A study about the semantic processing of counter-intuitive religious ideas with event-related potentials

Tesis inédita de la Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Facultad de Psicología, Departamento de Psicobiología, leída el 12-12-2013Explorar las causas de la recurrencia y naturalidad del pensamiento religioso a lo largo de la evolución humana es una cuestión de creciente interés científico. Desde la Ciencia Cognitiva de la Religión se ha propuesto que los conceptos religiosos resultan especialmente atractivos porque son mínimamente contra-intuitivos. Según esta Hipótesis, las ideas religiosas se caracterizan por violar o transferir alguna propiedad (física, biológica o psicológica) que de forma intuitiva se aplica a objetos o agentes, a la vez que mantienen el resto de las propiedades intactas (p. ej. una montaña sabia). Esto las convierte en óptimos cognitivos; captan nuestra atención y conllevan un bajo coste de procesamiento, lo que facilita su recuerdo. Asímismo, la Teoría Contemporánea propone que las metáforas establecen relaciones entre conceptos a través de la transferencia de propiedades. Su procesamiento se lleva a cabo sin esfuerzo, ya que forman parte de nuestro sistema conceptual y constituyen una forma natural de pensamiento. El objetivo de este trabajo es explorar los mecanismos neurocognitivos implicados en el procesamiento de ideas contra-intuitivas religiosas presentadas fuera de un contexto narrativo, y su relación con el pensamiento metafórico. Para tal fin, se empleó la onda N400 de los Potenciales Evento-Relacionados como índice del grado de contra-intuición de una idea. El análisis semántico de una muestra de ideas extraídas de diferentes mitologías del mundo desveló que alrededor de un 80% eran contra-intuiciones. Además, se observó que estas ideas se integran más fácilmente en el sistema semántico, lo que se reflejó en una reducción de la N400, y que son difícilmente consideradas como anomalías cuando se comparan con otro tipo de contra-intuiciones no religiosas. En un segundo experimento se exploró si la mínima contra-intuición de las ideas religiosas está relacionada con el modo en que se interpretan. Para ello, se indujeron dos modos de interpretación, literal vs. metafórico, para cada una de las contra-intuiciones, formulando preguntas sobre su contenido semántico. Se observó que una interpretación metafórica facilita la integración semántica de las contra-intuiciones religiosas haciéndolas más aceptables, mientras que una interpretación literal las convierte en anomalías. Las evidencias presentadas demuestran una estrecha relación entre contra-intuiciones y metáforas para explicar la recurrencia cultural del pensamiento religioso. [ABSTRACT] Exploring the causes behind the fact that religious thought is recurring and naturally found throughout human evolution is a field of growing scientific interest. The Cognitive Science of Religion has proposed that religious concepts are especially appealing because they are minimally counterintuitive. According to this hypothesis, religious ideas are characterized by a violation or transfer of some property (physical, biological or psychological) that is intuitively applied to objects or agents while the rest of their properties remain intact (e.g., a wise mountain). This makes them cognitive optimums; they capture our attention and they have a low processing cost, which makes them easier to remember. In addition, Contemporary Theory suggests that metaphors establish maps between concepts through the transfer of properties. The processing of metaphors takes place effortlessly, since they already are part of our conceptual system and they constitute a natural and spontaneous form of thought. The objective of this research is to analyze the neurocognitive mechanisms involved in the processing of counter-intuitive religious ideas presented outside of a narrative context, along with their relationship with metaphorical thought. To that end, we used the N400 waveform of the Event-Related Potentials to indicate how counter-intuitive an idea was. The semantic analysis of a sample set of ideas taken from different mythologies from all over the world revealed that 80% were technically counter-intuitive, according to the cognitive models o religion. Furthermore, in the first experiment these ideas were observed to be integrated more easily into the semantic system, which was reflected by a reduction in the N400, and to be hardly considered like semantic anomalies, compared to other types of non-religious counter-intuitive ideas. In the second experiment, we investigated whether the minimally counter-intuitiveness of religious ideas is related to the mode in which they are interpreted. To that end, different modes of interpretation were prompted (literal vs. metaphorical) for each one of these counter-intuitive ideas by asking questions regarding their semantic content. It was observed that a metaphorical interpretation facilitated the semantic integration of counter-intuitive religious concepts, making them more acceptable (reduction of the N400), while a literal interpretation made them semantic anomalies. The evidence presented here shows that there is a close relationship between counter-intuitive ideas and metaphors to explain the cultural recurrence of religious thought during the evolution of human culturesDepto. de Psicobiología y Metodología en Ciencias del ComportamientoFac. de PsicologíaTRUEunpu

Retinotopy of emotion: Perception of negatively valenced stimuli presented at different spatial locations as revealed by event-related potentials

Scarce previous data on how the location where an emotional stimulus appears in the visual scene modulates its perception suggest that, for functional reasons, a perceptual advantage may exist, vertically, for stimuli presented at the lower visual field (LoVF) and, horizontally, for stimuli presented at the left visual field (LeVF). However, this issue has been explored through a limited number of spatial locations, usually in a single spatial dimension (e.g., horizontal) and invariant eccentricities. Event-related potentials (ERPs) were recorded from 39 participants perceiving brief neutral (wheels) and emotional stimuli (spiders) presented at 17 different locations, one foveal and 16 at different peripheral coordinates. As a secondary scope, we explored the role of the magnocellular (M) and the parvocellular (P) visual pathways by presenting an isoluminant/heterochromatic (P-biased) and a heteroluminant/isochromatic version (M-biased) of each stimulus. Emo > Neu effects were observed in PN1 (120 ms) for stimuli located at fovea, and in PN2 (215 ms) for stimuli located both at fovea and diverse peripheral regions. A factorial approach to these effects further revealed that: (a) emotional stimuli presented in the periphery are efficiently perceived, without evident decrease from para- to perifovea; (b) peripheral Emo > Neu effects are reflected 95 ms later than foveal Emo > Neu effects in ERPs; (c) LoVF is more involved than UVF in these effects; (d) our data fail to support the LeVF advantage previously reported, and (e) Emo > Neu effects were significant for both M and P stimuliComunidad de Madrid, Grant/Award Number: HUM19-HUM5705; Ministerio de Ciencia, Innovación y Universidades, Grant/Award Number: PGC2018-093570-B-IO

Isolating the Effects of Word’s Emotional Valence on Subsequent Morphosyntactic Processing: An Event-Related Brain Potentials Study

Emotional information significantly affects cognitive processes, as proved by research in the past decades. Recently, emotional effects on language comprehension and, particularly, syntactic processing, have been reported. However, more research is needed, as this is yet very scarce. The present paper focuses on the effects of emotion-laden linguistic material (words) on subsequent morphosyntactic processing, by using Event-Related brain Potentials (ERP). The main aim of this paper is to clarify whether the effects previously reported remain when positive, negative and neutral stimuli are equated in arousal levels and whether they remain long-lasting. In addition, we aimed at testing whether these effects vary as a function of the task performed with the emotion-laden words, to assess their robustness across variations in attention and cognitive load during the processing of the emotional words. In this regard, two different tasks were performed: a reading aloud (RA) task, where participants simply read aloud the words, written in black on white background, and an Emotional Stroop (ES) task, where participants named the colors in which the emotional words were shown. After these words, neutral sentences followed, that had to be evaluated for grammaticality while recording ERPs (50% containing a morphosyntactic anomaly). ERP analyses showed main effects of valence across tasks on the two components reflecting morphosyntactic processing: The Left Anterior Negativity (LAN) is increased by previous emotional words (more by negative than positive) relative to neutral ones, while the P600 is similarly decreased. No interactions between task and valence were found. As a result, an emotion-laden word preceding a sentence can modulate the syntactic processing of the latter, independently of the arousal and processing conditions of the emotional word

Subliminal Priming Effects of Masked Social Hierarchies During a Categorization Task: An Event-Related Brain Potentials Study

published: 07 July 2022Evidence so far shows that status detection increases attentional resources, especially for high hierarchies. However, little is known about the effects of masked social status cues on cognition. Here, we explore the masked priming effects of social status cues during a categorization task. For this purpose, we use Event-Related brain Potentials (ERP) time-locked to the presentation of two types of artworks (Christian, non-Christian) primed by masked social hierarchies sorted into two types (religious, military), and in two ranks (high, low) each. ERP results indicate early attention effects at N1, showing larger amplitudes for the processing of artworks after high and military ranks. Thereafter, the P3a increased for all artworks primed by religious vs. military figures, indicating a relevant role of task demands at this processing stage. Our results remark the automaticity of hierarchy detection and extend previous findings on the effects of social status cues on complex cognitive processes.This work was supported by the MINECO (Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad, PSI2013-43107-P) and Ministerio de Ciencia, Investigación y Universidades (Programa Estatal de Investigación Científica y Técnica de Excelencia, PSI2017-82357-P), Spai

Prejudice drives exogenous attention to outgroups

Exogenous attention allows the automatic detection of relevant stimuli and the reorientation of our current focus of attention towards them. Faces from an ethnic outgroup tend to capture exogenous attention to a greater extent than faces from an ethnic ingroup. We explored whether prejudice toward the outgroup, rather than lack of familiarity, is driving this effect. Participants (N= 76) performed a digit categorization task while distractor faces were presented. Faces belonged to (i) a prejudiced outgroup, (ii) a non-prejudiced outgroup and (iii) their ingroup. Half of the faces were previously habituated in order to increase their familiarity. Reaction times, accuracy and event-related potentials (ERPs) were recorded to index exogenous attention to distractor faces. Additionally, different indexes of explicit and implicit prejudice were measured, the latter being significantly greater towards prejudiced outgroup. N170 amplitude was greater to prejudiced outgroup—regardless of their habituation status—than to both non-prejudiced outgroup and ingroup faces and was associated with implicit prejudice measures. No effects were observed at the behavioral level. Our results show that implicit prejudice, rather than familiarity, is under the observed attention-related N170 effects and that this ERP component may be more sensitive to prejudice than behavioral measures under certain circumstances.This work was supported by the Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación, Spain (PGC2018-093570-B-I00); the Universidad Autónoma de Madrid/Comunidad de Madrid, Spain (2017- T2/SOC-5569); the Comunidad de Madrid (HUM19-HUM5705, SI1-PJI-2019-00011); and by the Ministerio de Educación, Cultura y Deporte, Spain (FPU13/0651

The Automatic but Flexible and Content-Dependent Nature of Syntax

Syntactic processing has often been considered an utmost example of unconscious automatic processing. In this line, it has been demonstrated that masked words containing syntactic anomalies are processed by our brain triggering event related potential (ERP) components similar to the ones triggered by conscious syntactic anomalies, thus supporting the automatic nature of the syntactic processing. Conversely, recent evidence also points out that regardless of the level of awareness, emotional information and other relevant extralinguistic information modulate conscious syntactic processing too. These results are also in line with suggestions that, under certain circumstances, syntactic processing could also be flexible and context-dependent. However, the study of the concomitant automatic but flexible conception of syntactic parsing is very scarce. Hence, to this aim, we examined whether and how masked emotional words (positive, negative, and neutral masked adjectives) containing morphosyntactic anomalies (half of the cases) affect linguistic comprehension of an ongoing unmasked sentence that also can contain a number agreement anomaly between the noun and the verb. ERP components were observed to emotional information (EPN), masked anomalies (LAN and a weak P600), and unmasked ones (LAN/N400 and P600). Furthermore, interactions in the processing of conscious and unconscious morphosyntactic anomalies and between unconscious emotional information and conscious anomalies were detected. The findings support, on the one hand, the automatic nature of syntax, given that syntactic components LAN and P600 were observed to unconscious anomalies. On the other hand, the flexible, permeable, and context-dependent nature of the syntactic processing is also supported, since unconscious information modulated conscious syntactic components. This double nature of syntactic processing is in line with theories of automaticity, suggesting that even unconscious/automatic, syntactic processing is flexible, adaptable, and context-dependent

Event-related potentials associated to N-back test performance in schizophrenia

Producción CientíficaMapping of Event-Related Potentials (ERP) associated with auditory and visual odd-ball paradigms has shown consistent differences between healthy controls and schizophrenia patients. It may be hypothesized that higher task attentional/cognitive demand will result in larger differences in these paradigms, which may help understanding the substrates of cognitive deficits in this syndrome. To this aim, we performed an EEG study comparing the effects of increasing the attentional/cognitive load of an auditory N-back task on the Event-Related Potential in 50 subjects with schizophrenia (11 first episodes) and 35 healthy controls. We considered a post-target window of 1000 ms to explore possible between groups differences in N100, P300, and Late Slow Wave (LSW), and compared these components between 0-back (‘lower attentional/cognitive load) and 1-back (‘higher attentional/cognitive load’) conditions. Our results showed that N100 and LSW amplitude increase from 0- to 1-back condition was significantly larger in healthy controls compared to schizophrenia patients. Furthermore, LSW amplitude difference between 0- and 1-back conditions positively correlated with performance in the behavioral cognitive assessment. Taken together, these results support that higher task attentional/cognitive load (0-back vs. 1-back condition) increase N100 amplitude differences and reveal new findings related to the LSW component in schizophrenia.Junta de Castilla y León (project VA057P17)Instituto de Salud Carlos III (project PI18/00178

Satisfacción, Motivación y Necesidades del alumnado de la asignatura Psicobiología de la Educación

[EN] This educational innovation project consists of the elaboration of a questionnaire addressed to the students taking the subject Psychobiology of Education (from the education degrees of Universidad Complutense de Madrid), which assesses their satisfaction, motivation and needs in relation to this subject. It consists of a total of 40 items, with a closed-response Likert-type scale with options between 1 and 5, where 1 means "I do not agree at all" and 5 means "I totally agree". The main objective of this project is to find out the opinion of university students on teaching practice and the subject approach, in order to involve them actively in it, improve the teaching profession and promote educational innovation. The results of the questionnaire show the high motivation and satisfaction of the students towards this subject. They also highlight some needs that would improve their well-being and learning as well as the teaching of the subject, such as the applicability of the contents of the subject in the forthcoming professional development and a higher connection between this subject and the other ones of the degree.[ES] El presente proyecto de innovación educativa consiste en la elaboración de un cuestionario dirigido al alumnado de la asignatura Psicobiología de la Educación (de los grados de educación de la Universidad Complutense de Madrid), que valora su satisfacción, motivación y necesidades con respecto a dicha asignatura. Consta de un total de 40 ítems, de respuesta cerrada según la escala tipo Likert con opciones entre 1 y 5, donde el 1 significa “Nada de acuerdo” y el 5 “Totalmente de acuerdo”.El objetivo principal de este proyecto es conocer la opinión del alumnado universitario sobre la práctica docente y el planteamiento de la asignatura, para involucrarle activamente en la misma, mejorar la labor del profesorado y facilitar la innovación educativa.Los resultados del cuestionario muestran la alta motivación y satisfacción del alumnado con esta asignatura. A su vez ponen de relieve algunas necesidades que mejorarían su bienestar y aprendizaje, así como la docencia de la misma, tales como la aplicabilidad de los contenidos de la asignatura en la futura práctica profesional y una mayor vinculación de esta con las demás asignaturas del grado.López De Francisco, N.; Ruiz Gómez, A.; Fondevila Estévez, S.; Cerezo García, M.; Vergara Moragues, E. (2023). Satisfacción, Motivación y Necesidades del alumnado de la asignatura Psicobiología de la Educación. Editorial Universitat Politècnica de València. 915-929. https://doi.org/10.4995/INRED2023.2023.1663291592

Personality, psychopathology, life attitudes and neuropsychological performance among ritual users of ayahuasca: a longitudinal study

Ayahuasca is an Amazonian psychoactive plant beverage containing the serotonergic 5-HT2A agonist N,N-dimethyltryptamine (DMT) and monoamine oxidase-inhibiting alkaloids (harmine, harmaline and tetrahydroharmine) that render it orally active. Ayahuasca ingestion is a central feature in several Brazilian syncretic churches that have expanded their activities to urban Brazil, Europe and North America. Members of these groups typically ingest ayahuasca at least twice per month. Prior research has shown that acute ayahuasca increases blood flow in prefrontal and temporal brain regions and that it elicits intense modifications in thought processes, perception and emotion. However, regular ayahuasca use does not seem to induce the pattern of addiction-related problems that characterize drugs of abuse. To study the impact of repeated ayahuasca use on general psychological well-being, mental health and cognition, here we assessed personality, psychopathology, life attitudes and neuropsychological performance in regular ayahuasca users (n = 127) and controls (n = 115) at baseline and 1 year later. Controls were actively participating in non-ayahuasca religions. Users showed higher Reward Dependence and Self-Transcendence and lower Harm Avoidance and Self-Directedness. They scored significantly lower on all psychopathology measures, showed better performance on the Stroop test, the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test and the Letter-Number Sequencing task from the WAIS-III, and better scores on the Frontal Systems Behavior Scale. Analysis of life attitudes showed higher scores on the Spiritual Orientation Inventory, the Purpose in Life Test and the Psychosocial Well-Being test. Despite the lower number of participants available at follow-up, overall differences with controls were maintained one year later. In conclusion, we found no evidence of psychological maladjustment, mental health deterioration or cognitive impairment in the ayahuasca-using group

Los resultados de aprendizaje en la mejora de la formación de los alumnos. Profundización a partir de la concreción y formulación inicial para el Máster en Educación Especial de la Facultad de Educación

El proyecto, a partir de la formación del profesorado, durante el curso anterior, en la formulación y concreción de resultados de aprendizaje, tiene el objetivo de analizar las posibles lagunas de resultados de aprendizaje del Máster en Educación Especial de la UCM en relación con las competencias del título, así como estudiar la valoración por parte de los alumnos del Máster del fomento de los resultados de aprendizaje propuestos para cada asignatura, así como profundizar en las posibles mejoras en la metodología que podrían favorecer una mejora de la formación en términos de los citados resultados de aprendizaje