[SOUND] So today we will

discuss neurobiological
mechanisms of decision
making, and we will focus
on emotional aspects of
decision making.
To start this lecture, I would like to
present you, few interesting studies with
quite surprising results.
So imagine that you have to hold a pencil
in your teeth.
Do you think that this manipulation can
change your evaluation of funny cartoons?
An interesting study shows that indeed,
this
manipulation can effect your emotional
relation of cartoons.
In this study, participants, participated
in three different conditions,
in one condition, they had to keep a pen
in their
teeth, and in another condition, they had
to keep a pen in their lips,
and in a third condition thy simply kept
the pen in their hand.
Surprisingly, the, this simple
manipulation, changed
the ratings of funniness of cartoons.
As you see here in this table, they found
cartoons to
be the funniest, when they kept their pen
in their teeth.
And they found the cartoons as least
funny, when
they kept the pencil or the pen in their
lips.
So, how can we explain this strange
result?
Perhaps because when we keep this pen in
our
teeth it evokes an artificial smile on our
face.
And this smile, changes our ratings of
funniness of objects.
So let's make a look to another example.
Imagine that you are exposed to different
photos of neutral
faces, faces with neutral expressions, but
shortly before these faces.
Another face is presented, it is presented
only for 16 milliseconds, very briefly,
so this presentation is so fast that you
are unable to see this first face.
Some of these faces that are presented for
the
very short period of time, they have angry
expression.
Some are neutral, and some are actually
have happy expressions.
So, this procedures called masking
procedure.
So, these faces with emotional
expressions, are presented so
fast, and they are masked by the next
neutral mask.
That you are unable to recognize these
faces,
so we present these emotional expressions
subliminally, subconsciously.
Do you think that this brief very fast
presentation, of emotional expressions,
can modulate your consumption behavior?
So in this study, subjects, after the
exposure, after their subliminal exposure
to emotional expressions, were asked to
put as much drink as they wish to a glass.
And next to cosu, consume as much as they
wish.
Offers us a drink.
So, result shows that people put to the
glass, more of this drink.
After the subliminal, subconscious
exposure to happy
faces, than to neutral faces, and they
put the least amount of drink, if
they were subliminally, subconsciously
exposed to angry faces.
And, they also consumed more of this
drink,
if they were exposed to happy faces
subliminally, subconsciously.
So, this interesting result shows that our
consumption
can be modulated by unconscious
presentation of emotional stimuli.
Let's move to more economic situations.
So, for example, our economic decisions,
are
effected by the so called temporal
discounting.
Temporal discounting is our feature that
basically indicates
that we prefer immediate rewards to the
delayed rewards.
We like to get money immediately.
We do not like when money are delayed in
time.
So, for example, this, our preference for
immediate rewards, is used by lottery.
When people win substantial amount of
money
in lotteries, they quite often get an
offer.
They can select between the half of the
total sum immediately, but get it next
day.
Or, they actually can get the total sum
they win but this
sum will be presented them in portions,
and quite often,
these portions will be distributed along
different period of time.
So, maybe people prefer to get money
immediately.
And only half of the money in this
situation.
And they actually do not like to get the
total sum, but delayed in time.
This our aspect of decision making, can be
characterized by the individual discount
parameter, called k.
So normally, we can test this parameter by
offering people different choices.
They can, for example, select between a
smaller sum but tomorrow, and a larger
sum, but in a long period of time, for
example, in a few days.
So with this procedure we can
test temporal discounting parameter of
each subject.
Do you think that our temporal discounting
parameter, can
be modulated by the photos of [COUGH] sexy
females?
And this interesting study shows.
That pretty women photos of pretty females
can substantially modulate our preference
for immediate rewards.
As you see here the presentation of photos
of opposite sex faces, increase temporal
discounting parameter.
So people start to be more impatient.
Especially you see that this effect, is
pronounce for males.
So, even the fundamental aspects of our
financial decision making, the temporal
discounting parameter, is modulated by the
presentation of pretty opposite sex faces.
And let's now move to even more relevant
example relevant for economics.
Do you thinks that, the stock market
return, can be effected by the weather?
This interesting study, shows that
sunshine is
highly correlated, with the daily stock
returns.
So, this study investigated 26 leading
stock exchanges, and
it found that stock return, is affected by
the weather.
How can we explain this strange result?
Perhaps because investors and brokers are
affected by
the weather, their mood is affected by
weather.
So, and mood, emotional status, can change
financial decisions.
So, to understand all of these strange
results, we have
to perhaps assume that emotions contribute
to our decision making.
So let's try to understand the neuronal
mechanism for emotions, and also
how emotions can sometimes promote maybe
official decisions,
and sometimes perhaps leads to quite
disadvantaged of decisions.
So, you already know this photo.
And in this photo, you can easily
recognize
a dog at the center of the screen.
So, cognitive psychology, cognitive
neuroscience, spend a little time to
understand how this very strange noisy
pattern, is decoded
by our brain and how the image internal
representation
of the dog is produced by our neuronal
populations.
But here we face a kind of an abstract
shape.
An abstract dog.
But there is no abstract dog in real life.
There is a real dog, and evoke emotions.
For example, if this is dog of our son or
this
is a dog of our daughter, it can trigger
strong positive emotions.
Sometimes the dog can trigger also extreme
sadness, so in addition to the cognitive
processing of information, we also extract
certain emotional information.
So, there are two sorts of information
encoded in the
visual objects or in other objects the
cognitive and information
regarding the shape, for example, of the
object, and emotional
information, are related to the attached
emotional values of this object.
So let's try to understand, how do we
process,
how do we extract emotional information
from the outside world.
Some, of course, stimuli have innate
emotional meanings.
So we shouldn't learn that this stimulus
is emotional.
Of course when we're attacked by an
aggressive animal.
So we automatically react to this
situation.
So, we an innate mechanism, to extract
emotional meanings of certain situation.
In addition of course we have to learn
quite often, which situations, which
objects have emotional meanings.
So in our brain we have two
basically systems or two emotional
interacting system.
One system is dedicated to the automatic
reaction to innate emotional stimuli.
And second one is dedicated to learning of
emotional meanings.
And we will see today that especially
the second system, is important for
financial decisions.
So, why do we react automatically to some
sort of emotional stimuli?
I think it is quite useful to engage now
an interesting concept
from [UNKNOWN] Nobel Prize winner Konrad
Lorenz, suggested long time ago that
our cognitive perceptual categories also
adaptations to the specific
environment, is the same way as the fin of
a fish is adapted to water.
So, our cognitive systems, the way we
perceive this world, is an also
adaptation for our specific environment,
we see this world in a specific way.
Because we are adaptive to this
environment.
So, I will just illustrate it by a couple
of examples.
So, the shape of animal is an adaptation
for the environment.
As you see here, the shape of the dolphin,
and the shape of the shark, as well as
the shape of a bird, or even the shape
of a airplane, is in an adaptation to
certain environment.
We can tell a lot about the environment
just
by analyzing the shape of the animal, for
example.
So, the shape of the animal depicts
environment.
In the same way when we process external
information,
our cognitive structures are also adapted
to the specific environment.
And as you see, for example, in this
graph, I will
present to you the same photo but the
photo is rotated here.
So you see these two copies.
And interestingly, the upper version is
perceived
as a depression of the surface, as a
[UNKNOWN] and the lower version of the
same photo basically is perceived as a
hill.
So, why do you think we interpret the same
photo ,very differently, if the same photo
is rotated?
So, upper version is clearly perceived as
a [UNKNOWN] as a depression of the
surface.
And the lower one as a hill.
As an extension of the surface.
Perhaps we interpret it differently
because of the
different light distribution on the
surface of this photo.
So, our environment is a very specific
environment.
So, normally white comes from above, so
our visual system
automatically recognize the distribution
of, the specific distribution of white
on the surface, and interpret these two
versions of the
same photo differently, simply because of
the distribution of the light.
In our environment, in our planet, light
goes from above.
If you would imagine another environment,
another
hypothetical planet, where light goes from
different location.
These people on this planet would
interpret this picture quite differently.
Now, the same adaptations present in our
brain for more complex stimuli.
For example, make a look to this photo.
Do you see anything unusual with this
face?
So perhaps.
Yeah, this is a face, this is a sculpture,
this is a mask.
And there is nothing really special about
this face.
But I will slightly rotate this object.
And you will realize, that this is the
opposite side of the mask.
So if I will move this mask back.
You do not see, that, you do not perceive
this object, as a, opposite side of the
mask.
This face clearly, pop out of the surface.
You do not perceive this face,as a
depression of the surface.
So, we have a clear illusion that face is
normal,
so I will bring automatically, a
reconstructed normal face and to we
never see in our life an inverted face, so
our brain automatically reconstructs
the normal face, and simply because we
leave for thousands,
millions of years in social groups and we
are surrounded by faces.
So our brain is adapted for faces, and our
brain can take specific face-related
theories, that are automatically
reconstructed objects, into normal faces.
So, we do not see an inverted face, we see
a normal face.
And that's why we do have an innate
mechanism to process certain information.
And the same idea can be applied for
emotional stimuli.
So now would mention another theory
suggested by ethologists.
By Konrad Lorenz and Nikolaas Tinbergen,
suggested that
specific reactions, can be triggered by
specific stimuli.
So, they call it, this hypothesis, Innate
releasing mechanisms.
So, particularly behavior, can be
stimulated or released by specific
stimuli.
So, they suggested that our neural system
works as a filter, that filter important,
relevant information, that can trigger or
release specific behavioral patterns.
So, innate releasing mechanisms suggest
that specific
beca, behavior, can be elicited by
specific stimuli.
And surprisingly, many emotional stimuli
are releasers.
They automatically release our reactions,
and
they also automatically release also
emotional reactions.
So here you see an example.
So here, etologists try to select a
particular sound that is attractive for
female insect.
So, he check different versions of the
sound, and finally,
he detected the releaser, the emotional
stimulus that triggers sexual behavior.
So, with this sound the researcher was
able to attract female insects.
So this is an example of the releasing
mechanism.
The specific stimulus can trigger specific
behavioral reaction.
And in this case, this specific emotional
stimulus,
that triggers the specific emotional
reaction of sexual behaviour.
So, there are famous examples illustrating
that
our nervous system, is tuned to some
objects.
So here, a bird is offered by different
versions of eggs.
So, one of this egg, is a natural egg for
this bird.
Others are various versions of the egg.
So, scientists can investigate how
specific is a releaser.
Can we cheat people by modulation of the
releasers.
By modulation of different stimuli and
different objects.
So here you see a famous example, a gull
is offered by the, a normal egg, and hyper
egg.
This egg is much larger than the normal
egg,
so here scientists try to create a hyper
releaser, hyper
emotional stimulus, that kind of imitates
the releaser, imitates the
natural emotional signal, and hyper
emphasizes some of the features.
So what do you think would be the decision
of the gull?
Whether it will select the normal, smaller
egg, or it will
sit on the larger version, or the hyper
version of the egg.
So in reality, it selected the
hyper-stimulus.
Why?
Because this hyper-stimulus imitates an
hyper-emphasize
emotional features of the object and
it triggers very effectively, an
automatic,
emotional parental behavior of this bird.
So, we actually phase the same, hyper
releasers in our life.
So, for example, here you see on the top
of the picture, a normal shape of the
baby's head.
And this shape is quite pleasant to many
of us.
But artificially, you can create a hyper
releaser.
You can hyper emphasize some of the
aspect, aspects of this face.
You can create a, a larger head.
And this hyper releaser will trigger our
positive emotions, much more effectively.
So we can create hyper releaser,
hyper-emotional stimuli also for us.
And this idea is used by, for example, toy
manufacturers.
As they produce toys, we perceive them as
very pleasant, very emotional.
Simply because toys, they imitate natural
emotional stimuli,
and some of the aspects of this natural
emotional
stimuli, are hyper-emphasized in order to
create the
hyper releaser, in order to stimulate
certain behavioral patterns.
So here, you see in the illustration that
we normally react
quite positively to babies, to young
animals, and also to toys.
And toys, simply, are imitating natural
emotion stimuli, creating hyper releasers,
hyper-emotional stimuli.
So interestingly, if we will make a look
to cartoons, we
will find, different, very successful
characters,
that actually have very childish
appearance.
They imitate children.
They have specific shape that triggers
positive emotions.
If we will make you look to the evolution
of Mickey Mouse, over the
few decades, we will find that Mickey
Mouse became more and more child in
appearance.
So he has, his head became larger and
larger.
More and more successful in triggering our
emotions.
So now, Mickey Mouse is a, kind of a hyper
releaser, evoking our emotions.
So, what do we see here, is that our
specific emotions,
and our specific reactions, can be
triggered by very specific stimuli.
So some stimuli surrounding us, have
innate emotional meaning.
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