The Relationship Between Empathy and Reading Fiction - 3: Bottom-up will tend to create meaning that is less related to any affective you. (Thursday Words)
Fact vs fiction—how paratextual information shapes our reading processes -- https://academic.oup.com/scan/article/9/1/22/1673147/Fact-vs-fiction-how-paratextual-information-shapes
Abstract
Our life is full of stories: some of them depict real-life events and were reported, e.g. in the daily news or in autobiographies, whereas other stories, as often presented to us in movies and novels, are fictional. However, we have only little insights in the neurocognitive processes underlying the reading of factual as compared to fictional contents. We investigated the neurocognitive effects of reading short narratives, labeled to be either factual or fictional. Reading in a factual mode engaged an activation pattern suggesting an action-based reconstruction of the events depicted in a story. This process seems to be past-oriented and leads to shorter reaction times at the behavioral level. In contrast, the brain activation patterns corresponding to reading fiction seem to reflect a constructive simulation of what might have happened.
Comment: If you've made it to here, I have a question: Was Beth's story real to you? please give a node in the comments, if you'd like. (part 2 at the link above)
The last two 'short stories' - the Beth experiment in english and italian - presented a form of story, a narrative, done with the intent to provoke a shift in anyone reading them.
Though expecting a gender difference, the measure was unexpected - even in such a tiny case. On last count: of the 13 women who participated, all but one, a native German speaking anthropologist reading in English, took Beth's island story as actually happening, whereas only two of the 12 men (I being one of them) responded the same.Motivation. In a sort of deep way, the development of how we think, of where we place ourselves in differing contexts, the direction of our understanding or representing relevant aspects of the world. Our individual grooves, so to speak. In this thingy I wanted to see a little the differences in how we identify read (prose) character, place and time, but in plurality. Hence the specific thematics and loose development of Beth and her surroundings. Anyway.
Below are a couple quick cut and pasted exchanges with a couple of people who participated, introducing a few ideas because, well, I'm lazy. And other stuff. (Ironically, or maybe not, the two exchanges come from the one other male responding 'yes' and the only woman responding 'no'.) And forgetful. In the unlikely case that anyone is interested in a word or two more, any notes or comments would be very welcome. The first also refers to an article...which I can't find, on narrative.
1 - on internal modelling
....on the only two males (of 14) who accepted Beth's plurality in the empathy - story experiment...
Modelling. Color, or lack thereof. I don't know for others, but for me when developing a model there is a long accumulation in which a bunch of stuff and ways to that stuff is used. It doesn't matter the thing being modeled, Krebs cycle or visualizing a cell, financial markets, how to pop a difficult to reach pimple, ecc. Reading, doing, symbolic doodling as integration begins, equations, breaking down aspects into variables, discussions, ecc. At a some point it's formed. Two and half dimensions for me, that is the model seen in an abstract space - it's sort of visual in an oneiric-ish way.
It isn't delineated but the model space does end in a sort of dark gray nothing, I'm there but not in any abstracted way, that is the 'I' represented is there and can shift its position a little up or down or forward, even into, though not all the way to the farthest sides of the space (at that point you leave). But it isn't separated. It's part though distinguishable.
No colors or at most dim ones, only shades of gray. No specific words ever or sound but sometimes a faint background noise - not constant but a fast fuzz with a rhythmic aspect specific to the model. The model moves, it has a physiology but its time is unrelated to real time. And there is flavor, or more than falvor an index of bitterness (sweet to bitter.) That is the bitterness-sweetenss index has to be harmonious if the model is tending correctly or as correctly as accumlated information allows it (brain networks?). If it's acute, too bitter or sweet, then something isn't right with the representation.
I suppose that way of…developing has at least a little to do with a relatively weak top-down representative self. A very likely strong stress response from my mother to my fetus in the first trimester diluting testosterone, affecting development and my fetus' and my apparent response to then overproduce the same in turn solidified a relatively fun and rich network of intrinsic dialog, more caudal and right tempo-parietal (networks and expressive equilibriums, again.) That, in turn, and the subsequent relative lack of some kinds of developed motivation in adolescence effectively left me almost entirely out of that mine-is-bigger-than-yours here and now dominance loop, or 'what-am-i supposed -to-do-with-it' becoming much less motivational than 'what-does-it-mean'. Why and where from, later. In sum, hierarchy does't actually have anything to do with how I see the world or myself or why 'this thing's to do.' (dominance is a slightly different affair and largely unavoidable though its manifestion is context based and different person to person.) Attached to that is real time, or real time has little influence on meaning intrinsically. Ah, I should note for later, I'm not a first born, which tends to have likley an influence.
The other man who said 'yes' to plurality (Beth's, the main protagonist,) has a different path to similar aspects, I think. In his case, since I actually know him in person, the development of 'mine-is-bigger' stuff was diminished indirectly by, I suspect, a relatively higher level of dopamine. A little taller in adolescence, which can be helpful in that way. One of those rare people, certainly for men, that, ah, makes things better, even more with the capacity to accept...personality free radicles, so to speak. (Relatively immune to the development of rancor so easy for others whose apparent circumstantial generosity is however somewhat or even a lot provoked by their lack of presence. Again indirectly, a sort of fundamental indifference, ahime...) So he, to, sees information in a context that is less 'what am I supposed to do with it here and now' and more 'what does it mean.' (If I recall, he, to, is not first born.) Next, a quick dive into narrative followed by the supposed different tendencies between genders.
2. on narrative
.....narrative is not the organizational way we organize experience and memory of human happenings. It is instead, I think, a dominant way of describing memories and experience extrinsically - which includes others, including self. Narrative also doesn't have to be character-based but usually is, in this case as the article points out because cultural influence can trump other stuff, ie like what is a character. And emerges because of the diffusion of imitation, likely influenced by a network of mirror neuron 'turbo-chargers'. Hence as a species we are able both to abstract ourselves from ourselves and place ourselves into something - most importantly someone - else, or a representation of the same. Hence we build representations on varying strata in many dimensions. Symbolic thinking was a necessary precursor.
Time is likely quanta - but separate from meaning, even physiologically. It is a sort of emergent abstraction. Like a field. Narrative needs to use that approach in order to convey, per force, by speaking to our corresponding abstractions (temporal representations of complexity) and in turn to other representations top-down. And the unfortunate thing about real time and abstracted self or representations involving manipulations - they cannot afford contradiction. Only one possibility at a time - there can only be one, or what I call the Figaro rule (yukyuk.) So: the necessary removal of information on the way to emergent expression. Leading to a sort of narrative uniqueness - which may be representitavitly true only in narrative, but not beyond the particularity of the narrative.
It's hard to keep this flavor I realize but the principle of emergence and plurality (in systems of information) runs more deeply. Ironically, more than purely hermeneutical, a story is successful more when it allows the emergence of time-less, non-hermeneutical aspects that come from - here it comes - BEYOND (nudge-nudge, wink-wink without italics) the narrative, both of the conveyor and the conveyed to, more than 'constituted' or functions by the same. That is, it acts a bridge into larger integrative systems. (Strange, narrative in the article seems to mix story and narrative as concepts, using contextual domain conceptually to distinguish. And that's assuming a lot of homogeneity a-la Piaget, ironically)
3. (exchange with one, later to be diagnosed with aspergers - rather important, - of the only 2 women who did not see Beth's plurality as to possible why's she did not see that character as plural)
...One factor maybe: you've actually had a successful academic career as and are an anthropologist with a relative lot of field work. Unlike, say, working as a chemist or store clerk or even a psychiatrist, that implies to me observing human behavior in its context - as subject data with which, and other stuff, to form abstracted predictive and explicative models. Ie, because of, er, a quiet adolescence in a midwestern suburb where cultural (colloquial) exposure came only from personal initiative (PBS, books, an abandoned record collection and two foreign freaks in the public high school, one an indian Canadian who then went to Waterloo,) the first time I saw a Rembrandt self-portrait in London at 18 after a first univ. year, I didn't know what or who he was. But the painting floored me so I returned several times to look deeply before even reading the title and artist. If you shoved my head in an MRI then, and now, looking at the work, you might get very similar patterns. But if you ask me to respond to questions about significance or meaning and component, you'd instead likely get relatively differing ones.
A second obvious but less determinate aspect: I'm also presuming English is not your mother tongue, which as an individual variable should a bit ironically have slightly more determinate influence on women as a group than men and may also be slightly influenced by which language-culture is the first language (or languages). (Neat little aside, though tangent: in Italian we have genre with nouns, usually invariable. But some nouns, particularly intimate ones, switch from masculine in the abstracted singular to feminine in the contextual plural. So it's always his one arm, but her arms.)
A bit irrelevant but which indirectly moves toward the main point: only as a category (it'd be more interesting to identify other categories - they're all categories more than individual determinate variables, all could and should be broken down into much more fundamental aspects - categories like depression or professional musicians or narcissism or number of older siblings etc.,) the 'partiture' of contextual processing in women might tend to be relatively louder than in men. Is, I think. More, intrinsic circuits which deal with larger amounts of information, more time (temporal representations of complexity) and therefor accept contradiction (vs hierarchical, more purposefully abstractly manipulative and therefore per force more inhibitory and tied to real time, the emergent present eternal so to speak.) In a nutshell: representations of I tend to hear more context and timeless meaning, the later of which implies a large set of affected differences. Or phrased differently: as a category, women tend to maintain a relatively more bottom-up equilibrium.
Yeah, that implies at least tendential phenotypic differences and maintains the notion that a: hemispherically, right modules tend to process more context and integration and b: caudally, representations of I are less extrinsically and manipulatively oriented. (The noted recent study on hemispheric non-differences was, I think, rather silly. The data itself didn't match the headlines and more importantly, differences emerge once you're doing something, not at rest.) Anyway, more than anatomy - it's function: representations of self and world, abstracted and contextual, intrinsic and extrinsic (what I am, what should I do, what is this, what does it mean, what can I do with it.) Hence the specific thematics in Beth's story, (I, context, time) and the responses of men as a group (that also usually have a component, in their case, of simple, direct sexism. You'd be surprised. Well, actually you wouldn't.) (exchange with H.)
4 assumptions on bottom-up systemic expression
After reading 1, 2 and 3above in regards, it seems I, ah, jumped about a bit. A partial clarifying explanation regarding somewhat fundamental argumentative assumptions: context: assumption: bottom-up Bayesian directionally as a concept, is … useful even if incomplete. That is we, our cns, predict -confirm, predict-confirm in parallel processing. More margin for error the farther up so less acceptance of contradiction.
Likewise division of dialoging representative networks into abstracting and contextual, tendentially respectfully left and right (cerebral hemispheres), and representations of self into affective or extrinsic (tied to real time expression) and integrative/integrated or intrinsic, the former more inhibitive. Relatively speaking, women tend to have 'louder' bottom -up representations that are less inhibited in absolute terms. That is, their final narrative - the story that's invented to tell our affective, real-time selves why we did that - affords less bottom-up error by accepting partial contradiction (i.e. in gross terms, you'd expect as a category they might tend to have relatively more gray matter right tempo-parietal, the local brain 'stuff a bit mid-way back - and they do - and a smaller overall left pfc, the part up front, and they do.)
In the two male cases - another male friend, if I recall, might also have said yes - in mine during develop: relatively strong bottom-up representations are louder than usual, which then likely influenced developing dialog and motivation. In the other case or two, very similar personalities and with similar aspects of history, an important developed motivation tied to affective dominance and reward that sponsors top-down inhibition and abstracted representations of self, might be more quiet due to their not, ah, needing it all, that in turn due to naturally relatively high levels of dopamine. Or, in vulgar terms, no 'mine-has-to-be-and-is-bigger-than-yours' kick with resulting testosterone boost, NA stimulated motivation, 'mine-is-bigger', etc. In all three, aspects of wiring that are less 'manly-man' like, and body language/behavior averse to expressing dominance.
.Taste. Flavor. We smell and taste…and feel, hear, see, etc. That input arrives for the most part into our awareness only after a lot of integration has already occurred. So flavor is very much formed as much as what we are, by the receiver, as itself. Of course, though for some reason many had been and some are still trying to reduce input into 'qualia', (not quails, which are, ah, real - both before you put them in your mouth and after.) An excess of Sp2 receptors is sort of a condemnation. Likley deriving for the obvious survival benefits, (bitterness. I suppose, as in theorize, that a relative high concentration in your mouth often if not usually corresponds to high concentrations below. When your guts taste bitterness, they transmit a signal to, well, flush by adding water, getting rid of the potentially harmful bitter stuff by getting it out quicker and avoiding at least some intestinal absorption,) they and others also talk to your brain and mind bottom-up, influencing in a stratified way, directly and indirectly. But you're not aware of it.
Take the opposite extreme, in a sense, of someone autistic. Someone who has no or relatively little filter from integrated stuff into what that affective person is supposed to do with it. No inhibition, in that way. Always in the present, rather the expression. No alternatives allowed, breakfast cereal - only that kind, only that milk, only at that hour then we do that activity - only that activity, only in that order. You'd expect a part of their brain, that part that deals with affecting, to be relatively muscular, and a smaller part that deals with integration, with maintaining relations and alternative meanings outside of time. And they do, even on a neuronal basis.
Ie: I'm not a fully aware synesthesiac. Still, many things have a sort of flavor to me - but a bit farther up. That is, integrated material delivers a taste, has a taste - only of different kinds of bitterness and harmony, is the only way I can describe it, not flavor as such. But when an integrated model moves easily, correctly, it is accompanied by an harmonious, pleasant bitterness. If it has a tasted sweetness it's no good, something is wrong with the model. There's a contrast that still has to be resolved. Note, I'm an odd bloke effectively so that flavor in me is mixed into something that isn't affective, a sort of thing that usually most people aren't at all aware of. And given consistency and history, I likely have an excess of Sp2 receptors from my palate on down. And this is staying away from even more obvious stuff like serotinin levels.
The idea is that those enteric (gut) neurons play a role both in representing the world and our selves to our selves before abstraction, relatively, and communicate with a system that is very large, i.e. that likely includes stuff like all that bacteria we carry - which are probably more determinate genetically in the system than we, abstracted, are. Certainly larger than our selves alone. Anyway. Full stomachs. Irregular heart beats. Interaction of systems. Different representations of self. Different contexts. Different expressions of time. And quails
conclude, after omitting some dialogue on heart rythms and self expression
.…a longish after. The workout straightened my heart's beat but, as often, once that negative-reinforcing turbo kicks in I let the movement run long, all the way into dinner, pausing to walk to the kitchen to put the potatoes on to boil (the puree made after accompanied de-boned quail wrapped around sage and butter and wrapped in turn by prosciutto slices.) There's a difference between affective representations - abstracted things, identifying what an abstracted you can do with them and how - and integrated representations - what they mean or how they are connected without you doing anything. That's why the terminology used in this study and elsewhere - affective vs cognitive empathy - can be a bit confounding. It mixes words sloppily, I think.
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