Value Drive Attention Capture in Adolescence Order Instructions: Read this article, it is the focus paper – Roper, Z., Vecera, S.& Valdya, J. (2014).
Value-Driven Attentional Capture in Adolescence. Psychological Science, 25(11), pp. 1987-1993.
Your task is to write an APA formatted essay which argues for (or against) the relevance and applications of this research.
Include an analysis of the article which briefly outlines, in your own words and from your own viewpoint, how the study worked and how its conclusions were arrived at. Do not simply summarise any part of the article. Within your analysis, assess the methodology and arguments made by using other literature in the relevant fields (that is: Value-based attentional capture, Control in adolescence). Your argument is the most important aspect of your essay – choose a side, and back it up with evidence from the core article and others related to it. if you wish to argue strongly in favor of the relevance and applications of the research, be sure to qualify your statements and argument with recognition of limitations and research yet to be done. If you wish to argue strongly against the relevance and applications of the research, be sure to support your argument with evidence obtained from further research in the same field or closely related fields.
Value Drive Attention Capture in Adolescence Sample Answer
VValue-Drive Attention Capture in Adolescence
Brief Analysis of Article
This article presents an analysis of the decision-making process that is followed by the majority of people in the age of adolescence. To bring out the unique nature of adolescents’ mental reward mechanisms, the researchers had to involve adolescents as well as adults and subject them to similar controlled conditions whereby they were subjected to a test where they had to identify a red ring as well as a green one hidden within an image on a computer screen. Different awards were given for their accurate discoveries. The assumption that was held by the researchers prior to the commencement of the study was that teenagers generally tend to be impulsive. As such they sought to determine if there indeed exists a fundamental change in the way teenagers make decisions and the way adults do leading to the assumption that the three researchers had. The particular element of decision making that these researchers were focused on was the brain’s reward mechanism and how it functioned. The participants were trained on how to do the visual identification and keep track of the rewards. From the study, it emerged that the two age groups initially demonstrated what was termed as “value-driven emotional capture”. When the reward was withdrawn however teenagers lagged behind compared to the adults who maintained their level of performance. The performance of the teenagers was more adversely impacted by the withdrawal of the reward. The initial performance of the teenagers meant that the argument about having lower levels of development in their cognitive element could not be justified. The significance of an individual’s ability to control his or her attention appeared to lack in the teenagers and this was then theorized to result from the manner in which their brains assign value. Their subconscious prioritizing of things in their immediate environment had a direct impact on their cognitive performance (Vercera et al, 2014).
Value Drive Attention Capture in Adolescence Assessment of the methodology
The research methodology that was used by the scientists who conducted this study was purposive sampling since they required participants who met specific attributes with respect to their age group and also the level of understanding. This is because they were to be subjected to the same series of instructions and also similar stimuli. To this end, the researchers made the right decisions because the composition of the respondents was well in line with the study’s objective of finding out the dynamics of the reward mechanisms that exist in the minds of adolescents as well as adults. The hypothesis that was held by the researchers with regard to the teenagers’ relatively restricted capacity to maintain attention meant that it was important to include adults as well in the study so as to first of all given the assumption empirical support and therefore credibility. Secondly, this would meet the gap in knowledge given the controlled environment and the scientists’ ability to manipulate environmental parameters for the sample that was selected. While this was a complicated study, the organizers of the study made sure the complexity did not negatively impact the respondents. This was done through the design of a simple exercise for them to go through and also the issuance of clear instructions on the tasks that they were given to do. Having such stability meant that the focus of the study in the analysis stage would be relatively narrow and this is good as it allows for exhaustive study and interpretation of the results (Casey et al, 2008).
Value Drive Attention Capture in Adolescence and Arguments presented by Researchers
The arguments forwarded by the researchers following the study remained consistent with their initial hypothesis. This is because they maintained the focus on the actions of the teenagers. The specific actions of the teenagers right down to the focus of the teenagers on the previous circles that earned them awards that were no longer available. The argument was based on the theory they were investigating and this combined with the data collected confirmed the hypothesis. Furthermore, the study’s conclusions were a refinement of the initial hypothesis rather than merely a confirmation of the same (Sommerville et al, 2011; Galvan, 2010).
The design of the study and the subsequent analysis of the data that had been collected broke down the assumption held by the researchers and they attached relevant psychological and scientific parameters to the various elements of the assumption. The teenagers were categorized as adolescents and a specific age group used. The performance they presented was used as a measure of their concentration and this would be used to show the degree to which they had control over their cognitive faculties. The ability to do this highly correlates with the relative unscientific observation of teenagers being poor decision makers. They came closer to the root of the matter by attaching various responses to components of the brain, the most important being the reward mechanism. The argument then proposed by the study, in the end, was of greater value since it can be adapted to other areas of knowledge which may be used in areas of importance such as education, discipline and also sports (Huntsinger et al, 2010).
A limitation in their study, however, was the fact that they did not consider the possible socio-cultural factors that may have been contributing to teenagers being poorer decision makers. It is not so much a weakness as it is a gap in knowledge. A possible hypothesis for further studies would be that the social conditions and expectations placed on teenagers and adults lead to their different decision making patterns (Dahl, 2004).
Value Drive Attention Capture in Adolescence Personal Argument
I am in agreement with the study’s results based on the relevance it has and more so in appreciation of the efforts that the researchers made to scientifically quantify an assumption that is made with an explanation that is based on empirical observations. This is not to say that they have exactly added to existing knowledge. It could be argued on one hand that their conclusion is tantamount to reinventing the wheel since the assumption they had was common knowledge. On the other hand, however, they have indeed added to existing knowledge by linking up the theory they had with facts (Hooper et al, 2004). A possible area of application could be in the area of public safety where teenage delinquency is one of the major issues. Dangerous behavior of these adolescents could be investigated to find out the specific rewards that exist in these contexts and therefore leading to solutions such as possible alternatives for the teenagers or ways of limiting their poor decision making negatively affect them. In areas such as academics, such information could be put into practice through the inclusion of rewards at different stages of learning so as to increase their participation and improve their performance (Roper et al, 2014; Anderson et al, 2013).
Value Drive Attention Capture in Adolescence References
Anderson, B. A., Faulkner, M. L., Rilee, J. J., Yantis, S., & Marvel, C. L. (2013). Attentional bias for nondrug reward is magnified in addiction. Experimental and Clinical Psychopharmacology, 21, 499–506
Casey, B. J., Jones, R. M., & Hare, T. A. (2008). The adolescent brain. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, 1124, 111–126. doi:10.1196/annals.1440.010
Dahl, R. E. (2004). Adolescent brain development: A period of vulnerabilities and opportunities. Keynote address. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, 1021, 1–22.
Galvan, A. (2010). Adolescent development of the reward system. Frontiers in Human Neuroscience, 4, Article 6. Retrieved from http://journal.frontiersin.org/Journal/10.3389/neuro.09 .006.2010/full.
Hooper, C. J., Luciana, M., Conklin, H. M., & Yarger, R. S. (2004). Adolescents’ performance on the Iowa Gambling Task: Implications for the development of decision making and ventromedial prefrontal cortex. Developmental Psychology, 40, 1148–1158.
Huntsinger, J. R., Clore, G. L., & Bar-Anan, Y. (2010). Mood and global-local focus: Priming a local focus reverses the link between mood and global-local processing. Emotion, 10, 722–726.
Roper, Z. J., Vecera, S. P., & Vaidya, J. G. (2014). Value-driven attentional capture in adolescence. Psychological science, 0956797614545654.
Serences, J. T. (2008). Value-based modulations in human visual cortex. Neuron, 60, 1169–1181.
Somerville, L. H., Hare, T., & Casey, B. J. (2011). Frontostriatal maturation predicts cognitive control failure to appetitive cues in adolescents. Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 23, 2123–2134.
Vecera, S. P., Cosman, J. D., Vatterott, D. B., & Roper, Z. J. J. (2014). The control of visual attention: Toward a unified account. In B. H. Ross (Ed.), Psychology of learning and motivation (Vol. 60, pp. 303–347). Waltham, MA:
