Current Studies
Anticipated Affect
We are currently conducting research to study how emotion about a positive or negative event in the near future (anticipated affect) alters judgment of current emotions. If a student is taking a difficult exam (a current negative emotion) but are thinking of how much fun they will have with their friends this weekend (a future positive anticipation), then will they rate the exam as less negative or more negative compared to someone who was not anticipating anything? What about for a student who is at their friends house (a current positive emotion) but are dreading an upcoming exam that they will take tomorrow (a future negative anticipation), then how much fun will they say they had at their friends house?
Visual Focus and Sports Performance
Carolina Orsi
The brains of soccer players must smoothly adjust between internal and external cognitive pathways when making sports related decisions in order to optimize athletic performance. This study aims to find the connection between visual focus patterns and performance quality of a penalty kick task. It is hypothesized that if gaze coordination exhibits greater external focus, then less interference will occur among internal action signals. With less internal interference, an athlete may be able to execute skills with higher accuracy. The results of this study could contribute to future training programs that help athletes maximize their performance and skill execution consistency during play.
Attentional Parameterization and Saccadic Eye Movement
People diagnosed with ADHD have been found to have abnormal saccadic eye movements, movements of the eye towards stimuli to which we are attending. For example, in anti-saccade tasks (tasks where participants are required to not move their gaze towards distracting stimuli) participants with ADHD are less likely to inhibit their saccadic movement towards the distracting stimuli. The current study examines the role of reward and the rate of saccadic eye movement in modulating our ability to attend to stimuli. Basically, we hypothesize that when saccadic eye movements are rewarded for rapid shifts (rate), this will subsequently interfere with attentional processes later.
Creativity and Emotion
The "mad genius" character can be found in books, theater, movies, and other media throughout history. Many famous artists, musicians, speakers, actors, and poets have been diagnosed with anxiety and mood disorders, supporting this meme. We often associate great ability with great mental instability, but rarely stop to investigate the link further. This study attempts to investigate the connection between emotion and creative ability. We hypothesize that, as previous research has found, positive mood states increase creative ability. We also hope to clarify the link between negative mood states and creative ability to see if moods such as sadness, for example, help or hinder the creative process.
Future research into this area may examine correlations between emotional regulation and creative ability as well as the effects of creative task completion and emotional change.
Future research into this area may examine correlations between emotional regulation and creative ability as well as the effects of creative task completion and emotional change.
Effect of Anticipation on Risk-Taking in Framing Tasks
Are people more likely to take risks (gamble, engage in unprotected sex, drive fast) when they are anticipating positive or negative future events? The SACK Lab is currently conducting a study that tests whether anticipated affect states (thinking of a positive, negative, or neutral future event) lead to more risk taking in framing tasks.
Framing effects using spinners (Reyna, 1994; DeMartino et al., 2006) have found that individuals tend to avoid risk when a choice is framed as a "gain" (e.g., "Win $5 for sure by choosing the 100% red spinner) and to engage in risk when a choice is framed as a loss (i.e., "After receiving $10, you will lose $5 for sure when choosing the 100% red spinner, or you can choose the 50% red, 50% blue spinner and take a gamble by not losing the $10 or losing all of it" (Tversky & Kahneman, 1981). The current study induces participants into a desired anticipated affect state(positive, negative, or neutral) before they play the spinner game. It is hypothesized that if anticipation has an effect on risk-taking, then the positive and negative should reveal different spinner choices from the neutral anticipation condition and the control condition (no anticipation).
Framing effects using spinners (Reyna, 1994; DeMartino et al., 2006) have found that individuals tend to avoid risk when a choice is framed as a "gain" (e.g., "Win $5 for sure by choosing the 100% red spinner) and to engage in risk when a choice is framed as a loss (i.e., "After receiving $10, you will lose $5 for sure when choosing the 100% red spinner, or you can choose the 50% red, 50% blue spinner and take a gamble by not losing the $10 or losing all of it" (Tversky & Kahneman, 1981). The current study induces participants into a desired anticipated affect state(positive, negative, or neutral) before they play the spinner game. It is hypothesized that if anticipation has an effect on risk-taking, then the positive and negative should reveal different spinner choices from the neutral anticipation condition and the control condition (no anticipation).
Emotion and Information Processing
We are currently conducting research to study how different emotional states, for example, happy versus sad, affect how people process information. For example, how does watching a negative video affect how you experience a positive picture? We hope to find that the one’s experience of emotional events is contingent upon the emotional state prior to the event.
We will also be comparing to the results of this study to the results of the Anticipated Affect Study to see if there is a relationship between arousal and attentional focus.
We will also be comparing to the results of this study to the results of the Anticipated Affect Study to see if there is a relationship between arousal and attentional focus.
Helping Students and Student Effort: Give them Less and They'll Do More
This work examines the effect of student aides on student effort and motivation in the classroom. We hypothesize that in giving students materials to increase their knowledge and understanding of course material, we are inadvertently decreasing the amount of effort the student feels they should give to the course. This work is in the initial stages and a motivated student would be able to greatly contribute to design, construct and survey development, recruitment, sampling, and all aspects concerning data, from entry to analysis.
Intrusive Thoughts and Cognitive Dissonance Theory
Memory plays a large part in informing people of who they think they are: it colors how people view their past self, informs the current personal narrative that they create for themselves, and influences how they think they should act in the future. Memory also serves a protective function in informing who people think that they aren't. Why then do people have intrusive thoughts of non-representative schemas of the self and attribute these intrusive thoughts to their narrative (a problem especially prevalent in OCD patients)? This study will look to investigate the role that cognitive dissonance plays in ignoring or integrating these intrusive thoughts into the self-narrative that people form.
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Pain
The processing of pain is both an external (what is causing me pain?) and internal (the signals from the pain receptors themselves) attentional process. The current study uses Electroencephalogram (EEG) to examine how attentional processes can moderate the experience of pain.
Specifically, training participants in a higher arousal state should orient the attention of the participant towards external processing, inhibiting the processing of the internal signal for pain, producing 1) lower subjective reports of pain, and 2) an increase in the ability to withstand pain.
The Source of Emotion Generation in the Brain
This study uses EEG methodology to examine whether emotional experiences generated internally will show a distinct pattern from emotional experiences generated from an external source.