Fleeing From the Fear of The Mind’s Eye
| dc.contributor.author | Hajiloo, Marzieh (Marianne) | |
| dc.contributor.examiningcommittee | Ryan Giuliano (Psychology) | |
| dc.contributor.examiningcommittee | Randall K. Jamieson (Psychology) | |
| dc.contributor.supervisor | Greening, Steven | |
| dc.date.accessioned | 2023-11-07T15:17:24Z | |
| dc.date.available | 2023-11-07T15:17:24Z | |
| dc.date.issued | 2023-11-06 | |
| dc.date.submitted | 2023-11-06T23:29:51Z | en_US |
| dc.degree.discipline | Psychology | en_US |
| dc.degree.level | Master of Arts (M.A.) | |
| dc.description.abstract | Mental imagery can elicit strong emotional reactions. Recent research indicates that fear conditioned responses can be acquired to imagined conditioned stimuli paired with a physical unconditioned stimulus (Burleigh et al. 2022). However, it remains unclear whether imagery fear acquisition is consistent with the depictive theory, in which mental images can be stored in a depictive, pictorial format consistent with a subjective experience of imagery vividness, or if this finding is confounded by participants forming the association through a descriptive, linguistic process. The present study (N=52) aimed to deepen our understanding of the underlying mechanism of mental imagery in the context of differential fear conditioning by combining the imagery-based differential fear conditioning paradigm (Burleigh et al. (2022)), with a behavioral avoidance paradigm (Boyle et al., 2016). In addition, a manipulation of the imagery cue was added to the experimental paradigm in which participants heard two distinct auditory cues (instruction modality: imagine color vs imagine orientation) and received shock only for a specific instruction modality, throughout the experiment. Inconsistent with our primary hypothesis, participants did not exhibit significant differences in the skin conductance responses (SCRs) and the self-report ratings of fear during the acquisition phase. As for the behavioral avoidance phase, different results for different instruction modalities were obtained which contradicted our primary hypothesis. Finally, for the generalization phase, significant differential conditioning to imagined conditioned stimuli, regardless of the instruction modality, was reflected through self-reported fear, proportional avoidance, and SCR. Also, participants exhibited higher SCR and reported higher levels of fear in response to GCS+ (Generalized Conditioned Stimuli, which were visual depictions of the previously imagined stimuli) than GCS-, which, as predicted, indicated successful fear generalization. However, inconsistent with primary hypothesis, no significant difference in avoidance attempts was observed between GCS+ and GCS- trials. More importantly, during color modality trials in the generalization phase, significantly higher SCR was observed for CS+ trials than CS- trials. In conclusion, the findings from the cue manipulation raise the possibility that descriptive knowledge contributes to differential conditioning with imagined CSs. Yet, the mixed results obtained in the generalization phase, particularly regarding the color modality trials, supports the depictive theory. | |
| dc.description.note | February 2024 | |
| dc.identifier.uri | http://hdl.handle.net/1993/37762 | |
| dc.language.iso | eng | |
| dc.rights | open access | en_US |
| dc.subject | Mental Imagery | |
| dc.subject | Fear Conditioning | |
| dc.subject | Fear Generalization | |
| dc.subject | Behavioral Avoidance | |
| dc.title | Fleeing From the Fear of The Mind’s Eye | |
| dc.type | master thesis | en_US |
| local.subject.manitoba | no |