Conclusions of the big studies for psy

Overall: Past research on both animals and humans have identified the multiple links between areas of the brain and agression. These finding are further supported by this study (41 NGRI). This study also supports and provides evidence that murderers pleading NGRI have signifiacntly differing brains than 'normal' people.

Confounding vairables: although the study was well designed and involved a large sample of matched controls, Raine et al. acknowledge that head injury and IQ had not been ruled out as contributory factors.

• The results DO NOT demonstrate:
• violent behaviour is determined by biology alone (social, culural predispositiions apply)
• murderers pleading NGRI are not reponsible for their actions (not that PET can be used for diagnosis of brain dysfuction)
• Brain dysfuntion causes violence (this can even be an effect of violence.

However, the findings do suggest a link between brain dysfunction and predisposition to violence in the specific group (NGRI).

Overall: children would not have become offenders if they had not had experiences which were harmful to their healthy development.

As a result of Bowlby subscribing to the psychodynamic view that early experiences are vital for later development, he particularly focussed upon the relationship between the mother and the child and the importance of this in emotional development. He suggested/proposed that damage to this relationship early on in life can surpress the superego from developing thus resulting in the children having very little sense of right ad wrong.

Treatment implications: if the findings are correct, treatments should be able to be offered to delinquents (although this could prove difficult and slow). A better alternative would be to prevent the seperation while they still can.

findings indicate that the form of a question (verb in this case) can markedly and systematically affect a witness's answer to a question. they proposed to explainations for this:

• response-bias factors- the different speed estimates are because thw critical word influences/biases a person's response to the overall question.
• the memory representation is altered- meaning the critical word changes a person's memory so that their perception of the event is affected. if this is true we would expect participantas to rememeber other untrue factors of the accident; L&P tested this in Ex.2 where those in the smashed condition combined two pieces of their memory (the speed of the car+what damage this would do) and thus creates/generates various/certain expectations = the likelihood of broken glass.

These findings could be understood further in relation to research on the effects of verbal labels on forms to be rememebered (Carmichael et al. (1932) found that verbal labels cause a shift in the way information is represented - it is more likely to be more similar to the verbal label suggested).

demonstrtaed how a fear response is able to be created. simply two joint stimulations were enough  to create a conditioned emotional response and only seven were enoug to bring around a complete reaction!

the study also demonstarated that a learned response to a particular stimuli can also be generaled to stimuli similar-albert maintained a fearful response to other furry objects over the time they studied him.

'it is probable' that many phobias are aquired by conditioning in everyay life.although they did suspedct that the mere persistence of the early conditioned reponses would only be found n thoe who were 'constitutionally inferior'.

*at the time of the study fredian explainations were much more favoured in psychology so watson and rayner adressed these specifically:

• when LA started sucking his thmb = form of compensation to block his fear response rather than what freud would believe to be tha he was gaining some sort of sexual stimulation.
• if albert were to see a freudiaqn psychologist  he would not be able to be cured as they would believe his fear of furry objects =being scolded when playing with his mum's *****.

• The importance of adaption: the effects of positive and negative effects fade over time. for example those who win the lottery only experience happiness for a short period, and on the contrast those who have suffered traumatic experineces  (eg concentration camps) can recover/restore their hope and happiness. a recent longdituinal study found that only events lasting three months inflluence SWB  due to a human capacity to adapt to life circumstances).
• cultural world view: cultural attitudes have an ability to predispose individuals to interpret life event differently. some cultures construe the worl as benevlent and controllable whereas some emphasise negative emotions (anger, pain, guilt).
• Values and goals: those with a high SWB have goals and things they are striving to achieve.other factors such as memory or intellegence only matter if they are relevant to the goals being aimed towards. this poses an explaination to why money matters more in a poor country (relevant to on's goals. in a more affluent society, money matters less as it is not the prime(main) factor in achieving specific goals)

the future- an individual's happiness is not predictable from their age, gender nor afluence.- is associated with race+culture. Those who are happy possess certain traits, have close relationsips, enjoy their work and are usually religious. psychs build a world enhances HWB.