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Full-Text Articles in Social Psychology
Attitudes, William A. Cunningham, Ingrid J. Haas, Andrew Jahn
Attitudes, William A. Cunningham, Ingrid J. Haas, Andrew Jahn
Department of Political Science: Faculty Publications
This chapter reviews social neuroscience research that links social psychological attitudes and evaluative processes to their presumed neural bases. The chapter is organized into four parts. The first section discusses how attitude representations are transformed into evaluative states that can be used to guide thought and action. The next two sections address the related processes of attitude learning and change. The final section discusses applications of these concepts for the study of prejudice and political behavior.
Affective Flexibility: Evaluative Processing Goals Shape Amygdala Activity, William A. Cunningham, Jay J. Van Bavel, Ingrid Johnsen Haas
Affective Flexibility: Evaluative Processing Goals Shape Amygdala Activity, William A. Cunningham, Jay J. Van Bavel, Ingrid Johnsen Haas
Department of Political Science: Faculty Publications
Although early research implicated the amygdala in automatic processing of negative information, more recent research suggests that it plays a more general role in processing the motivational relevance of various stimuli, suggesting that the relation between valence and amygdala activation may depend on contextual goals. This study provides experimental evidence that the relation between valence and amygdala activity is dynamically modulated by evaluative goals. During functional magnetic resonance imaging, participants evaluated the positive, negative, or overall (positive plus negative) aspects of famous people. When participants were providing overall evaluations, both positive and negative names were associated with amygdala activation. When …