Browsing by Author "Ferguson, Ryan"

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    Distinguer la peur de la surprise indépendamment du processus d’interprétation : un examen de l’hypothèse des limites perceptuelles et attentionnelles
    (2015-03-30) Graham, Michelle; Chamberland, Justin A.; Ferguson, Ryan; Reguigui, Leila; Dickinson, Joël
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    Give me a verb! Give me a noun!: an ERP investigation of perceptual words with ambiguous word classes
    (Laurentian University of Sudbury, 2015-07-08) Ferguson, Ryan
    Previous research has demonstrated that retrieving a verb from memory elicits different neural activity than retrieving a noun, however, what about words that can be both? It has been found that the context surrounding a target word hold primary importance in the classification of a word as being either a verb or a noun in the case of an ambiguous target word. Using Event-Related Potentials as a physiological instrument to measure cognitive processes through the means of a lexical decision task; the current study will examine brain activity when context is manipulated for words that are considered both verbs and nouns. The target words consisted of 5 English words: view, watch, witness, notice, sense. During the task, there were 2 sets of conditions presented to the participants twice. The first condition consisted of the words ‘to’ and ‘the’ preceding the target word in a random order. The second condition consisted of the word ‘this’ preceding or succeeding the target word in a random order. After the completion of all conditions, participants were prompted to complete a counterbalanced 9-point likert scale for each target word. They were asked to rate their opinion of how strongly each word was classified as a verb or a noun. Resulting ERP data was examined for contextual differences across word context category and between regions of interest montages.
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    Investigating emotional facial recognition in trait anxious individuals: an eye-tracking study
    (2016-07-28) Ferguson, Ryan
    The current study examined the relationship between the recognition of the six basic emotions as a function of trait anxiety. Previous research has led to conflicting findings; one study reported increased accuracy for expressions of fear, and another finding no differences as a function of trait anxiety. As suggested by previous literature, the current study included eye movement measures to further investigate the processing of emotional expressions in anxious individuals. The current study also utilized four intensities of emotional expressions, a new addition to anxiety literature, as well as incorporated a measure of emotional dysregulation. The task consisted of a free viewing recognition task of expressions of the six basic emotions. Results from the current study revealed no accuracy or viewing time differences as a function of trait anxiety, however, a robust relationship was found between level of trait anxiety and emotional dysregulation. Clinical implications and future directions are discussed.