The neural basis of implicit moral attitude—An IAT study using event-related fMRI

The Quadruple Process model approach to examining the neural underpinnings of prejudice

“…In other words, this study will be the first to disentangle two distinct processes that contribute to prejudiceingroup favoritism (positive associations) and outgroup negativity (negative associations). Further, application of the Quad model will also refine our understanding of the frontal lobe activations found in previous research on the IAT (e.g., Chee et al, 2000;Luo et al, 2006;Knutson et al, 2006;2007;Richeson et al, 2003) by generating independent estimates of two distinct controlled processes (D, OB) that can be related to neural activity.…”

“…Although the IAT is one of the most popular behavioral measures of automatic (or implicit) attitudes, particularly for prejudice (Fazio and Olson, 2003), behavioral and modeling research suggests that IAT performance reflects both automatic and controlled processes (Conrey et al, 2005;Sherman et al, 2008). Previous fMRI studies involving the IAT are consistent with this view; significant activation has been found in regions associated with automatic processing, such as the amygdala (Cunningham et al, 2004;Phelps et al, (2000) although see Phelps et al, (2003) for evidence that amygdala is not critical for implicit racial bias) as well as controlled processing such as the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (Richeson et al, 2003), middle frontal gyrus (Knutson et al, 2007), ventrolateral prefrontal cortex (Luo et al, 2006), and cingulate gyrus (Luo et al, 2006). The proposed research builds on this work by applying the Quadruple Process model (Quad model; Conrey et al, 2005;Sherman et al, 2008) to the interpretation of IAT performance in an fMRI environment, in order to examine the neural correlates of specific automatic and controlled processes that contribute to prejudice.…”

“…Although arousal is equated with automaticity, it is possible that greater control is engaged in relation to arousing stimuli and, therefore, any results may reflect a combination of automatic and controlled processing. This analysis found significant activity in regions more typically associated with automatic associations for the arousing moral stimuli (amygdala, ventromedial prefrontal cortex: Luo et al, 2006). Another study examined implicit preference for political figures by regressing individual differences in explicit ratings of preference for the political figures on the Congruent condition map (in relation to a control condition).…”

“…Most of the hypothesized neural regions were based on activations identified in previous neural investigations using the IAT. These regions included amygdala, insula, caudate, orbital, and medial and lateral portions of the frontal lobes (Chee et al, 2000;Cunningham et al, 2004;Knutson et al, 2006;2007;Luo et al, 2006;Phelps et al, 2000;Richeson et al, 2003). These analyses were conducted using the AAL map to identify anatomical boundaries and an ROI toolbox designed for use with SPM ('MarsBar'; Brett et al, 2002) to correct for these regions.…”

“…In other words, automatic associations may not be expressed because of controlled processing. In order to address the problematic behavioral measurement of automatic aspects of attitudes, a small amount of neural research interested in the neural systems underlying prejudice has drawn on the Implicit Association Test (IAT: Greenwald et al, 1998) (Chee et al, 2000;Cunningham et al, 2004;Knutson et al, 2006;2007;Luo et al, 2006;Phelps et al, 2003;Phelps et al, 2000;Richeson et al, 2003). Although the IAT is one of the most popular behavioral measures of automatic (or implicit) attitudes, particularly for prejudice (Fazio and Olson, 2003), behavioral and modeling research suggests that IAT performance reflects both automatic and controlled processes (Conrey et al, 2005;Sherman et al, 2008).…”