Emotions and reward – but no arousal?

2000 ◽  
Vol 23 (2) ◽  
pp. 217-218
Author(s):  
Holger Ursin
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Mechanisms ◽  
The Brain

This commentary argues for the inclusion of the neurophysiological arousal concept to help understanding the brain mechanisms of emotions and reward and the cognitive mechanisms involved.

Diagnosis as a Detriment: A Cognitive Approach to Understanding the Depressive Experience

2015 ◽  
Vol 17 (2) ◽  
pp. 125-134 ◽  
Author(s):  
Evan Hy Einstein
Keyword(s):  
Mental Health ◽  
Health Care ◽  
Theoretical Model ◽  
Mental Health Care ◽  
Cognitive Model ◽  
Clinical Applications ◽  
Psychotropic Medications ◽  
Cognitive Mechanisms ◽  
Cognitive Approach ◽  
The Brain

Depression is currently understood within a biomedical paradigm. This paradigm is an example of reductionism; people are clinically diagnosed and categorized based on behavior and affect, while they are then prescribed psychotropic medications based on an inconclusively correlated neurotransmitter imbalance in the brain. In this article, clinical diagnosis and labeling are explored with respect to their detrimental potential. A framework of embodied cognition is used to conceptualize a cognitive model of depressive experience. This theoretical model explores the potentially self-reinforcing cognitive mechanisms behind a depressive experience, with the goal of highlighting the possibility of diagnosis as a detrimental influence on these mechanisms. The aim of this article is to further a discussion about our current mental health care paradigm and provide an explanation as to how it could cause harm to some. Clinical applications of the model are also discussed pertaining to the potential of rendering formal dichotomist diagnoses irrelevant to the ultimate goal of helping people feel better.

A Computational Simulation of the Cognitive Process of Children Knowledge Acquisition and Memory Development

2012 ◽  
pp. 111-127
Author(s):  
Jeff Bancroft ◽  
Yingxu Wang
Keyword(s):  
Knowledge Representation ◽  
Knowledge Acquisition ◽  
Computational Simulation ◽  
Simulation Tool ◽  
Memory Development ◽  
Cognitive Mechanisms ◽  
Children's Memory ◽  
Mechanisms Of Memory ◽  
The Mathematical Model ◽  
The Brain

The cognitive mechanisms of knowledge representation, memory establishment, and learning are fundamental issues in understanding the brain. A basic approach to studying these mental processes is to observe and simulate how knowledge is memorized by little children. This paper presents a simulation tool for knowledge acquisition and memory development for young children of two to five years old. The cognitive mechanisms of memory, the mathematical model of concepts and knowledge, and the fundamental elements of internal knowledge representation are explored. The cognitive processes of children’s memory and knowledge development are described based on concept algebra and the object-attribute-relation (OAR) model. The design of the simulation tool for children’s knowledge acquisition and memory development is presented with the graphical representor of memory and the dynamic concept network of knowledge. Applications of the simulation tool are described by case studies on children’s knowledge acquisition about family members, relatives, and transportation. This work is a part of the development of cognitive computers that mimic human knowledge processing and autonomous learning.

Unveiling the Cognitive Mechanisms of Eyes

2014 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 36-50 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yingxu Wang
Keyword(s):  
Eye Movements ◽  
Knowledge Base ◽  
Crucial Role ◽  
Cognitive Mechanisms ◽  
Brain Science ◽  
Internal Memory ◽  
Cognitive Knowledge ◽  
The Mind ◽  
The Brain

Eyes as the unique organ possess intensively direct connections to the brain and dynamically perceptual accessibility to the mind. This paper analyzes the cognitive mechanisms of eyes not only as the sensory of vision, but also the browser of internal memory in thinking and perception. The browse function of eyes is created by abstract conditioning of the eye's tracking pathway for accessing internal memories, which enables eye movements to function as the driver of the perceptive thinking engine of the brain. The dual mechanisms of the eyes as both the external sensor of the brain and the internal browser of the mind are explained based on evidences and cognitive experiences in cognitive informatics, neuropsychology, cognitive science, and brain science. The finding on the experiment's internal browsing mechanism of eyes reveals a crucial role of eyes interacting with the brain for accessing internal memory and the cognitive knowledge base in thinking, perception, attention, consciousness, learning, memorization, and inference.

Music and Movement

2018 ◽  
pp. 40-61
Author(s):  
Jay Schulkin
Keyword(s):  
Instrumental Music ◽  
Sense Of Self ◽  
Social Contact ◽  
Aesthetic Judgment ◽  
Human Condition ◽  
Human Society ◽  
Cognitive Mechanisms ◽  
Aesthetic Sense ◽  
Sense Of Time ◽  
The Brain

Music and movement go together in every human society: “music to my feet,” as it were. The human condition, particularly human emotional expression, is linked to music. Indeed, movement and a sense of time are intimately connected, and the brain is prepared to detect movement, both familiar and unfamiliar. Our sense of self is tied to movement. Aesthetic sense is a feature of the way we come prepared to interpret the world. Such aesthetics are historically variable and rich when the ecological conditions are suitable. Aesthetic judgment reflects our cognitive flexibility, and our extension and use of specific cognitive mechanisms to widen domains of human expression. Music evolved in the context of social contact and meaning. Music continues to allow us to reach out to others and expand our human experience toward and with others. This process began with sounds and expanded into song and instrumental music.

Formal Models and Cognitive Mechanisms of the Human Sensory System

2013 ◽  
Vol 5 (3) ◽  
pp. 55-75 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yingxu Wang
Keyword(s):  
Sensory System ◽  
Cognitive Mechanisms ◽  
Neural Signals ◽  
Sensory Neural ◽  
Comprehensive Framework ◽  
Strategic Project ◽  
Cognitive Robots ◽  
Physical And Chemical ◽  
The Brain ◽  
Theoretical Foundations

The human sensory system is a perfect natural real-time distributed system. It transforms physical and chemical stimuli of the external environment into electronic neural signals by specialized sensory receptors. This paper presents a comprehensive framework of the human sensory system as well as its cognitive and theoretical foundations. A set of primary and perceptual sensory and neural receptors is formally modeled and analyzed. Sensory neural interfaces and interactions to the central and peripheral nervous systems of the brain and associated memories are systematically described. This work is a part of a strategic project towards the development of cognitive computers and cognitive robots.

scholarly journals Emotional bonds: Bridging the gap between evolutionary and humanistic accounts of religious belief

2020 ◽  
Vol 42 (1) ◽  
pp. 6-28
Author(s):  
Léon Turner
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Science ◽  
Religious Belief ◽  
Social Bonding ◽  
Cognitive Mechanisms ◽  
Cognitive Science Of Religion ◽  
Evolutionary Account ◽  
Emotional Bonds ◽  
Pluralistic Approach ◽  
The Brain ◽  
Broad Consensus

Recent years have seen a growing willingness in the evolutionary cognitive science of religion (ECSR) to embrace an inclusive, theoretically pluralistic approach and the emergence of a broad consensus around some key themes that collectively constitute a central theoretical core of the field. Nevertheless, ECSR still raises serious problems for some in the humanities. In exploring the reasons for the perception of conflict between humanistic and cognitive evolutionary approaches to religion, I suggest that both ECSR’s default account of the origins of religion and religion’s role in social bonding rely upon notions of culturally unmediated universal cognitive mechanisms that preclude alternative humanistic explanations. I subsequently suggest that the gap between humanistic approaches and the evolutionary study of religion more broadly conceived may be narrowed by further expanding ECSR to include recent research into the brain opioid theory of social attachment (BOTSA), which emphasises the emotional rather than cognitive basis of religion’s social bonding functions. Finally, I outline a possible evolutionary account of the earliest forms of religious ideas and practices, which decouples the origins of religion from the evolution of specialised cognitive machinery and which humanists are likely to find more amenable than mainstream ECSR.

Machine Learning and Cognitive Algorithms for Engineering Applications

2013 ◽  
Vol 7 (4) ◽  
pp. 64-82 ◽  
Author(s):  
Leonid Perlovsky ◽  
Gary Kuvich
Keyword(s):  
Fuzzy Logic ◽  
Cognitive Processes ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Abstract Concepts ◽  
Cognitive Mechanisms ◽  
Research Directions ◽  
Semiotic Approach ◽  
Future Research Directions ◽  
The Brain ◽  
Universal Representation

Mind is based on intelligent cognitive processes, which are not limited by language and logic only. The thought is a set of informational processes in the brain, and such processes have the same rationale as any other systematic informational processes. Their specifics are determined by the ways of how brain stores, structures, and process this information. Systematic approach allows representing them in a diagrammatic form that can be formalized. Semiotic approach allows for the universal representation of such diagrams. In that approach, logic is a way of synthesis of such structures, which is a small but clearly visible top of the iceberg. The most efforts were traditionally put into logics without paying much attention to the rest of the mechanisms that make the entire thought system working autonomously. Dynamic fuzzy logic is reviewed and its connections with semiotics are established. Dynamic fuzzy logic extends fuzzy logic in the direction of logic-processes, which include processes of fuzzification and defuzzification as parts of logic. The paper reviews basic cognitive mechanisms, including instinctual drives, emotional and conceptual mechanisms, perception, cognition, language, a model of interaction between language and cognition upon the new semiotic models. The model of interacting cognition and language is organized in an approximate hierarchy of mental representations from sensory percepts at the “bottom” to objects, contexts, situations, abstract concepts-representations, and to the most general representations at the “top” of mental hierarchy. Knowledge Instinct and emotions are driving feedbacks for these representations. Interactions of bottom-up and top-down processes in such hierarchical semiotic representation are essential for modeling cognition. Dynamic fuzzy logic is analyzed as a fundamental mechanism of these processes. Future research directions are discussed.

scholarly journals Dementing brain processes in patients with Wilson’s disease and multiple sclerosis (pathogenesis and treatment approaches)

2019 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Multiple Sclerosis ◽  
Cognitive Impairment ◽  
Wilson’S Disease ◽  
Early Stage ◽  
Critical Mass ◽  
Wilson's Disease ◽  
Biological Aging ◽  
Cognitive Mechanisms ◽  
The Impact ◽  
The Brain

This article discusses various aspects of dementing processes in patients with Wilson’s disease (WD) and multiple sclerosis (MS), followed by a discussion of current pathogenetic treatment methods for these patients. A comprehensive clinical and laboratory study showed that the pathogenesis and staged development of the dementing process in patients with WD and MS largely coincides with those in patients with Alzheimer's disease and depends on three groups of factors: genetic predisposition, natural (biological) aging, and endo and exogenous pathogenic factors effects on the brain. Therefore, on the basis of the data presented by us, as well as literature data, it allows us to state that dementia is an organic pathophysiological syndrome of destruction of the critical mass of structural-functional blocks and systems of cognitive mechanisms of the brain. Each individual has his own, genetically determined, critical mass of cognitive mechanisms. Like any false system, this one is ultimately subject to both natural (slow) decay and pathological (accelerated) decay due to the death of neurons both in the type of apoptosis and in the type of necrosis. Thus, in patients with WD and MS, the pathogenetic process always involves structures sooner or later that ensure the functioning of the cognitive functions of the brain and lead to the development of their defects, therefore, therapy should be prescribed for the treatment of these patients. Dementia should be treated at its early stage, at the stage of cognitive impairment (CI). The general principles of managing patients with CI are the determination of the etiopathogenetic cause underlying the development of cognitive impairment, the reduction in the degree and prevention of the progression of cognitive deficit and the impact, if possible, on risk factors. Also, at all stages of cognitive deficiency, treatment of concomitant somatic diseases and correction of the emotional state are relevant. Therefore, timely prescribed comprehensive, pathogenetically substantiated personified therapy helps prevent irreversible consequences and improves the quality of life of patients.

scholarly journals Focused learning promotes continual task performance in humans

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Timo Flesch ◽  
Jan Balaguer ◽  
Ronald Dekker ◽  
Hamed Nili ◽  
Christopher Summerfield
Keyword(s):  
Machine Learning ◽  
Task Performance ◽  
State Of The Art ◽  
Mutual Interference ◽  
Task Space ◽  
Cognitive Mechanisms ◽  
Analysis Of Error ◽  
Task Representations ◽  
The Brain ◽  
Continual Learning

AbstractHumans can learn to perform multiple tasks in succession over the lifespan (“continual” learning), whereas current machine learning systems fail. Here, we investigated the cognitive mechanisms that permit successful continual learning in humans. Unlike neural networks, humans that were trained on temporally autocorrelated task objectives (focussed training) learned to perform new tasks more effectively, and performed better on a later test involving randomly interleaved tasks. Analysis of error patterns suggested that focussed learning permitted the formation of factorised task representations that were protected from mutual interference. Furthermore, individuals with a strong prior tendency to represent the task space in a factorised manner enjoyed greater benefit of focussed over interleaved training. Building artificial agents that learn to factorise tasks appropriately may be a promising route to solving continual task performance in machine learning.Significance StatementHumans learn to perform many different tasks over the lifespan, such as speaking both French and Spanish. The brain has to represent task information without mutual interference. In machine learning, this "continual learning" is a major unsolved challenge. Here, we studied the patterns of errors made by humans and state-of-the-art deep networks whilst they learned new tasks from scratch and without instruction. Humans, but not machines, seem to benefit from training regimes that focussed on one task at a time, especially when they had a prior bias to represent stimuli in a way that facilitated task separation. Machines trained to exhibit the same prior bias suffered less interference between tasks, suggesting new avenues for solving continual learning in artificial systems.

Play

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sergio M. Pellis ◽  
Vivien C. Pellis
Keyword(s):  
Computational Models ◽  
Explanatory Power ◽  
Social Play ◽  
Social Partner ◽  
Cognitive Mechanisms ◽  
Emotional Resilience ◽  
Object Play ◽  
New Methods ◽  
The Brain ◽  
Made In

Play behavior is relatively rare in the animal kingdom, but is widespread, and in some lineages is very common not only in childhood but also in adulthood. It can take many forms, as playful actions can be directed to a social partner (social play), to an inanimate object (object play), or self-directed, as the animal, jumps, runs, and turns (locomotor-rotational play). Considerable progress has been made in understanding the neural, emotional, and cognitive mechanisms mammals use in regulating social play, but whether comparable mechanisms are used to regulate other forms of play, or apply to non-mammalian animals, remains to be resolved. Similarly, social play in some mammals has been demonstrated to benefit the development of sociocognitive skills and emotional resilience, while locomotor-rotational play can benefit the development of motor skills. The factors that allow some species to gain these benefits also remain to be resolved. Statistical approaches that take the relatedness of species into account are increasingly being applied to analyze a growing comparative database that includes species from many different lineages. In addition, mathematical and computational models are being used to test the explanatory power of various factors to account for the evolution of play. Coupled with new methods in neuroscience that provide a deeper understanding of the brain during play, these approaches will enable extraordinary progress in understanding play over the next few decades.

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