Abstract Central to many emotional responses is the accompanying peripheral somatic and autonomic arousal, feedback from which has been hypothesized to enhance emotional memory and to contribute to appraisal processes and decision making, and dysfunction of which may contribute to antisocial behaviour. Whilst peripheral arousal may accompany both positive and negative emotional contexts, its relationship with the former is poorly understood, as are the neural mechanisms underlying such a relationship. The purpose of the present study was to determine the autonomic correlates of anticipation, as well as consumption, of high incentive food, in the freely moving common marmoset and to investigate the contribution of the amygdala to such effects. Blood pressure (BP) and heart rate (HR) were measured remotely by a telemetric device implanted into the descending aorta and behavioural responses were monitored whilst marmosets viewed preferred or non‐preferred foods and were then allowed access to eat those foods. A marked rise in blood pressure in unrestrained marmosets was observed in response both to the sight of highly preferred foods (anticipatory period) as well as during the actual consumption of those foods (consummatory period). Excitotoxic lesions of the amygdala abolished the autonomic arousal in the anticipatory period, but spared both the behavioural arousal in the anticipatory period and the autonomic arousal in the consummatory period. Together these data serve as an important step towards understanding the role of autonomic arousal in emotion and its neural underpinnings.
The development of food preferences contributes to a balanced diet, and involves both innate and learnt factors. By associating flavour cues with the reinforcing properties of the food (i.e. postingestive nutrient cues and innately preferred tastes, such as sweetness), animals acquire individual preferences. How the brain codes and guides selection when the subject has to choose between different palatable foods is little understood. To investigate this issue, we trained common marmoset monkeys (Callithrix jacchus) to respond to abstract visual patterns on a touch-sensitive computer screen to gain access to four different flavoured juices. After preferences were stable, animals received excitotoxic lesions of either the amygdala, the orbitofrontal cortex or the medial prefrontal cortex. Neither the orbitofrontal nor the medial prefrontal cortex lesions affected pre-surgery-expressed flavour preferences or the expression of preferences for novel flavours post-surgery. In contrast, amygdala lesions caused a shift in the preferences for juices expressed pre-surgery such that, post-surgery, juices were chosen according to their overall carbohydrate (simple sugars) content or 'sweetness'. Subsequent tests revealed that amygdala-lesioned animals only expressed juice preferences if they differed in 'sweetness'. Unlike controls, orbitofrontal cortex-lesioned and medial prefrontal cortex-lesioned animals, they were unable to display preferences between juices matched for 'sweetness' i.e. 5% sucrose solutions aromatised with different essential oils. The most parsimonious explanation is that the amygdala contributes to the expression of food preferences based on learnt cues but not those based on an innate preference for sweetness.
Journal Article THE END OF A WAR Get access JOHN PARKINSON, D.Sc. JOHN PARKINSON, D.Sc. Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar African Affairs, Volume XXXIV, Issue CXXXIV, January 1935, Pages 72–74, https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordjournals.afraf.a100900 Published: 01 January 1935
The use of SAFMEDS cards, which stands for “Say All Fast Minute Every Day Shuffled” has been widely reported in the literature as an effective fluency-building tool. Most studies have focused on students with a learning disability or those classed as at risk of failing academically. In addition, most of the research has implemented SAFMEDS one-to-one or in small groups. We investigated the use of SAFMEDS in a high school setting, targeting basic maths skills across the whole class. Forty-eight students aged 11–12 years participated in the study over a 4-week period. Our results showed that using SAFMEDS to compliment students’ maths lessons can further increase basic maths skills when compared to standard maths classes alone. We also found that the gains were maintained at a 1 month follow-up. An application quiz showed that students could also transfer the information they had learned to real-world maths problems.
Chapter seven takes the results of the four previous chapters and discusses their implications for the analysis of deliberation per se (a micro phenomenon) and the deliberative quality of democratic systems (a macro one). After specifying contrasting implications of the additive and summative views, it then looks at what kinds of methods can address the key research questions that have arisen in the discussion, recommending a problem-led, pluralist approach rather than insisting that deliberative democracy can only be studied by either qualitative or quantitative means. The chapter then surveys a number of novel methods that can be used to map and measure deliberative quality, from formal indicators to more qualitative tools, including new computer-aided methods developed in corpus linguistics and psychology, and gives examples from a current project on Scottish independence.
Journal Article YORUBA FOLK-LORE Get access JOHN PARKINSON, M.A., F.G.S. JOHN PARKINSON, M.A., F.G.S. Formerly Principal Mineral Survey of Southern Nigeria Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar African Affairs, Volume VIII, Issue XXX, January 1909, Pages 165–186, https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordjournals.afraf.a098993 Published: 01 January 1909