Key study conclusions and trivia

Phineas Gage’s iron rod length

109 cm long. 3 cm thick

Damasio et al conclusions

The ventromedial frontal region was involved with emotion and decision making

Sperry conclusions

• Left hemisphere is for processing of language

• Right hemisphere was able to read words, make mental associations, process emotional reactions and solve simple arithmetic

Bartlett War of the Ghosts: sample

20 British participants, 7 women, 13 men

Bartlett War of the Ghosts: repeated reproduction

First reproduction happened 15 minutes after reading, then participants recalled the story from 20 hours to almost 10 years

Bartlett War of the Ghosts: conclusions

• Accuracy in reproduction of the story is an exception rather than a norm of memory

• Significant amount of interference with the story from reconstructing it

Peterson & Peterson: procedure

• Participants will spell out a trigram and then will be given a number where they have to count backwards in either 3’s or 4’s

• Each participant was tested eight times at each of the following six recall intervals: 3 seconds, 6 seconds, 9 seconds, 12 seconds, 15 seconds and 18 seconds

Peterson & Peterson: results

With a 3 second interference interval, participants could recall just over 50% of the trigrams accurately. This dropped to less than 10% from 15 seconds onwards

Peterson & Peterson: conclusion

Accurate recall of the trigrams decreasing rapidly over the duration of 18 seconds, and very little accuracy shown in recall in 15 second and 18 second trials. Therefore, short-term memory has limited duration.

Freud Little Hans: giraffe dream

• There was a big giraffe and a crumpled one

• The big giraffe shouted because Little Hans took the crumpled one away

• Freud and Little Hans’ father thought the big giraffe was a symbol for a penis and Little Hans denied it

• It was later on assumed that the big giraffe was the father and the crumpled one his mother

Freud Little Hans: trivia of Little Hans

• In the phallic stage from about 3-5 years old

• Oedipus complex: where a boy would feel strong feelings of hatred for his father for possessing his mother who he wanted too

• He had a phobia of horses

Siffre: trivia

• Aged 33 years

• Underground cave in Texas for 6 months: february 14th - 5th of September

Siffre: Tasks he did

• recording blood pressure

• tasks to measure mental acuity

• tasks to measure memory

• tasks to measure physical dexterity, including:

  • a cycle machine to cycle 3 miles

  • firing a pellet rifle to test coordination

  • threading beads on string

• Shaving daily

• Cleaning the cave

Siffre: findings

Siffre’s sleep–wake cycle ranged from 18 to 52 hours, although each cycle felt like a ‘day’ to him

Piaget and Inhelder Three mountains: sample

21 were aged between 4 and 6 years old

30 were aged between 6 and 8 years old

33 were aged between 8 and 9 years old

16 were aged between 9 and 12 years old.

• 100 in total

Piaget and Inhelder Three mountains: results

4-6: mostly show their own viewpoint, but can rearrange the boards

7-12: attempts to reflect the viewpoint of the doll, but it is not consistent

9-12: able to view from the perspective o fthe doll

Gunderson et al Parent praise: sample

53 children from Chicago (29 boys, 24 girls) taken from a larger sample of 63 families who had been taking part in a study of language development. The sample represented the demographics of Chicago (income, race, ethnicity

Pilliavin: victim scenarios

• Drunk

• Sick (with the use of the cane)

Alongside these scenarios, the race of the victim was either black or white

Pilliavin: trivia

• A total of 4450 men and women were present over the duration of the scenes being staged. Approximately 55% were ‘white’ and 45% ‘black

• Staged scenes took place on a 7 minute continuous train between 59th street and 125th street stations in the New York subway

• Took place between 11:00 am - 3:00 pm

Pilliavin: conclusions

• Spontaneous helping occurred within 70 seconds, before a model could assist

• Bystanders are more likely to offer immediate help for an ill victim than a drunk victim.

• There is a tendency for same-race helpers to be more frequent, and also more likely to assist the drunk victim

• No race effect when helping the ill victim with the cane

• Men are more likely to help a male victim than women; the costs of not helping are lower for women (it’s not a woman’s role).

Pilliavin: results

• Help before 70 seconds for the ill, white victim was recorded in 52/57 trials.

• Help before 70 seconds for the ill, black victim was recorded in 7/8 trials.

Zimbardo: trivia

• 75 people responded to the advertisment in a newspaper

• 24 male participants were selected as normal, healthy males

• Each paid 15$ per day of the study

• 22 took part and 2 were kept on standby

• Prisoners were only referred to by their ID number

• Experiment ended on day 6, 8 days earlier than planned

Zimbardo: results

• Group interactions tended to be hostile

• Guards gave verbal orders that were impersonal to the prisoner and sometimes aggressive

• Prisoners were more passive to interaction

• Guards modified or ignored the rules

Bandura Bobo doll: sample

There were 72 children (36 were boys and 36 were girls), all aged between 37  and 69 months old and all from Stanford University nursery school. Two adults (one male and one female) acted as the role models

Bandura Bobo doll: results

• Boys imitated more physical aggression than girls

• Boys imitated more physical and verbal aggression after being exposed to the male  aggressive role model than to the female aggressive role model

Charlton et al: sample

a random sample of the school population of children aged between 3 and 8  years old was used. The number of children in the school was approximately 160

Charlton et al: resutls

• Significant differences were found between girls’ and boys’ levels of anti-social  behaviour, with boys committing nearly four times more anti-social acts.  

• Pro-social behaviour took place approximately twice as much as anti-social behaviour. 

Capsi et al: results

• Those who have at least one short version of the gene and had experienced stressful life events showed significant increase in symptoms of depression after the event and until their 26th birthday

• Those with the short version and had experienced stressful life events were more likely to be diagnosed with depression