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188
How (and where) does moral judgment work?
- Trends in Cognitive Science
, 2002
"... Why do we care so strongly about what other people do, even when their actions won't affect us? And how do we decide that someone else has done something wrong? These questions are at the heart of moral psychology, and psychologists' answers to these questions have changed with intellectu ..."
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Cited by 140 (6 self)
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Why do we care so strongly about what other people do, even when their actions won't affect us? And how do we decide that someone else has done something wrong? These questions are at the heart of moral psychology, and psychologists' answers to these questions have changed with intellectual fashion. Historically, psychologists have disagreed about whether moral judgments are primarily products of emotional and non-rational processes (such as Freudian internalization or behaviorist reinforcement) or of reasoning and 'higher' cognition (as in Piaget's and Kohlberg's post-conventional reasoning). Recently, however, findings from several areas of cognitive neuroscience have begun to converge on an answer: emotions and reasoning both matter, but automatic emotional processes tend to dominate. Trends in moral psychology During the cognitive revolution of the 1950s and 1960s, behaviorist and Freudian theories gave way to mental models and information processing as the preferred framework in psychology. In the moral domain, Lawrence Kohlberg was a part of this revolution. He built on the earlier work of Jean Piaget [1] to develop a six-stage model of the development of moral reasoning But as the cognitive revolution matured in the 1980s, many researchers began calling for a complementary 'affective revolution'. Kohlberg's focus on moral reasoning seemed to ignore the importance of moral emotions. At the same time, new findings in evolutionary psychology Integrating affect and reasoning In the 1990s the affective revolution was reinforced by a new focus on 'automaticity' -the mind's ability to solve many problems, including high-level social ones, unconsciously and automatically This emphasis on quick, automatic affective reactions is supported by recent findings in social psychology, such as: (1) that people evaluate others and apply morally laden stereotypes automatically [9]; (2) that motivations to maintain relationships and defend against threatening ideas bias judgments and motivate subsequent reasoning Somatic markers and decision-making In keeping with this affective trend, Antonio Damasio and colleagues have generated widespread interest in the affective neural bases of social judgment through their ongoing study of patients with damage to the ventral and medial portions of the frontal lobes
The link between social cognition and self-referential thought in the medial prefrontal cortex.
, 2005
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The amygdala theory of autism.
- Neurosci. Biobehav. Rev.,
, 2000
"... Abstract Brothers (Brothers L. Concepts in Neuroscience 1990;1:27-51) proposed a network of neural regions that comprise the "social brain", which includes the amygdala. Since the childhood psychiatric condition of autism involves deficits in "social intelligence", it is plausib ..."
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Cited by 108 (10 self)
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Abstract Brothers (Brothers L. Concepts in Neuroscience 1990;1:27-51) proposed a network of neural regions that comprise the "social brain", which includes the amygdala. Since the childhood psychiatric condition of autism involves deficits in "social intelligence", it is plausible that autism may be caused by an amygdala abnormality. In this paper we review the evidence for a social function of the amygdala. This includes reference to the Kluver-Bucy syndrome (which Hetzler and Griffin suggested may serve as an animal model of autism). We then review evidence for an amygdala deficit in people with autism, who are well known to have deficits in social behaviour. This includes a detailed summary of our recent functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) study involving judging from the expressions of another person's eyes what that other person might be thinking or feeling. In this study, patients with autism or AS did not activate the amygdala when making mentalistic inferences from the eyes, whilst people without autism did show amygdala activity. The amygdala is therefore proposed to be one of several neural regions that are abnormal in autism. We conclude that the amygdala theory of autism contains promise and suggest some new lines of research. ᭧
Recognition of faux pas by normally developing children and children with Asperger Syndrome or highfunctioning autism
- Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders
, 1999
"... Most theory of mind (ToM) tests are designed for subjects with a mental age of 4-6 years. There are very few ToM tests for subjects who are older or more able than this. We report a new test of ToM, designed for children 7-11 years old. The task involves recognizing faux pas. Study 1 tested 7-9, and ..."
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Cited by 104 (10 self)
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Most theory of mind (ToM) tests are designed for subjects with a mental age of 4-6 years. There are very few ToM tests for subjects who are older or more able than this. We report a new test of ToM, designed for children 7-11 years old. The task involves recognizing faux pas. Study 1 tested 7-9, and 11-year-old normal children. Results showed that the ability to detect faux pas developed with age and that there was a differential developmental profile between the two sexes (female superiority). Study 2 tested children with Asperger syndrome (AS) or high-functioning autism (HFA), selected for being able to pass traditional 4- to 6-year level (first- and second-order) false belief tests. Results showed that whereas normal 9- to 11-year-old children were skilled at detect-ing faux pas, children with AS or HFA were impaired on this task. Study 3 reports a refinement in the test, employing control stimuli. This replicated the results from Study 2. Some patients with AS or HFA were able to recognize faux pas but still produced them. Future research should as-sess faux pas production. KEY WORDS: Theory of mind; faux pas recognition; Asperger syndrome; high-functioning autism.
Effects of a secure attachment relationship on right brain development, affect regulation, and infant mental health
- Infant Mental Health Journal
, 2001
"... ABSTRACT: Over the last ten years the basic knowledge of brain structure and function has vastly expanded, and its incorporation into the developmental sciences is now allowing for more complex and heuristic models of human infancy. In a continuation of this effort, in this two-part work I integrate ..."
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Cited by 77 (5 self)
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ABSTRACT: Over the last ten years the basic knowledge of brain structure and function has vastly expanded, and its incorporation into the developmental sciences is now allowing for more complex and heuristic models of human infancy. In a continuation of this effort, in this two-part work I integrate current interdisciplinary data from attachment studies on dyadic affective communications, neuroscience on the early developing right brain, psychophysiology on stress systems, and psychiatry on psychopathogenesis to provide a deeper understanding of the psychoneurobiological mechanisms that underlie infant mental health. In this article I detail the neurobiology of a secure attachment, an exemplar of adaptive infant mental health, and focus upon the primary caregiver’s psychobiological regulation of the infant’s maturing limbic system, the brain areas specialized for adapting to a rapidly changing environment. The infant’s early developing right hemisphere has deep connections into the limbic and autonomic nervous systems and is dominant for the human stress response, and in this manner the attachment relationship facilitates the expansion of the child’s coping capcities. This model suggests that adaptive infant mental health can be fundamentally defined as the earliest expression of flexible strategies for coping with the novelty and stress that is inherent in human interactions. This efficient right brain function is a resilience factor for optimal development over the later stages of the life cycle.
The regulatory function of self-conscious emotion: insights from patients with orbitofrontal damage
, 2003
"... Although once considered disruptive, self-conscious emotions are now theorized to be fundamentally involved in the regulation of social behavior. The present study examined the social regulation function of self-conscious emotions by comparing healthy participants with a neuropsychological populatio ..."
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Cited by 68 (9 self)
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Although once considered disruptive, self-conscious emotions are now theorized to be fundamentally involved in the regulation of social behavior. The present study examined the social regulation function of self-conscious emotions by comparing healthy participants with a neuropsychological population— patients with orbitofrontal lesions—characterized by selective regulatory deficits. Orbitofrontal patients and healthy controls participated in a series of tasks designed to assess their social regulation and self-conscious emotions. Another task assessed the ability to infer others ’ emotional states, an appraisal process involved in self-conscious emotion. Consistent with the theory that self-conscious emotions are important for regulating social behavior, the findings show that deficient behavioral regulation is associated with inappropriate self-conscious emotions that reinforce maladaptive behavior. Additionally, deficient behavioral regulation is associated with impairments in interpreting the self-conscious emotions of others. Embarrassment is not an irrational impulse breaking through socially prescribed behavior but part of this orderly behavior itself. (Goffman, 1956, pp. 270–271)
Age, executive function, and social decision making: A dorsolateral prefrontal theory of cognitive aging
- Psychology and Aging
, 2002
"... Current neuropsychological models propose that some age-related cognitive changes are due to frontallobe deterioration. However, these models have not considered the possible subdivision of the frontal lobes into the dorsolateral and ventromedial regions. This study assessed the age effects on 3 tas ..."
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Cited by 52 (1 self)
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Current neuropsychological models propose that some age-related cognitive changes are due to frontallobe deterioration. However, these models have not considered the possible subdivision of the frontal lobes into the dorsolateral and ventromedial regions. This study assessed the age effects on 3 tasks of executive function and working memory, tasks dependent on dorsolateral prefrontal dysfunction; and 3 tasks of emotion and social decision making, tasks dependent on ventromedial prefrontal dysfunction. Age-related differences in performance were found on all tasks dependent on dorsolateral prefrontal dysfunction. In contrast, age-related differences were not found on the majority of the tasks dependent on ventromedial prefrontal dysfunction. The results support a specific dorsolateral prefrontal theory of cognitive changes with age, rather than a global decline in frontal-lobe function. Healthy adult aging is associated with the deterioration of the frontal lobes of the brain, earlier and more severely than other brain areas (Haug et al., 1983). Current neuropsychological models propose that it is this frontal-lobe deterioration that is responsible for many age-related cognitive changes (Daigneault & Braun, 1993; Moscovitch & Winocur, 1995; West, 1996). Furthermore,
Functional neuroanatomy of altered states of consciousness: The transient hypofrontality hypothesis.
- Consciousness and Cognition,
, 2003
"... Abstract It is the central hypothesis of this paper that the mental states commonly referred to as altered states of consciousness are principally due to transient prefrontal cortex deregulation. Supportive evidence from psychological and neuroscientific studies of dreaming, endurance running, medi ..."
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Cited by 41 (2 self)
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Abstract It is the central hypothesis of this paper that the mental states commonly referred to as altered states of consciousness are principally due to transient prefrontal cortex deregulation. Supportive evidence from psychological and neuroscientific studies of dreaming, endurance running, meditation, daydreaming, hypnosis, and various druginduced states is presented and integrated. It is proposed that transient hypofrontality is the unifying feature of all altered states and that the phenomenological uniqueness of each state is the result of the differential viability of various frontal circuits. Using an evolutionary approach, consciousness is conceptualized as hierarchically ordered cognitive function. Higher-order structures perform increasingly integrative functions and thus contribute more sophisticated content. Although this implies a holistic approach to consciousness, such a functional hierarchy localizes the most sophisticated layers of consciousness in the zenithal higher-order structure: the prefrontal cortex. The hallmark of altered states of consciousness is the subtle modification of behavioral and cognitive functions that are typically ascribed to the prefrontal cortex. The theoretical framework presented yields a number of testable hypotheses.
General and specific contributions of the medial prefrontal cortex to knowledge about mental states.
- NeuroImage,
, 2005
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Orbitofrontal cortex and social behavior: integrating self-monitoring and emotion-cognition interactions.
- Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience,
, 2006
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