Deconstructed Research Methods - Report Example

Deconstructed Research Methods Name Institution Deconstructed Research Methods Introduction Psychology is the science of understanding the behavior and mind of individuals, which bear the same goal with other fields, philosophies, and disciplines, for instance, history, theology, or philosophy, however, psychology has a different approach. Psychology is the study of the mind and behavior via comprehensive scientific investigation. The paper will study the prosopagnosia as a disorder to understand the psychology of mind and behavior. Prosopagnosia (also referred as “face blindness” ) is a disorder, which is visuo-cognitive in nature that is characterized by failure in familiar face detection. This disorder may be acquired due to brain injury, , or in most cases may be present as a lifetime impairment in face processing. The latter type of this disorder has been termed as ‘developmental prosopagnosia’ (DP) has been characterized by serious face processing impairment in the absence of neurological damage and intellectual or visual dysfunction (Ellis & Lewis, 2001). Current research has indicated that the disorder can be inherited and can run down families; therefore, it has suggested that this disorder might be genetic underpinning to the disorder. There are two kinds of covert recognition. The behavioral covert recognition is appraised utilizing indicators that include reaction time (RT), while physiological covert recognition has classically been measured utilizing the skin conductance response (SCR). Conventionally, the dissociation between the two kinds of the covert recognition has been contained using the dual-route models of face processing. Ellis & Lewis, (2001) says models argue that behavioral covert recognition happens within a cognitive pathway that contains face recognition units, semantic information units and person identity nodes. According to Avidan & Behrmann (2008) they claimed that behavioral covert recognition may be explained by a disconnection between face recognition units and person identity nodes. It has been thought that the pathway bifurcate at the levels of the face recognition units, thus generating a second efficient route, which mediates emotional responses to familiar faces. Therefore, the efficient reaction is mirrored in person’s increased SCR for familiar in comparison with new faces. According to some theories, covert recognition may be prominent in prosopagnosics who have encountered a period of normal face processing before acquiring the condition meaning that the phenomenon cannot be easily identified. In addition, previous research has indicated that since face recognition units are affected in both behavioral and physiological covert recognition which makes the observation of DP in both cases difficult. It has been established that purposely, even when DP contributor failed to distinguish a well-known face, he made less fixations to that face and sampled less facial characteristics than he did for faces of new persons. This can be interpreted to mean that less information is required to process well-known in comparison with new faces, even when that face is not overtly acknowledged. Furthermore, research has indicated that if this is the case, the SCR rise for each recognizable face must correlate with his efficient ratings of the celebrities, however not his familiarity ratings (Ellis & Lewis, 2001). Despite the several researches undertaken, it still remain large that several elements of the disorders’ neutral and cognitive profile remain unknown ,and the degree to which other processes may be impacted by the disorder is still not clear. These processes comprises of face, unconscious, and covert recognition. In covert recognition, there are two different kinds which are behavioral covert recognition and physiological covert recognition (Bate et al, 2009). Face recognition has played a leading role in social interaction for millions of years in different species hence making it a vital topic. Therefore, the topic is interesting and important because researchers have struggled over 35 years to find out the mechanisms that are behind this disorder. The paper will examine the disorder to find out the impacts of psychology in understanding mind and behavior of an individual. Aim of the Research It has conventionally been considered that covert face recognition cannot be viewed in developmental instances of prosopagnosia, since the occurrence is thought to depend on the establishment of face representations developed during a period of usual processing The paper aims to investigate how prosopagnosia as a disorder affects individuals’ mind and behavior. Therefore, the research will look at how this research will affect individuals from recognizing familiar faces. This implies that mechanisms different from those producing other visual recognition mechanisms will be studied to find the effects of psychology (Avidan & Behrmann, 2008). Research Questions 1. What is the cause of prosopagnosia among the individuals? 2. How the disorder caused and what is the side effect of the disorder on other mechanisms? 3. Is prosopagnosia curable? Method Participants In the research, one right-handed man with DP (WS) participated in the study. WS is a retired quantity surveyor who was aged 61 years at the moment of testing. He has lifespan impairments concerning face recognition where 20m adults were requested to rate the familiarity of the faces using a scale 1 to 5 (1 represents those who are not familiar, and 5 representing those with highly familiar faces). The final stimulus set involved popular faces judged to be greatly familiar by more than 80% of the participants. Every image was attuned to 650 pixels in elevation and 500 pixels in width, and shown in the center of a 14-inch laptop computer screen, utilizing Microsoft PowerPoint (2007). The SCR was monitored utilizing the NeXus-4 system (MindMedia). Procedure Participants for the research were seated in a calm room, 60 cm from the screen. The SCR unit was linked by attaching two small sensors to the palmer surface of the proximal phalanx of the middle and left index fingers of respondent’s non-dominant hand. A 4-min recording of the SCR was at first carried out to determine a steady baseline. Responds were then given 45 faces in a random order (Bate et al, 2009). Every face was shown for 2 seconds, followed by a 20- to 25-sbreak in which a blank screen was presented. The respondents were given instructions to inactively attend the faces and were not needed to make any reply, since this may hinder the SCR recording. Controls made identical observations in response to the faces, however did not take part in the name version of the assignment. Results As projected, a related-samples t test shown that the mean increase in SCR for controls was elevated for well-known faces (M = 0.31, SE = 0.11) as compared to new (M= 0.19, SE = 0.08) faces, t (9)=2.112, p= .032,d = .382. Nevertheless, there was no such disparity between well-known (M = 0.13, SE = 0.01) and new (M = 0.17, SE = 0.01) faces was acknowledged for WS, t (32) = .670, p = .431, signifying that he was not covertly distinguishing the celebrities used in the research. For every individual, the SCR rise for every well-known face correlated against ratings of pleasantness and familiarity. In controls familiarity ratings were elevated in all participants (M =5.34, SE = .14, range 4–6), and provided with the limited range of reactions on the Likert scale, it was predictable that a major correlation did not appear between the SCR raise and awareness ratings for any contributor (Bate et al, 2009). Discussion The research majorly used SCR to investigate covert recognition in then instance of DP. In relation to the previous study, control participants in the study showed high SCR for well-known faces in comparison with new faces, yet no such disparities was visible in patient WS. Though no correlation was evident between the SCR and emotional ratings in controls (showing that they were processing faces according to acquaintance only), a well-built pessimistic correlation between these measures was identified for WS, however only for emotional ratings given in response to name indications. Furthermore, the results indicated that WS was covertly contacting his identity-specific emotional knowledge regarding the celebrities (Bate et al, 2009). Certainly, WS’ SCR rise only interrelated with emotional ratings when he understood the characteristics of the faces (when given with name indications), and did not associate with emotional ratings given in response to facial facade only -when he was naive of every individual’s characteristics). This model of findings increases the likelihood that, at least in some instances of DP, hidden face identification may show emotional rather than familiarity processing. Current neurophysiological proof from healthy practitioners offers a hypothesis about the neutral pathways, which might strengthen emotional covert recognition in DP. It is also clear that liked faces educed powerful activation in the fusiform gyrus as compared to neutral and disliked faces. These untimely influences of the emotion may represent rapid coarse categorizations in perceptual pathways, which run in parallel to structural encoding, eliciting a primary affective response as well as offering quick response to visual cortex (Bate et al, 2009). There was a negative connection between the SCR rise and emotional ratings of the celebrities; however this is not essentially a challenge for the study. Certainly, whilst it is presently unclear what the SCR in reality represents, it is probable to represent a non-directional blunt assessment of the degree of an emotional response to a stimulus, in spite of whether it is powerfully disliked or liked. Future Research Research has indicated that the disorder has no formal treatment or cure. Nonetheless, several researchers are currently working on the disorder. Some of the studies currently focuses on understanding or advancing the basis and causes of the disorder, whereas after other researchers are investigating the effectiveness of training programs tailored to promote face recognition (Avidan & Behrmann, 2008). Therefore, the future is promising in getting new treatment for the disorder. This means that there is need to undertake numerous studies by several researchers to establish and explore the new fields and knowledge and pursue the treatment for prosopagnosia. Consequently, governments, individuals, and agencies undertaking research on prosopagnosia must ensure that they have the relevant resources and equipments to promote research (Bate et al, 2009). Conclusion Prosopagnosia is a neuropsychological state entailing the incapability to distinguish faces of people they are familiar with. It is said to be a neurological, since it entails the brain, any injury done to an explicit area of the brain damages the patient from acknowledging faces. The explicit region of the brain in charge for this disorder is the fusiform gyrus which is component of the temporal lobe. This is also referred to as occipitotemporal gyrus (Avidan & Behrmann, 2008). Researchers deduce therefore, that the difficulty has something to do with the fusiform gyrus itself or in the neural routes, which relay information from that region to other parts of the brain, similar to the occipital lobe that processes visual information. Accordingly, prosopagnosics typically depend on style of walking, voice, hairstyle, and clothing to get appreciation of the individual they habitually meet up or are in contact with (Ellis & Lewis, 2001). References Avidan, G., & Behrmann, M. (2008). Implicit familiarity processing in congenital prosopagnosia. Journal of Neuropsychology, 2, 141– 164.doi:10.1348/174866407X260180. Bate, S., Haslam, C., Jansari, A., & Hodgson, T. L. (2009). Covert face recognition relies on affective valence in congenital prosopagnosia. Cognitive Neuropsychology, 26, 391– 411. doi:10.1080/02643290903175004. Bukowitz, Wendi and Williams, Ruth L. (2000). The Knowledge Management Fieldbook. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson. Caramazza, A., & Mahon, B. Z. (2003). The organization of conceptual knowledge: The evidence from category-specific semantic deficits. Trends in Cognitive Science, 7, 354– 361. Caramazza, A., & Shelton, J. R. (1998). Domain-specific knowledge systems in the brain: The animate–inanimate distinction. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 10, 1–34. Ellis, H. D., & Lewis, M. B. (2001). Capgras delusion: A window on face recognition. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 5, 149–156. doi:10.1016/S1364-6613(00)01620-X Maninger, R. M. (2006). Students Test Scores Improved in an English Literature Courses through the Use of Supportive Device. Techtrends: Linking Research & Practice to Improve Learning, 50(5), 37-45. Nevid, J. S. (2013). Psychology: Concepts and applications. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth Cengage Learning. Ohara, S. (2013). What is the Impact of Technology on Learning?. Online Source. Retrieved from http://www.education.com/reference/article/what-impact-technology- learning/?page=4 Sue, D., Sue, D., Sue, Stanley, & Sue, Derald Wing. (2013). Understanding abnormal behavior. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth/Cengage Learning. Read More

Therefore, the efficient reaction is mirrored in person’s increased SCR for familiar in comparison with new faces. According to some theories, covert recognition may be prominent in prosopagnosics who have encountered a period of normal face processing before acquiring the condition meaning that the phenomenon cannot be easily identified. In addition, previous research has indicated that since face recognition units are affected in both behavioral and physiological covert recognition which makes the observation of DP in both cases difficult.

It has been established that purposely, even when DP contributor failed to distinguish a well-known face, he made less fixations to that face and sampled less facial characteristics than he did for faces of new persons. This can be interpreted to mean that less information is required to process well-known in comparison with new faces, even when that face is not overtly acknowledged. Furthermore, research has indicated that if this is the case, the SCR rise for each recognizable face must correlate with his efficient ratings of the celebrities, however not his familiarity ratings (Ellis & Lewis, 2001).

Despite the several researches undertaken, it still remain large that several elements of the disorders’ neutral and cognitive profile remain unknown ,and the degree to which other processes may be impacted by the disorder is still not clear. These processes comprises of face, unconscious, and covert recognition. In covert recognition, there are two different kinds which are behavioral covert recognition and physiological covert recognition (Bate et al, 2009). Face recognition has played a leading role in social interaction for millions of years in different species hence making it a vital topic.

Therefore, the topic is interesting and important because researchers have struggled over 35 years to find out the mechanisms that are behind this disorder. The paper will examine the disorder to find out the impacts of psychology in understanding mind and behavior of an individual. Aim of the Research It has conventionally been considered that covert face recognition cannot be viewed in developmental instances of prosopagnosia, since the occurrence is thought to depend on the establishment of face representations developed during a period of usual processing The paper aims to investigate how prosopagnosia as a disorder affects individuals’ mind and behavior.

Therefore, the research will look at how this research will affect individuals from recognizing familiar faces. This implies that mechanisms different from those producing other visual recognition mechanisms will be studied to find the effects of psychology (Avidan & Behrmann, 2008). Research Questions 1. What is the cause of prosopagnosia among the individuals? 2. How the disorder caused and what is the side effect of the disorder on other mechanisms? 3. Is prosopagnosia curable? Method Participants In the research, one right-handed man with DP (WS) participated in the study.

WS is a retired quantity surveyor who was aged 61 years at the moment of testing. He has lifespan impairments concerning face recognition where 20m adults were requested to rate the familiarity of the faces using a scale 1 to 5 (1 represents those who are not familiar, and 5 representing those with highly familiar faces). The final stimulus set involved popular faces judged to be greatly familiar by more than 80% of the participants. Every image was attuned to 650 pixels in elevation and 500 pixels in width, and shown in the center of a 14-inch laptop computer screen, utilizing Microsoft PowerPoint (2007).

The SCR was monitored utilizing the NeXus-4 system (MindMedia). Procedure Participants for the research were seated in a calm room, 60 cm from the screen. The SCR unit was linked by attaching two small sensors to the palmer surface of the proximal phalanx of the middle and left index fingers of respondent’s non-dominant hand. A 4-min recording of the SCR was at first carried out to determine a steady baseline.

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