Categorization is a fundamental process that underlies much of cognition. People form categories that allow them to generalize to and make inferences about novel objects and events. Current accounts of category learning suggest that there are two systems for learning categories, an explicit rule-based system that depends on frontal-striatal loops and working memory, and a procedural system that learns implicitly and depends on the tail of the caudate nucleus and occipital regions. In the present thesis, I propose that an additional declarative category learning system exists that is recruited to learn categories that are associated with multiple conjunctive and explicit, but not strictly rule-based, representations. The basis of the declarative category learning system is then tested in several behavioral and physiological recording experiments. The first issue that is examined in relation to the declarative category learning system is how subjects’ ability to encode stimuli affects their ability to form new flexible conjunctive representations. I provide evidence consistent with the idea that there are two ways to encode stimuli in category learning, either as a conjunction of individual parts or as holistic images. Forming part-based representations is found to be especially critical for forming new conjunctive representations for exceptions in brief single session experiments. A second question is how emotional processes interact with the declarative category learning system. Numerous lines of evidence suggest that emotional processes strongly affect learning and behavior. In a study using skin conductance, I find that anticipatory emotions (i.e., emotions present before a behavioral response) show a pattern consistent with orienting attention to behaviorally significant or potentially novel events. A final fMRI project ties together hypotheses about anticipatory emotions and encoding to their neural basis and provides a test of the predicted mapping of the declarative category learning system to the brain. By relating quantitative predictions from SUSTAIN, a model that shares relationships to the medial temporal lobes (MTL) and declarative category learning system, to fMRI data, I find clusters in an MTL-midbrain-PFC network that show patterns of activation consistent with recognizing exception items and updating these representations in response to error or surprise. / text

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Perceived control (PC), the degree to which individuals believe they have direct influence over events in their life, is often found to be associated with emotional well-being. Moreover, for over three decades, research has demonstrated that PC fosters health in advanced age. The mediational role of health in the PC and emotion relationship was investigated. Community-dwelling older adults (n = 232) were examined via secondary data analysis from the Aging in Manitoba (AIM) project and the Successful Aging Study (SAS). Separate mediational models were assessed for two different health mediators, self-rated health and health-related restrictions, and for positive and negative emotions. PC was found to benefit both physical and emotional well-being. The evidence of mediation was most compelling in the prediction of negative emotions and health-related restrictions. Findings have implications for treatment interventions in hopes to foster PC which in turn, should promote health and enhance later life emotional well-being.

Understanding the risk factors that contribute to sexual offending against children is an important topic for research. The present study set out to examine whether deficits in emotion recognition might contribute to sexual offending, by testing if child sexual offenders were impaired in their recognition of facial expressions of emotion, particularly with children, relative to non-offender controls. To do this, we tested 49 child sexual offenders and 46 non-offender controls on their ability to recognise facial expressions of emotion using photographs of both adults and children posing emotions from the Radboud Faces Database (Langner et al., 2010). We created continua along six emotion pairs (e.g. happiness-sadness) in 10% increments, from the emotions of sadness, anger, happiness, and fear, with morphing software. Using signal detection analyses, we found that across the emotion pairs, non-offenders were significantly better able to discriminate between emotions than offenders, although there were no significant differences within individual emotion pairs, and was not significant with either age or level of education as a covariate. When discriminating between fear and anger, non-offenders showed a significant bias towards labeling an emotion as fear when judging male faces, whereas offenders did not, and this difference remained significant with age, level of education and socioeconomic status as covariates. Additionally, both groups showed a strong bias towards labeling an emotion as anger when judging female faces. Thus sexual offenders were more likely to identify anger rather than fear with male faces, suggesting that sexual offenders lack an inhibition against recognising anger in males that non-offenders showed. Overall, contrary to our predictions, we found no evidence to indicate that child sexual offenders showed a specific deficit in their recognition of emotions in children. However, future research should continue to examine this area and its potential link to recidivism.

Purpose The  purpose  of  this  thesis  is  to  identify  the  role  of positive  emotions  in  project  failure  and  how  these emotions  affect  corporate  entrepreneurs´  decision-making and motivation. Theoretical perspective Entrepreneurial Failure, Emotions, Appraisal Theory, Attribution  Theory,  Psychological  Ownership,  Psychological Capital. Empirical foundation Seventeen respondents from 14 entrepreneurial companies  were  interviewed to identify  the role of positive emotions in  project failure and  their impact  on corporate entrepreneurs’  decision-making  and motivation in subsequent projects. Interviews were conducted by phone (1), audio conference (2), video conference (3) and face-to-face interviews (4). Conclusion We  offer  a  model,  which  shows  the  three  positive emotions that were found to be experienced in project failure, namely relief, confidence and challenge and their  impact  on  corporate  entrepreneurs’  decision-making and motivation in subsequent projects.

Perceived control (Rothbaum, Weisz, & Snyder, 1982) and achievement goals (Dweck & Leggett, 1988) are two widely studied motivational constructs that influence students’ emotions and achievement. The central focus of this dissertation was to explore the associations between achievement goals and perceived control in three studies. Each study used a separate cohort of first-year college students taken from the Motivation and Academic Achievement (MAACH) Project (1992-2005, N = 10,053). Study 1 (n = 752) was descriptive and tested the associations between goals, control, and attributions. The results demonstrated that primary control was very clearly defined by the controllability dimension of attributions; however, the other variables were less clear. The purpose of Study 2 (n = 360) was to test for reciprocal relationships between goals and control by using a two-wave four-variable cross-lag panel model. The best predictor of each Time 2 variable was its corresponding Time 1 counterpart. Additionally, the results showed that Time 1 mastery goals positively predicted Time 2 primary and secondary control, but no other relationships emerged. Study 3 (n = 251) extended the relationships between goals and control to predict students’ emotions and achievement. The direct and indirect effects implied by the following longitudinal model were tested: goals → control → emotions → achievement (Pekrun, 2006). Mastery goals positively predicted primary and secondary control, whereas performance goals positively predicted primary control only. Primary control was the main mediator between goals and negative emotions. Additionally, primary control had a positive direct effect on achievement, and thus mediated the effects of both mastery and performance goals on this outcome. Secondary control had a negative direct effect on achievement and consequently acted as a negative mediator between mastery goals and achievement. For mastery goals, anger, anxiety, and boredom functioned as positive mediators with achievement. These emotions also positively mediated the effects of primary control on achievement. Results of the three studies are discussed in terms of contributions to the separate literatures on achievement goals and perceived control and in terms of implications for students in new and challenging achievement settings.

The present paper explores vicarious emotional conditioning and some variables of dependency that may influence the rate of conditioning. Volunteer introductory psychology students were administered the Edwards Personality Preference Schedule using the deference and autonomy scales as criteria for classifying subjects as dependent or independent. Ten females and four males were randomly chosen for each group. All subjects underwent adaptation to a tone which served as a conditioned stimulus. Ten acquisition trials followed where each subject was exposed to witnessing an experimental stooge emiting pain cues to a fake shock. Six test trials were presented where the conditioned stimulus was presented alone. The measure of emotional reaction was the subject’s GSR. Mann-Whitney-U-Test was performed on the percent of GSRs elicited and a t-test on the GSR and BSR magnitude. The results indicated that dependent individuals elicited significantly more GSRs during the acquisition and test trials. No significant difference was found on GSR or BSR magnitudes. Possible relationships between introversion/extroversion and dependency/independency are presented and confounding variables are discussed.

Perceived control (Rothbaum, Weisz, & Snyder, 1982) and achievement goals (Dweck & Leggett, 1988) are two widely studied motivational constructs that influence students’ emotions and achievement. The central focus of this dissertation was to explore the associations between achievement goals and perceived control in three studies. Each study used a separate cohort of first-year college students taken from the Motivation and Academic Achievement (MAACH) Project (1992-2005, N = 10,053). Study 1 (n = 752) was descriptive and tested the associations between goals, control, and attributions. The results demonstrated that primary control was very clearly defined by the controllability dimension of attributions; however, the other variables were less clear. The purpose of Study 2 (n = 360) was to test for reciprocal relationships between goals and control by using a two-wave four-variable cross-lag panel model. The best predictor of each Time 2 variable was its corresponding Time 1 counterpart. Additionally, the results showed that Time 1 mastery goals positively predicted Time 2 primary and secondary control, but no other relationships emerged. Study 3 (n = 251) extended the relationships between goals and control to predict students’ emotions and achievement. The direct and indirect effects implied by the following longitudinal model were tested: goals → control → emotions → achievement (Pekrun, 2006). Mastery goals positively predicted primary and secondary control, whereas performance goals positively predicted primary control only. Primary control was the main mediator between goals and negative emotions. Additionally, primary control had a positive direct effect on achievement, and thus mediated the effects of both mastery and performance goals on this outcome. Secondary control had a negative direct effect on achievement and consequently acted as a negative mediator between mastery goals and achievement. For mastery goals, anger, anxiety, and boredom functioned as positive mediators with achievement. These emotions also positively mediated the effects of primary control on achievement. Results of the three studies are discussed in terms of contributions to the separate literatures on achievement goals and perceived control and in terms of implications for students in new and challenging achievement settings.

Perceived control (PC), the degree to which individuals believe they have direct influence over events in their life, is often found to be associated with emotional well-being. Moreover, for over three decades, research has demonstrated that PC fosters health in advanced age. The mediational role of health in the PC and emotion relationship was investigated. Community-dwelling older adults (n = 232) were examined via secondary data analysis from the Aging in Manitoba (AIM) project and the Successful Aging Study (SAS). Separate mediational models were assessed for two different health mediators, self-rated health and health-related restrictions, and for positive and negative emotions. PC was found to benefit both physical and emotional well-being. The evidence of mediation was most compelling in the prediction of negative emotions and health-related restrictions. Findings have implications for treatment interventions in hopes to foster PC which in turn, should promote health and enhance later life emotional well-being.

Charlotte Brontë wrote some memorable criticism of Jane Austen. What particularly affronted her was Jane Austen's treatment of emotion. This suggests grounds for comparison. If conducted historically the comparison makes more sense. It also helps to consider the novel as 'conjectural history', i.e. to assign (some) novels not to the category of make-believe (creating imaginary worlds which only make sense if certain conventions are accepted), nor that of lying (evoking possible but partial worlds for consolation), but that of guesswork (considering what might have happened in this world).