The Wake

This semester the Institute for Advanced Study is hosting a weekly series of events titled “Thursdays at Four.” As one might assume, the lectures are held each Thursday at 4 p.m. in room 120 or 125 of Nolte Center. The series hosts a broad range of lectures and features people from all disciplines and areas of work. On Thursday, February 22 University of Minnesota psychology professor Bruce Cuthbert enlightened listeners on the new science of emotion.

Feelings and emotions have always been regarded as mere roadblocks on the way to higher human intellect; a not-so-close second to the sophisticated realm of cognition. Recent advances in approaches to studying emotion, however, have brought the science of emotion into the same league as natural science. Cuthbert was selected by the Institute for Advanced Study to discuss these new ideas in regards to emotion science.

Cuthbert, who works in the University’s psychology department, aims his research toward the development of new psychophysiological models and measures of affective processes, especially in applying these results to research directed at an improved understanding of mood and anxiety disorders. In order to put the importance and severity of emotional disorders into perspective, Cuthbert told us that depression is the second leading cause of disability in the United States. Worldwide it is the number one cause.

The main portion of the lecture was devoted to the new study of mammalian startle research. Cuthbert has been conducting and studying this type of research in order to gain an improved understanding of clinical disorders, such as depression and anxiety disorder. In mammalian startle research humans or other mammals are exposed to a tiny blurb of white noise or view a slideshow of uncomfortable photographs. Cuthbert showed an image of an arm with a needle poking into it as an example. The intensity of shock is measured either through a jump or flinch produced by the white noise or via the blinking that is a result of viewing the photos.

When Cuthbert and his colleagues performed these tests on people who have been diagnosed with an array of emotional disorders (depression, phobias, social anxiety disorder, generalized anxiety disorder, etc.) they found is that people with more distressing emotional disorders, such as generalized anxiety disorder, respond less to the tests than do people with less distressing emotional disorders, such as depression and phobias. What this basically means is that the more distressed a clinical patient is in their everyday life, the less they respond to startling noises or images. Cuthbert hopes that by gaining a better understanding of these results, there will be the possibility of new breakthroughs in treating these disorders.

At the end of the lecture, Cuthbert held a question and answer session. An audience member asked Cuthbert if his subjects are aware of the type of stimuli they will be exposed to before they agree to the tests. “Of course,” Cuthbert answers. Why then, knowing that they will be shocked by either an unpleasant noise or a slideshow of graphic pictures, would these people agree to do the experiments, she questions. “Because everyone is interested in emotion and emotion research,” Cuthbert says. “Especially those who can be helped by the results.”

At Thursdays at Four there is something interesting going on each week. The Institute for Advanced Study hopes that people come back each week not because they are necessarily interested in the topic of field of work, but because each week is an opportunity to learn something new and valuable.