Causation and the Somatosensory System Público

Abstract

Abstract
Causation and the Somatosensory System
By Sam Ritter

The role of the somatosensory system in the representation of causal relationships was investigated in five behavioral experiments. In Experiment 1, it was found that participants were faster to respond to a haptic target when it was preceded by activation of the somatosensory system by a haptic prime than when it was preceded by an auditory or visual prime. In Experiments 2 - 4, the primes were replaced by videos depicting causal or similar non-causal events. Given the results from Experiment 1, it was predicted that if the somatosensory system is recruited during the representation of causal relationships then participants would be faster to respond to a haptic target after viewing causal videos than after viewing non-causal videos. The results were as predicted. This effect was not found in control conditions in which auditory or visual targets were used instead of haptic targets. In Experiment 5, the videos were replaced by sentences that described causal or similar non-causal events. It was predicted that if the somatosensory system is recruited to represent causal relationships during language comprehension then participants would be faster to respond to a haptic target after reading causal sentences than after reading non-causal sentences. Results of this experiment did not support the contention that reading causal sentences activates the somatosensory system. Implications for theories of causation are discussed.

Table of Contents

Table of Contents
Abstract...p. 2
Introduction...p. 3
Experiment 1...p. 8
Experiment 2...p. 11
Experiment 3...p. 17
Experiment 4...p. 20
Experiment 5...p. 23
General Discussion...p. 26
References...p. 34
Appendix...p. 31

About this Honors Thesis

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School	Emory College
Department	Psychology and Linguistics
Degree	BA
Submission	Honors Thesis
Language	English
Research Field	Psychology, General Psychology, Cognitive
Palavra-chave	Somatosensory Haptic Controller Reaction Time Haptic Causation
Committee Chair / Thesis Advisor	Wolff, Phillip, Emory University
Committee Members	Lourenco, Stella, Emory University Barsalou, Lawrence, Emory University Summet, Valerie H, Emory University Grigni, Michelangelo, Emory University

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