I WAS IN GREAT PERPLEXITY: AN ELECTROENCEPHALOGRAPHIC INVESTIGATION OF MEANING THREAT

dc.contributor.advisor Langston, William
dc.contributor.author Fehrman, Christof
dc.contributor.committeemember Magne, Cyrille
dc.contributor.committeemember Fuller, Dana
dc.contributor.department Psychology en_US
dc.date.accessioned 2017-10-04T20:13:32Z
dc.date.available 2017-10-04T20:13:32Z
dc.date.issued 2017-06-23
dc.description.abstract Meaning Maintenance Model (MMM) predicts that violations in meaning can result in the affirmation of alternative or novel meaning frameworks. These violations, known as meaning threats, often occur unconsciously yet have been shown to significantly influence cognition. An increased ability to learn an artificial grammar when exposed to meaning threat has been reported as well as a polarization of beliefs in social justice and pacifism. Several different stimuli have been found to cause meaning threat behavior: anomalous playing cards, absurdist literature by Kafka, films by David Lynch, and the unconscious switching of experimenters half-way through a study. However, no studies have attempted to measure the neurological effects of meaning threats. Using the N400 event-related potential as a "window into the neurobiology of meaning," this study examined the change in mean N400 amplitude of related and unrelated word pairs due to meaning threat. Additionally, source localization techniques were used to examine if there was increased activation in the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC), a hypothesized prediction in the MMM literature. There were no significant differences found in mean N400 amplitude due to meaning threat nor were there any significant differences in ACC activation levels.
dc.description.degree M.A.
dc.identifier.uri http://jewlscholar.mtsu.edu/xmlui/handle/mtsu/5396
dc.publisher Middle Tennessee State University
dc.subject EEG
dc.subject Kafka
dc.subject Meaning Maintenance Model
dc.subject Meaning Threat
dc.subject N400
dc.subject SLORETA
dc.subject.umi Neurosciences
dc.subject.umi Cognitive psychology
dc.subject.umi Psychology
dc.thesis.degreegrantor Middle Tennessee State University
dc.thesis.degreelevel Masters
dc.title I WAS IN GREAT PERPLEXITY: AN ELECTROENCEPHALOGRAPHIC INVESTIGATION OF MEANING THREAT
dc.type Thesis
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