Predictive processing theorists have claimed PTSD and depression are maladaptive and epistemically distorting because they entail undesirably wide gaps between top-down models and bottom-up information inflows. Without denying this is sometimes so, the “maladaptive” label carries questionable normative assumptions. For instance, trauma survivors facing significant risk of subsequent attacks may overestimate threats to circumvent further trauma, “bringing forth” concretely safer personal spaces, to use enactive terminology, ensuring the desired gap between predicted worries and outcomes. The violation of predictive processing can (...) go in the opposite direction too, as when depression coincides with energy-depletion, and hence objectively strenuous situations in which things look farther away because they are (accurately anticipated to be) harder to reach. These examples partly encapsulate what predictive processing theorists call “active inference,” yet with differences. In the first case, actions fruitfully obviate predictions rather than fulfilling them. In the second, mental models do not dysregulate bodily processes, making coping harder. Instead, problems (e.g., personal obstacles, gastric illness) deplete energy, eliciting a depressive and adaptive slow-down. Some predictive proponents apply correspondence criteria when alleging mismatches between internal models and the world, while incongruously asserting that the brain did not evolve to see things veridically, but to execute actions. An alternative is to adopt pluralistic, pragmatic epistemologies suited to the complexity of mind. The upshot is that mental outlooks can depart from the norm without epistemically being distorted and that mismatches between anticipatory worries and outcomes, when they actually exist, can be a measure of adaptive and epistemic success. (shrink)

Intra-individual variability (IIV) refers to within-person variability in behavioural task responses. Several factors can influence IIV, including aging and cognitive demands. The present study investigated effects of aging on IIV of response times during executive functioning tasks. Known age-related differences in cognitive control and emotion processing motivated evaluating how varying the design of emotional response inhibition tasks would influence IIV in older and younger adults. We also tested whether IIV predicted inhibitory control across task designs and age groups. Older and (...) younger adults (N = 237) completed one of three versions of a stop-signal task, which all displayed happy, fearful, or neutral faces in Stop trials. An independent group of older and younger adults (N = 80) completed a go/no-go task also employing happy, fearful and neutral faces. Results showed older adults had more consistent responses (lower IIV) than younger adults in the stop-signal task, but not the go/no-go task. Lower IIV predicted more efficient emotional response inhibition for fear faces in the stop-signal task, but only when attention to emotion was task-relevant. Collectively, this study clarifies effects of aging and task design on IIV and illustrates how task design impacts the relationship between IIV and emotional response inhibition in younger and older adults. (shrink)

I begin this article with an increasingly accepted claim: that emotions lend differential weight to states of affairs, helping us conceptually carve the world and make rational decisions. I then develop a more controversial assertion: that environments have non-subjective emotional qualities, which organize behavior and help us make sense of the world. I defend this from ecological and related embodied standpoints that take properties to be interrelational outcomes. I also build on conceptions of experience as a cultural phenomenon, one that (...) coheres around shared environmental contours and public emotional concerns, introducing normative constraints (or what might be called “world grammars”). Endorsing this outlook suggests an argument for the view that cultural spaces have affectively charged, non-subjective, normative openings and closures. These openings and closures engender selectively permeable barriers which cordon space without physically preventing entry, as seen with decorative half walls and elevation changes. An area with such barriers may look emotionally hostile to, say, the dispirited homeless who are in fact less welcome there. Outcomes like these might be thought of as “political affordances.” These affordances can be regarded as normative openings and closures that implicitly filter, and hence segregate, according to various social divisions. Although registering political affordances requires more than the detection of ambient arrays, the notion retains core Gibsonian ideas: that affordances are values, that these values are linked with how a space can be used, and that the existence and nature of such affordances is not a subjective matter. (shrink)

We have previously proposed that mothers and infants co-regulate one another’s autonomic state through an autonomic conditioning mechanism, which starts during gestation and results in the formation of autonomic socioemotional reflexes following birth. Theoretically, autonomic physiology associated with the ASR should correlate concomitantly with behaviors of mother and infant, although the neuronal pathway by which this phenomenon occurs has not been elucidated. In this paper, we consider the neuronal pathway by which sensory stimuli between a mother and her baby/child affect (...) the physiology and emotional behavior of each. We divide our paper into two parts. In the first part, to gain perspective on current theories on the subject, we conduct a 500-year narrative history of scientific investigations into the human nervous system and theories that describe the neuronal pathway between sensory stimulus and emotional behavior. We then review inconsistencies between several currently accepted theories and recent data. In the second part, we lay out a new theory of emotions that describes how sensory stimuli between mother and baby unconsciously control the behavior and physiology of both. We present a theory of mother/infant emotion based on a set of assumptions fundamentally different from current theories. Briefly, we propose that mother/infant sensory stimuli trigger conditional autonomic socioemotional reflexes, which drive cardiac function and behavior without the benefit of the thalamus, amygdala or cortex. We hold that the ASR is shaped by an evolutionarily conserved autonomic learning mechanism that forms between mother and fetus during gestation and continues following birth. We highlight our own and others research findings over the past 15 years that support our contention that mother/infant socioemotional behavior is driven by mutual autonomic state plasticity, as opposed to cortical trait plasticity. We review a novel assessment tool designed to measure the behaviors associated with the ASR phenomenon. Finally, we discuss the significance of our theory for the treatment of mothers and infants with socioemotional disorders. (shrink)

As English plays a significant role in most professions, improving the English for Specific Purpose writing competence allows individuals to participate in the global professional community, which makes ESP writing important for research. However, research on ESP writing is reported to be insufficient, and how factors such as emotions affect ESP writing is rarely and marginally studied. Therefore, this study aimed at investigating how induced emotions influence the learning outcome in ESP writing classes with an emphasis on a particular rhetorical (...) choice among medical university undergraduates. A total of 63 medical university undergraduates were recruited. After the emotional inducement, they were taught with materials selected and adopted from the BioCauses corpus and with an explicitly inductive teaching approach. Results revealed that positive emotions positively correlated with better learning outcomes, while negative emotions hindered participants in their learning. The results shed light on the impact of emotional states on ESP/medical research article writing, learning, and teaching. Further study implications were provided accordingly. (shrink)

This study investigates the effects of visual mnemonics and the methods of presenting learning materials on learning visually similar characters for Chinese-as-second-language (CSL) learners. In supporting CSL learners to build robust orthographic representations in Chinese, addressing the challenges of visual similarity of characters (e.g., 理 and 埋) is an important issue. Based on prior research on perceptual learning, we tested three strategies that differ in the extent to which they promote interrelated attention to the form and meaning of characters: (1) (...) Stroke Sequence, aform-emphasisstrategy, (2) Key-images, aform+meaningstrategy utilizing visual code, (3) Pithy Formulas with Key-images, aform+meaningstrategy combining visual and verbal codes. A pretest–posttest equivalent-group design was adopted. The independent variables were the learning strategy, the method of presenting character pairs (visually similar vs. dissimilar), and testing time. The dependent variables were learners’ proportions of accurate responses to reading and writing Chinese characters through a posttest (immediately performed after learning) and a delayed posttest (1 week after learning); a learner experience survey was also administered to investigate learners’ opinions on each strategy. Sixty-six non-beginning learners of Chinese participated; they were randomly assigned to one of the two groups in which participants learned ten charactersviathe three strategies, respectively, differing between whether the characters were presented in similar pairs or dissimilar pairs. Data were analyzedviathree-way ANCOVAs. The Pithy Formulas with Key-images and the Key-images generally yielded higher writing accuracy than Stroke Sequence immediately after learning. Notably, the advantage of the Pithy Formulas with Key-images (verbal and visual) over the Key-images (visual) on writing was specific to the participants that learned with visually similar pairs rather than those that learned with dissimilar pairs. All strategies were effective for reading, yet learners’ experience ratings favored the twoform+meaningstrategies over the strategy that focused primarily onform.Suggestions for future research and pedagogical implications on learning visually similar characters were offered. (shrink)

Previous research has shown that emotionally-valenced words are given higher judgements of learning (JOLs) than are neutral words. The current study examined potential explanations for this emotional salience effect on JOLs. Experiment 1 replicated the basic emotionality/JOL effect. In Experiments 2A and 2B, we used pre-study JOLs and assessed memory beliefs qualitatively, finding that, on average, participants believed that positive and negative words were more memorable than neutral words. Experiment 3 utilised a lexical decision task, resulting in lower reaction times (...) (RTs) for positive words than for neutral words, but equivalent RTs for negative and neutral words, suggesting that processing fluency may partially account for higher JOLs for positive words, but not for negative words. Finally, we conducted a series of moderation analyses in Experiment 4 which assessed the relative contributions of fluency and beliefs to JOLs by measuring both factors in the same participants, showing that RTs made no significant contribution to JOLs for either positive or negative words. Our findings suggest that although positive words may be more fluently processed than neutral words, memory beliefs are the primary factor underlying higher JOLs for both positive and negative words. (shrink)

In the context of English as a foreign language classroom, affections that form between teacher and students may affect the teaching/learning process. This review aimed to investigate the related studies on the effect of teacher-learner interpersonal relationships on learners’ educational performance in English as a Foreign Language (EFL) educational contexts. This review concluded that there is a significant constructive correlation between teacher-learner interpersonal relationships and learners’ academic achievement. Learners are required to have some sense of belonging to improve their educational (...) performance. Moreover, other positive emotional factors such as grit, wellbeing, self-efficacy, academic engagement, motivation, and foreign language enjoyment can mediate the association between teacher-learner interpersonal relationships and learners’ academic success. The study concludes with some implications for English learners, English language teachers, and English language teacher trainers. The ideas can improve their awareness of teacher-student interpersonal relationships, including teacher stroke, rapport, and teacher immediacy and their role in improving learners’ foreign language learning. (shrink)

The college athletics environment within the USA is ethically complex and often controversial. From an academic standpoint, athletes are often viewed as a privileged class receiving undue benefit. Yet closer inspection reveals that student athletes are at risk psychologically, physically, and intellectually in ways that undermine development and flourishing. This reality stands in troubling contrast to the prosocial, virtue-based goals expressed by university mission statements. Given the role of sport in many university business models, college athletics invites scrutiny from a (...) business ethics standpoint. Using a humanistic leadership perspective (Pirson in: Humanistic management: protecting dignity and promoting well-being, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2017), we organize our analysis around three challenges facing the college athletics system: (1) navigating the tension between claiming college athletes are amateurs rather than professionals; (2) defining the ethical edge between winning and winning fairly; and (3) moderating the insatiable drive to win while protecting student athlete well-being. We then articulate three strategies for successfully addressing these challenges: leadership role modeling, putting structural supports in place and holding people accountable. We argue that humanistic leadership and a ‘balanced motivational drive mindset’ (Lawrence and Nohria in: J Bus Ethics 128:383–394, 2002, https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-014-2090-2 ; Pirson 2017) could help move college athletics from an economistic model toward a more humanistic model that prioritizes the dignity and well-being of its participants, particularly student athletes. (shrink)

Emotions are a core factor of learning. Studies have shown that multiple emotions are co-experienced during learning and have a significant impact on learning outcomes. The present study investigated the importance of multiple, co-occurring emotions during learning about human biology with MetaTutor, a hypermedia-based intelligent tutoring system. Person-centered as well as variable-centered approaches of cluster analyses were used to identify emotion clusters. The person-centered clustering analyses indicated three emotion profiles: a positive, negative and neutral profile. Students with a negative profile (...) learned less than those with other profiles and also reported less usage of emotion regulation strategies. Emotion clusters identified through spectral co-clustering confirmed these results. Throughout the learning activity, emotions built a stable correlational structure of a positive, a negative, a neutral and a boredom emotion cluster. Positive emotion cluster scores before the learning activity and negative emotion cluster scores during the learning activity predicted learning, but not consistently. These results reveal the importance of negative emotions during learning with MetaTutor. Potential moderating factors and implications for the design and development of educational interventions that target emotions and emotion regulation with digital learning environments are discussed. (shrink)

The present study has two main purposes: First, investigating the role of sensory-processing sensitivity, describing inter-individual differences with regard to people’s sensitivity to positive and negative environmental stimuli through a deeper level of information processing, in the teaching work place. Second, it aims at revealing further insight into the association between SPS and different mental disorders as well as variables of therapeutic success. The teaching profession is widely accepted as being complex and highly demanding with many expectations and requirements, so (...) the high level of stress found across teachers is thus not surprising. Nonetheless, teachers can only efficiently fulfill their important tasks and have a positive influence on students if they are mentally healthy. Given empirical findings supporting an increased stress level across teachers, numerous studies have investigated the conditions and processes behind the onset of mental ill-health and developed various prevention programs to support teachers in dealing with their perceived stress. Looking through the research area, a clear focus on behavior and personality-related characteristics of teachers is present, including, for example, various dysfunctional cognitions, coping behavior or the Big Five personality traits. Although other studies consider environmental aspects of the work place as well, such as noise or schedules, the integration of these two entities is still a research gap. This is true despite recent developments emphasizing the perspective of person-environment interactions, particularly in the field of stress. The present study takes up this gap by introducing the temperament trait of SPS into the field of teacher professionalism and health research, representing a holistic way of analyzing person-environment interactions as it focuses on individuals’ reactivity to certain environmental conditions and stimuli. Embedded into the project “Risiko-Check für das Lehramt”, two teacher samples participated in the study: a non-clinical sample of teachers, who were actively teaching in the school context and a clinical sample of teachers, who received inpatient treatment and were diagnosed with mental disorders during the data collection process. Both groups filled out the same questionnaire, which included different scales measuring aspects of the teaching environment and personality-related variables of teachers. For a small sub-group of the teachers in the clinical sample, additional clinically-relevant data, such as measures of therapeutic success or additional measures of mental disorders, was also available. In line with the first goal of the study, results reveal further evidence for the validity of the construct: SPS was successfully differentiated from other variables measuring psychological well-being, including Depression, Anxiety, and Stress. The second aim represents the investigation of the role of the temperamental trait of SPS in the teaching context. Of particular interest are the perception of certain workplace-demand characteristics unique to this profession and the extent to which certain characteristics related to SPS are activated in teachers in their everyday lives. Findings suggest that highly sensitive teachers feel more attuned to the students, who need help, but, at the same time, have more difficulties with regard to the characteristics that are very open and include a certain degree of flexibility. Those are for example, maintaining an efficient work-life balance, dealing with their tasks and deciding when certain demands are fulfilled, lack of feedback, and the various expectations teachers are confronted with. In spite of these difficulties, they perceive themselves as similarly successful as non-highly sensitive teachers. Additionally, SPS mediates the relationship between different demands and teachers’ perceived stress. Three ways this is possible are an increased frequency of applying dysfunctional cognitions, coping strategies, and lower self-efficacy. Research questions in line with the third general goal of the present study include a more detailed investigation of the association with clinically relevant variables; the difference between mentally ill teachers and those teaching actively; and evidence for the presence of the Vantage Theory framework in clinical contexts, describing increased effect of positive and supporting environments, such as those found in therapeutic interventions. In general, participants in the clinical sample reach higher mean scores on the scale measuring SPS than participants in the non-clinical sample. Additionally, investigating the symptoms of teachers in the clinical sample, highly sensitive teachers show more severe symptoms of anxiety and depressive disorders. Finally, in line with one of the hypotheses stated in this context, results support the presence of vantage sensitivity in this study. While almost all patients show improvements in their general functioning and clinical global impression at release, patients with high levels of SPS are found to benefit even more from the treatment, on average, than patients with lower levels of SPS. This is true for the majority of symptoms that are associated with SPS, which include phobic anxiety, anxiety, and depressive disorders. Finally, the fourth objective of the present study aims at broadening the findings by investigating the hypothesis of the existence of different sensitivity types. Then, all theoretical and empirical models as well as existing findings and those generated in the present study are taken together in order to develop an overarching model for the development of stress in teaching, including SPS as one facet. Results of a cluster analysis including the highly sensitive teachers of both samples disclose the existence of three sensitivity types that differ significantly with regard to their core areas of certain characteristics of SPS. While one group reaches comparably high scores across facets, the remaining two sensitivity types show a particular focus, either the facet Aesthetical sensitivity or the two factors Low sensory threshold and Ease of excitation. The majority of the clinical sample is found to be more aesthetically sensitive, whereas most teachers in the nonc-clinical sample are assigned to the group with comparably higher scores across facets. Furthermore, these sensitivity types differ with regard to their work-life balance and dysfunctional cognitions as well as coping strategies in a such way that the Aesthetically sensitive type reach mean scores that can be interpreted as most functional when compared to the remaining types. Finally, with regard to a general model of stress development for teaching, despite the final model not reaching statistical indices indicating a fit to the data of the present study, comparisons of regression weights reveal support for the significant role of SPS in comparison to already-established variables. In summary, the findings of the present study close various research gaps and have multiple implications. First, they reveal evidence for the fact that SPS could add valuable information when implemented into research on teacher professionalism and teacher stress, which has diverse implications for the political, administrational and individual level. Secondly, they broaden the research field of SPS by revealing more insight into the associations between SPS and mental ill-health as well as evidence in support of vantage sensitivity, suggesting that patients with higher levels of SPS benefit more from therapeutic interventions than patients with lower levels. Limitations of the present study are discussed critically and suggested approaches for further research studies are described. (shrink)

This qualitative case study examines early career social studies educators’ knowledge of the role of emotion in teaching and learning. More specifically, we examine how our efforts to expand social studies educators’ understanding of emotion, shifted their perception of the role of emotion in learning social studies content and how they can use this knowledge to plan instruction. Prior to beginning their “emotion education,” all participants described the role of emotion in teaching and learning as important for relationship-building and as (...) something to be carefully managed. They focused their efforts in the classroom on creating a welcoming environment for their students and managing their students’ emotions. Though they described their classrooms as emotional spaces, none had explicitly considered the role of emotion in learning content.As they learned about the role of emotion in cognitive processes like memory and problem-solving, participants began to recognize the need to rethink their pedagogical choices. However, none of the participants embraced or accepted an expanded view of emotions as social and political forces. Reluctant to consider how emotions shape our identities, our communities and our politics, these social studies educators did not meaningfully engage in a critical examination of how social studies curriculum can contribute to “schooling” students’ emotions. Findings from this initial study suggest it is important to engage social studies educators in critical awareness of their own emotions and critical examination of what emotions “do” in the world and how the social studies content we teach can contribute to the “schooling” of our students’ emotions. (shrink)

One of the effects of the current COVID-19 pandemic is that low-income countries were pushed further into extreme poverty, exacerbating social inequalities and increasing susceptibility to drug use/abuse in people of all ages. The risks of drug abuse may not be fully understood by all members of society, partly because of the taboo nature of the subject, and partly because of the considerable gap between scientific production/understanding and communication of such knowledge to the public at large. Drug use is a (...) major challenge to social development and a leading cause of school dropout rates worldwide. Some public policies adopted in several countries in recent decades failed to prevent drug use, especially because they focused on imposing combative or coercive measures, investing little or nothing in education and prevention. Here we highlight the role of neuroscience education as a valid approach in drug use education and prevention. We propose building a bridge between schools and scientists by promoting information, student engagement and honest dialogue, and show evidence that public policy regulators should be persuaded to support such science-based education programs in their efforts to effect important positive changes in society. (shrink)

Positive Psychology has turned its attention to the study of emotions in a scientific and rigorous way. Particularly, to how emotions influence people’s health, performance, or their overall life satisfaction. Within this trend, Flow theory has established a theoretical framework that helps to promote the Flow experience. Flow state, or optimal experience, is a mental state of high concentration and enjoyment that, due to its characteristics, has been considered desirable for the development of the performing activity of performing musicians. Musicians (...) are a population prone to health problems, both psychological and physical, owing to different stressors of their training and professional activity. One of the most common problems is Musical Performance Anxiety. In this investigation, an electronic intervention program was carried out for the development of psychological self-regulation skills whose main objective was to trigger the Flow response in performing musicians and the coping mechanism for Musical Performance Anxiety. A quasi-experimental design was used with a control group in which pre- and post-measures of Flow State, Musical Performance Anxiety and, also, Social Skills were taken. Sixty-two performing musicians from different music colleges in Spain participated in the program. Results indicated that the intervention significantly improved Flow State, and Sense of Control, and decreased Music Performance Anxiety, and self-consciousness of the participants in the EG but not CG. The changes in the EG after the program showed the inverse relationship between Flow and Anxiety. Two important theoretical factors of both variables, such as worry and the feeling of lack of control, could be involved. The results are under discussion and future lines of research are proposed. (shrink)

Cognition is defined as the brain’s ability to acquire, process, store, and retrieve information. Pain has been described as an unpleasant sensory or emotional experience, and for experiencing pain consciously, cognitive processing becomes imperative. Moreover, evaluation of pain strongly depends on cognition as it requires learning and recall of previous experiences. There could be a possible close link between neural systems involved in cognition and pain processing, and studies have reported an association between pain and cognitive impairment. In this narrative (...) review, we explore the available evidence that has investigated cognitive changes associated with pain. We also examine the anatomical, biochemical, and molecular association of pain and neuro-cognition. Additionally, we focus on the cognitive impairment caused by analgesic medications. There is a need to improve our understanding of pathophysiology and cognitive impairment mechanisms associated with chronic pain and its treatment. This area provides a diverse opportunity for grounding future research, aiding institution of timely interventions to prevent chronic pain and associated cognitive decline, ultimately improving patient care. (shrink)

This study validated the school psychological capital scale in the Chinese context and examined the predictive effect of PsyCap resources on academic engagement and achievement emotions. Self-report data for PsyCap resources, student engagement, enjoyment, anxiety, and boredom toward English learning were collected from 1,000 sophomores. Item-level analyses and confirmatory factor analysis were used to verify the validity of the school PsyCap scale, and structural equation modeling was applied to reveal the predictive effect of school PsyCap resources on academic engagement and (...) achievement emotions. Results showed that the school PsyCap scale retained superior psychometric properties. Besides, PsyCap resources were demonstrated to have a positive relationship to academic engagement and enjoyment, and a negative relationship to anxiety and boredom. The effectiveness of the school PsyCap scale was verified among Chinese college students, and besides the traditional predictors, school PsyCap is also critically important for students’ academic engagement and achievement emotions. Limitations and implications are discussed. (shrink)

Films, compared with emotional static pictures, represent true-to-life dynamic stimuli that are both ecological and effective in inducing an emotional response given the involvement of multimodal stimulation (i.e., visual and auditory systems). We hypothesized that a direct comparison between the two methods would have shown greater efficacy of movies, compared to standardized slides, in eliciting emotions at both subjective and neurophysiological levels. To this end, we compared these two methods of emotional stimulation in a group of 40 young adults (20 (...) females). Electroencephalographic (EEG) Alpha rhythm (8–12 Hz) was recorded from 64 scalp sites while participants watched (in counterbalanced order across participants) two separate blocks of 45 slides and 45 clips. Each block included three groups of 15 validated stimuli classified as Erotic, Neutral and Fear content. Greater self-perceived arousal was found after the presentation of Fear and Erotic video clips compared with the same slide categories. sLORETA analysis showed a different lateralization pattern: slides induced decreased Alpha power (greater activation) in the left secondary visual area (Brodmann Area, BA, 18) to Erotic and Fear compared with the Neutral stimuli. Instead, video clips elicited reduced Alpha in the homologous right secondary visual area (BA 18) again to both Erotic and Fear contents compared with Neutral ones. Comparison of emotional stimuli showed smaller Alpha power to Erotic than to Fear stimuli in the left precuneus/posterior cingulate cortex (BA 7/31) for the slide condition, and in the left superior parietal lobule (BA 7) for the clip condition. This result matched the parallel analysis of the overlapped Mu rhythm (corresponding to the upper Alpha band) and can be interpreted as Mu/Alpha EEG suppression elicited by greater motor action tendency to Erotic (approach motivation) compared to Fear (withdrawal motivation) stimuli. Correlation analysis found lower Alpha in the left middle temporal gyrus (BA 21) associated with greater pleasantness to Erotic slides (r38= –0.62,p= 0.009), whereas lower Alpha in the right supramarginal/angular gyrus (BA 40/39) was associated with greater pleasantness to Neutral clips (r38= –0.69,p= 0.012). Results point to stronger emotion elicitation of movies vs. slides, but also to a specific involvement of the two hemispheres during emotional processing of slides vs. video clips, with a shift from the left to the right associative visual areas. (shrink)

This article will provide a unifying perspective on perception and cognitionviathe route of linguistic representations of emotion. Linguistic representations of emotions provide a fertile ground for explorations into the nature and form of integration of perception and cognition because emotion has facets of both perceptual and cognitive processes. In particular, this article shows that certain types of linguistic representations of emotion allow for the integration of perception and cognition through a series of steps and operations in cognitive systems, whereas certain (...) other linguistic representations of emotion are not so representationally structured as to permit the unity of perception and cognition. It turns out that the types of linguistic representations of emotion that readily permit the desired unity of perception and cognition are exactly those that are linguistically encoded emotive representations of everyday objects, events, and things around us. It is these ordinary objects, events and things that provide the scaffolding for task-dependent or goal-oriented activities of cognitive systems including autonomous systems. In this way, cognitive systems can be saliently tuned to the outer world by being motivated and also subtly governed by emotion-driven representations. This helps not only tie together perceptual and cognitive processesviathe interface between language and emotive representations, but also reveal the limits of emotive representations in amalgamating perceptual and cognitive processes in cognitive systems. (shrink)

Knowledge of our own memory processes, whether driven by prior experiences or beliefs, is crucial in perceiving and interacting with our environment. This knowledge and awareness is metamemory, whi...