally will look in the location where she originally put the marble
C) Sally will move the marble back to its original location
D) Sally will prefer to focus on her own thoughts and not look for the marble

Question 31

Studies of the neural bases of autism have found that people with autism

A) have less activation in the medial prefrontal cortex and superior temporal sulcus when performing theory of mind tasks.
B) have smaller amygdalae in comparison to nonautistic people.
C) do not significantly deactivate the medial prefrontal cortex when performing non-self- referential tasks.
D) All of the above are true.

Question 32

Neuroeconomic studies have shown that humans

A) make decisions that maximize rewards and minimize losses.
B) make decisions that maximize rewards and minimize losses, unless they have suffered damage to the amygdala.
C) do not always make decisions that maximize rewards and minimize losses.
D) do not always make decisions that maximize rewards and minimize losses, unless they have suffered damage to the orbitofrontal cortex.

Question 33

Functional MRI studies of ethical dilemmas suggest that decisions recruit working memory processes, whereas decisions recruit emotional and social cognitive processes.

A) personal ; impersonal
B) impersonal ; personal
C) moral ; ethical
D) ethical ; moral

Question 34

What do mentalizing tasks have in common with attentional cuing tasks?

A) Both tasks have strong social cognition components.
B) Both tasks strongly engage the right anterior cingulate.
C) Both tasks require that participants direct their attention away from invalid information.
D) Both b and c are true.

Question 35

Studies of the perception of the self and others have suggested that

A) similar regions of the medial prefrontal cortex are activated when we answer questions about the self and about others.
B) similar regions of the medial prefrontal cortex are activated when we answer questions about the self and about others, if they are close.
C) similar regions of the medial prefrontal cortex are activated when we answer questions about others, regardless of whether they are close.
D) three distinct regions of the medial prefrontal cortex are activated when we answer questions about the self, close others, and acquaintances.

Question 36

Studies of people with autism have suggested that they do not significantly deactivate the when performing non-self-referential tasks. This is consistent with the observation that many people with autism have an unusual focus on rather than .

A) medial prefrontal cortex ; the external world ; internal states
B) medial prefrontal cortex ; internal states ; the external world
C) temporoparietal junction ; their own mental states ; the mental states of others
D) temporoparietal junction ; the mental states of others ; their own mental states

Question 37

Neuroeconomic functional MRI studies have suggested that rational decision making is associated with the , and emotion-driven decision making is associated with the .

A) orbitofrontal cortex ; cingulate
B) orbitofrontal cortex ; amygdala
C) dorsolateral prefrontal cortex ; cingulate
D) dorsolateral prefrontal cortex ; amygdala

Question 38

Single-cell recording studies in monkeys and human neuroimaging studies support the idea that the is important for interpreting eye gaze in relation to mental states.

A) temporoparietal junction
B) superior temporal sulcus
C) orbitofrontal cortex
D) medial frontal cortex

Question 39

In the experimental economics task known as the Ultimatum Game, one participant must choose how to split a sum of money with another player. The second player can choose to accept the offer-or to reject it, upon which neither player receives anything. Consideration of unfair offers is associated with activity in the , an area that has been associated with disgust.

A) superior temporal sulcus
B) orbitofrontal cortex
C) cingulate cortex
D) insula

Question 40

In a teasing experiment, people with orbitofrontal injuries and control participants were asked to make up nicknames for an experimenter whom they did not know well. What were the results?

A) The control participants chose flattering nicknames, whereas the people with orbitofrontal injuries chose unflattering ones.
B) The people with orbitofrontal injuries chose flattering nicknames, whereas the control participants chose unflattering ones.
C) The control participants refused to perform the task, finding the idea socially inappropriate.
D) The people with orbitofrontal injuries refused to perform the task, finding the idea socially inappropriate.

Question 41

What is the self-referent effect? Describe a neuropsychological study-real or hypothetical-that would support or disprove the self-referent effect.

Question 42

The infamous procedure known as the frontal lobotomy was associated most closely with which of the following periods?

A) 1870-1890
B) 1890-1910
C) 1910-1930
D) 1930-1950

Question 43

Do patients with retrograde and anterograde amnesia have difficulty with their self-representation? Please explain why this is.

Question 44

Simulation theory suggests that theory of mind is based on an ability to put ourselves in the shoes of another person, using our own minds to simulate what might be going on in the mind of someone else.

Question 45

Research suggests that self-description judgments rely on recall of specific autobiographical episodes.

Question 46

The most common method for performing frontal lobotomies involved

A) pounding an ice pick through the eye sockets with a small hammer.
B) administering a severe electric shock that was strong enough to damage the sensitive frontal cortex.
C) injecting the person with a strong dose of L-dopa.
D) deliberate damage to the posterior brain areas that were believed to be overactive.

Question 47

Which of the following is true of the prefrontal cortex, schizophrenia, and depression?

A) Both schizophrenia and depression are associated with hypermetabolism in the prefrontal cortex.
B) Both schizophrenia and depression are associated with hypometabolism in the prefrontal cortex.
C) Whereas schizophrenia is associated with hypermetabolism in the prefrontal cortex, depression is associated with hypometabolism in the prefrontal cortex.
D) Whereas schizophrenia is associated with hypometabolism in the prefrontal cortex, depression is associated with hypermetabolism in the prefrontal cortex.

Question 48

The dorsolateral prefrontal cortex plays a strong role in forming impressions about the internal states of other people.

Question 49

Raine 2002) has argued that violent behavior. factors play a role in determining whether someone exhibits

A) genetic
B) environmental
C) both genetic and environmental
D) neither genetic nor environmental

Question 50

False-belief tasks require participants to direct their attention away from invalid information to answer questions about another person's mental states.

Question 51

Information processed in relation to the self is better remembered than that which is processed in relation to others.

Question 52

The anterior cingulate cortex is important for distinguishing positive self-relevant information from negative self-relevant information.

Question 53

Neuroeconomics is the field of philosophy that discusses the rights and wrongs of the treatment or enhancement of the human brain.

Question 54

Describe the role of the medial prefrontal cortex in the perception of the self and of others. How might the two be related?

Question 55

Phineas Gage was a famous neurological patient who suffered damage to the orbitofrontal cortex.

Question 56

The trolley problem described in your text has many variations. One of them goes as follows: "You are a surgeon and have five patients who each need a different organ transplant. No acceptable donor for any of them can be found, until one day a healthy traveler comes into your office and is the perfect donor for all five patients. Are there any circumstances under which it would be morally acceptable to kill this person to save the lives of five others?" Based on the study of Greene and colleagues, which areas of your brain did you likely use when thinking about this ethical dilemma?

Question 57

Research suggests that the brain regions that are active during mentalizing tasks and during attentional cuing are functionally distinct from one another.

Question 58

Experimental economics research has often assumed that humans behave as rational agents, always making choices that will maximize gains and minimize losses. What is problematic about this assumption from a psychological or neuroscientific perspective?

Question 59

Neuroimaging studies suggest that the medial prefrontal cortex activates more relative to a baseline when people make self-referential judgments than when they make other kinds of judgments.

Question 60

What evidence supports the notion that autistic people are "mindblind"? What are some alternative hypotheses?

Question 61

People with orbitofrontal damage show difficulty with which types of tasks? Describe their symptoms. How are they different from children with autism?

Question 62

Describe Raine's biosocial model of violence. Give an example of how this model applies to those with violent behavior.

Question 63

Joint attention is an important aspect of social interaction. How do children with autism differ in joint attention from children who do not have autism?

Question 64

The Sally-Anne task is used to test whether someone can understand how others' thoughts differ from our own. Describe two populations that have difficulty with this task. What is similar or different about these populations?