Cognition Test 2

Front 1

1. What are the two types of selective attention?

Back 1

Internal:Memory and Knowledge

External:Environmental objects and events

Front 2

According to the presentation, what are the advantages and disadvantages of selective attention?

Back 2

Advantages: Ability to hyper-focus on individual things amidst ambient noise
Ability to block unwanted stimuli

Disadvantages:Eliminates ability to comprehend crucial stimuli
Can lead to an increased state of unsocial behavior

Front 3

What state of mind can negatively affect selective attention?

Back 3

Anxiety negatively affects selective attention in that it decreases learning and reading ability

Front 4

According to the presentation, what are 4 possible causes of the symptoms of ADHD?

Back 4

1.Altered brain function
2.anatomy
3.heredity
4.maternal smoking and drug
5. early exposure to environmental toxins

Front 5

What 4 brain regions are possibly connected with ADHD?

Back 5

1.Prefrontal cortex
2basal ganglia
3.corpus callosum
4.cerebellum

PBCC

Front 6

What specific areas of the prefrontal cortex may be involved and why?

Back 6

Dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (Working memory or ability to keep plans in mind),

Orbital prefrontal cortex (Ability to inhibit inappropriate actions),

Anterior cingulate cortex (Emotional and cognitive control), Damage to these regions leads to impulsive, unsocialized, emotionally unregulated, and amotivational syndromes.

DOA

Front 7

What are the six general classes of drug treatment for ADHD?

Back 7

1.Stimulants
2.Non stimulants
3.antidepressants
4.antihypertensives
5.mood stabilizers
6.neuroleptics

Front 8

When are mneumonics bad or not very useful?

Back 8

-They are bad when you try to memorize everything instead of "hooking" information

-They are too confusing or convoluted

Front 9

What are some ways to create useful mneumonics?

Back 9

-Use a word that sounds like the word you want to remember

-Associate an absurd image or sound with the thing you want to remember

-Use a numeric code to associate the thing you want to remember

Front 10

According to the presentation, what is the difference between context and dependant memory and state dependant memory?

Back 10

Context dependent memory is based on location (sea, land).

State dependent memory is based on emotional/mental state.

Front 11

What is a schema?

Back 11

A schema is a theory that discusses how we perceive and understand the world around us through an abstract mental network. It helps to perceive, process and use information.

Front 12

How can chunking improve memory?

Back 12

Chunking is a hypothetical storage unit in working memory-it can help us improve memory by allowing us to memorize more due to more information being stored in each unit (It is easier to remember 12 4-digit years then 48 individual numbers)

Front 13

According to the presentation, what is the difference between episodic and semantic memory?

Back 13

Epsodic memory is the theoretical knowledge based on specific times and places

semantic memory: factual information independent of time and place

Front 14

What is generic knowledge?

Back 14

It's the knowledge about how things unfold in general

knowledge about what's typical in a particular sort of setting.

Front 15

What are intrusion errors and where do they come from?

Back 15

In the DRM procedure, intrusion errors come from words (or ideas) merely associated with the materials being learned.

Intrusion errors also come from the background knowledge we bring into the situation.

Front 16

What is the difference between local and distributed representation? (for more information, see the diagrams on slide 11 of lecture 8)

Back 16

-Local: "Features" (e.g., letters) are redundantly encoded in a localist system. CAT and ACT each has its own set of A, C, and T letter representations. So the A in CAT is not the same A as the one in ACT.


-Distributed: "Features" (e.g., letters) are shared in a distributed system. CAT and ACT use the very same A, C, and T letter representations. The letters just get used differently in CAT than in ACT.

Front 17

How are neural networks and the biological model alike?

Back 17

Neural Networks Model:
There are a variety of network models, not all used solely by cognitive psychologists.

Neural Networks are also used in computer programming, particularly in the area of artificial intelligence.

There are also several mathematical algorithms and probability equations that go into the various neural network models, but these vary.

Front 18

According to the presentation, what are the two major principles regarding the theory of connectionism and neural networks?

Back 18

Any given mental state can be described as an (N)-dimensional vector of numeric activation values over neural units in a network.


Memory is created by modifying the strength of the connections between neural units.

Front 19

What is the difference between automated neural networks and other computational models (such as Turing machines)?

Back 19

The crucial difference is that ANNs (artificial neural networks) incorporate nonlinearity.

Front 20

What is the difference between a feed forward network and a recurrent network?

Back 20

Feed forward: networks have no cycles and are the simplest.

Recurrent network: allows feedback to earlier nodes, which makes computation much more complex, but also more powerful.

Basically, feed forward only sends the information one way, where as recurrent network can send information back up the line

Front 21

Why are artificial neural networks important?

Back 21

One reason is that they can be trained to imitate higher-order human behaviors, primarily pattern recognition and decision making.
These abilities are useful in many areas such as sound and image processing, financial systems, and data mining.

Front 22

The nonlinearity of artificial neural networks adds what aspect that makes them more complex?

Back 22

Chaos

Front 23

What determines the strength of long term memory connections in memory?

How can the learner affect long-term memory?

Back 23

The strength of connections in long term memory is determined by how well you understand and connect them to other things.

You can remember things better by knowing the meaning, and gaining understanding by finding the purpose and making connections. Maintenance rehearsal is not the best way to get things into your long term memory, but if you make relationships/connections (elaborate or relational rehearsal) with previous information they you will remember it better.

Front 24

Understand Table 5.1 on page 162 and the results of the experiment looking at types of processing vs. intentional or incidental learning.

Back 24

You'll have to look at the table on pg 162 to really understand this one--but the main difference between intentional and incidental learning is incidental is learning without any intention to learn, and for intentional learning you will have to process something.

Front 25

What are the stages in the modal model of memory?

Back 25

The stages of the "modal" model are:

Sensory input

Sensory register

Short-term memory

Long-term memory

Front 26

How long do items stay in the sensory store

Back 26

For sensory register items stay in memory for 300 milliseconds (for Iconic memory), and it can hold vast amounts of information (stimuli).

Front 27

How long do items stay in short-term memory?

capacity?

Back 27

For short-term memory items stay in memory for 30 seconds (Iconic memory), and it can hold 7+/- 2

Front 28

How long do items stay in long-term memory?

Capacity?

Back 28

Long term memory stays indefinitely, and can hold an indefinite amount, but details may be hazy as it has to do with how people move information from short to long term memories.

Front 29

What brain areas are most responsible for maintaining short-term memories?

Back 29

Brain parts that are important for short-term memory:

Central executive:holds memory, makes choices;

Dorsolateral Prefrontal Cortex:executive control, maintenance of items in working memory;

Inferior Frontal Cortex:phonological rehearsal (phonological loop).

Superior Parietal Lobe: attentional aspects of working memory;

Front 30

What brain areas are most responsible for encoding long-term memories?

Back 30

Brain parts that are important for encoding long-term memory:

Hippocampus: has to do with making new memories,

But I'm not entirely sure this is what he is looking for--anyone know?

Front 31

What is the definition of chunking? Why is it important?

Back 31

Chunking is the hypothetical storage unit in working memory; it is estimated that the working memory can hold 7+/-2 chunks--but each chunk can be a large amount of information. Chunking is important because you can memorize more if you have larger chunks.

Front 32

What is the primacy and recency effect?

What type of memory is associated with the primacy effect?

What type of memory is associated with the recency effect?

Back 32

The primacy and recency effects have to do with remembering things--you remember things at the beginning (primacy) and end (recency) better than things in the middle. Primacy effect is due to not having to divide attention too much because there aren't too many things to remember in the sequence yet. They both are associated with short term memory, but the primacy effect also shows some long term memory.

Front 33

Thoroughly understand state-dependent learning. How does meaning play a role?

Back 33

State dependent learning states that you get a better performance when your mental state is similar during study-test phases. The book gave the example of a group of people that were told to learn certain material while sitting on the edge of water and some of the people were to learn certain materials while underwater (p. 181-182). They were later tested. Some of them had to test while underwater and some while they were out of the water regardless of where they learned the material. The outcome suggested that those who learned the material and were tested in the same environment did better.
The role that meaning plays is that people tend to remember words if there is a meaning behind them. Subjects were given a list of words to remember, then given a separate that was going to help them remember the words on the first list.

For example, the word “cat” appeared on one list and the word “dog” was their trigger word. The other group was given the trigger word of “hat”, which was supposed to encourage participants to think about the word’s sound. They found that those that were given the trigger word of “dog” did better on the test than those given the trigger word “hat”. Meaning plays a bigger role than sound when it comes to remembering.

Front 34

What is source confusion?

Back 34

Source confusion is a memory error in which you misremember where a it of information was learned, or where a particular stimulus was encountered.
i.e., you can remember a face, or a place, etc., but you can’t remember where or how you know.

Front 35

Understand how implicit familiarity biases perception and how familiarity can masquerade as truth.

Back 35

Implicit familiarity biases perception and can masquerade as truth because studies have shown that if you hear a statement whether true or false, then later are asked about that same subject, more people will assume it is true because they have heard it before. Implicit memories are memories with no conscious realization that it is influenced by past events. You simply heard it, so it must be true.

Front 36

What memory deficits are present with retrograde amnesia?

Back 36

Retrograde amnesia is memory disruption of things learned before the event that initiated the amnesia.

Common injuries that cause this type of amnesia are blows to the head.

A person is unable to recall events occurring just prior to the blow.

Front 37

? What memory deficits are present with antereograde amnesia?

Back 37

Antereograde amnesia is memory disruption of things that occur after the event that initiated the amnesia. Subjects with this type of amnesia seldom are able to learn anything new.

Front 38

Be very familiar with Korsakoff’s syndrome and possible memory deficits associated with it.

Back 38

Korsakoff’s syndrome (p. 206) often affects alcoholics, who have inadequate diets and seem to get most, if not all, of their nutrition from whatever they are drinking. Most alcoholic drinks are missing several key nutrients, like Vitamin B, which can cause Korsakoff’s syndrome. Those suffering from this tend to have antereograde memory.

Front 39

17. Be familiar with the Brewer and Treyens study. (p.215-216)

Back 39

Participants were told to wait the experimenter’s office prior to the experiment starting. After 35 seconds, the participants were taken out of the office and told that there actually was no experiment procedure. Instead, they were asked about their memory of the room they just left. The participant’s recollections of the office were plainly influenced by their prior knowledge. Most of them said there were books on the shelf when there were none. A “typical” office would have books, therefore several of the participants stated so on.

Front 40

18. Thoroughly understand the hypothesis on the causing of forgetting.

Back 40

Decay: With the passage of time, memories may fade or erode. Perhaps because the relevant brain cells die or because the connections among memories need to be constantly refreshed, or they weaken.


Interference: Less is remembered about old events because as time passes, new learning occurs which can interfere with old memories.

Retrieval failure: is also a possibility. Just because the memory is there does not guarantee you will remember it.

Front 41

Understand interference thoroughly such as blurring of similar episodes and the effect of leading questions.

Back 41

Leading questions are those that are looking for a specific answer. For example, one group of people were asked, “How fast were the cars going when they hit each other?” A different group was asked, “How fast were the cars going when they smashed into each other?” Those in the second group said that the cars were going a lot faster when the word “smashed” was used.

Front 42

How are false memories created?

Back 42

False memories are created generally when someone is trying to recover the distant past rather than more recent events.

It is impossible to tell the difference between recovered memory and conscious/unconscious implant of memory.

Front 43

Missinformation effect

Back 43

Children are especially vulnerable to leading questions and the implant of memory.
The misinformation effect occurs when a persons’ memory is plainly being influenced by misinformation they received after an episode was over. If you drive by a farm and later someone tells you that there was a tractor in front of a barn when in fact there wasn’t, you might believe it.

Front 44

What is the difference between knowing and remembering?

Back 44

Fully correct memories arrive in your thoughts with a feeling of knowing
Fully false memories come with a detailed sense of remembering.

Front 45

According to your book, how does hypnotism and sodium amytal affect memory?

Back 45

Hypnotized participants who are instructed to remember do their very best to comply, so they give a full and detailed reporting of the targeted event. BUT, they don't remember more. They simply say more in order to be cooperative. These memories aren't very accurate either. They guess sometimes. SO hypnosis doesn't improve memory, it just changes the willingness to talk. They are more prone to the misinformation effect.(p.233)


This drug works as a sedative and puts an individual in a less guarded, less cautious state of mind. This allows them to report more on the past not because they remember more, but because they are willing to say more. This puts them vulnerable to the affects of leading or misleading questions
CONCLUSION: hypnosis and sodium amytal don't improve memory, they put the person in a position to say more, which isn't necessarily truth.

Front 46

What is unique about flashbulb memories? How accurate are they?

Back 46

Flashbulb memories are extraordinally vivid and are rich in detail. They are marked by highly emotional events retained despite the passage of many years. Like what you were doing on 9/11.
The problem with flashbulb memories is that they are so vivid to the person that they are sure of their accuracy. BUT despite the detail and assurance, they aren't always accurate. Both inaccurate and accurate flashbulb memories are recalled with great detail and confidence.
Accuracy was closely linked to their assessments of how important the event was for them. If it was important to the, they were much more likely to remember it.(p.238-239)

Front 47

Be able to convert from binary numbers to normal numbers as well as figure out values of output nodes.

Back 47

Binary numbers have to do with powers. The first place (farthest to the right) is 2^0=1, the second place is 2^1=2, the third is 2^3, and so on... so, 10 would be written 1010, where the ones represent which numbers should be added in... 2^3=8 plus 2^1=2 equals 10.... as another example: 11010 would be 2^4+2^3+2^0=16+8+1=25. If this isn't clear enough for you, I'd be happy to talk with you and clear it up--it is difficult to explain in an email.

Front 48

What is back propagation?

Back 48

Back propagation has to do with teaching artificial neural networks how to perform.

Front 49

What makes back propagation most effective?

Back 49

. It works best with forward feeding networks, so ones with no feedback.

Front 50

Understand inhibitory and excitatory links in a connectionist network

Back 50

. The difference is calculated, as is a scaling factor, which is how much higher or lower the output needs to be adjusted to meet the desired output. The neurons are then adjusted in weight to lower the local error.

Front 51

What causes nodes to fire in a connectionist network?

Back 51

Thinking about what that node represents causes that node to fire. Then the link you made(whether it be positive or negative) while learning causes the next node to fire, or inhibits the next node to fire.

Front 52

Understand the concept of "degree of fan".

Back 52

A degree of fan is the number of associative links radiating out from a node.

Front 53

What are advantages/disadvantages of high degree of fan vs. low degree of fan?

Back 53

. If there are more links (high degree of fan) then each of the associated nodes will receive only a small fraction of the activation flowing outward from the node. If you have a low degree of fan then you have less nodes to project to and therefore more activation for each of those nodes, so the connections are more solidified. (p.262)

Front 54

How can the disadvantage of high degree of fan be overcome?

Back 54

To overcome the disadvantage of high degree of fan you must make interconnections, meaning the more you create more nodes that are connected to another node with a high degree of fan the more activation that the two nodes are getting and the greater the connection. This idea can be explained by the fact that you can understand something better if you learn things about it from different perspectives as opposed to trying to learn it from one vantage point. If you are only looking at something from one vantage point you are making a high degree of fan node.(p.262-265)

Front 55

How is an idea or mental content represented in a distributed system? How does a distributed system function?

Back 55

“Features” (e.g., letters) are SHARED in a distributed system. CAT and ACT use the very same A, C, and T letter representations. The letters just get used differently in CAT than in ACT.
Example 1 (from Power Point): When you see a pine tree … a distributed system assumes that there is no CONCEPT of a pine tree, rather there is some node that is activated. The lines that form a pine tree use the same neurons activated for other objects that have similar lines and angles (e.g., CD cases). Activation MUST flow back to the visual cortex and activate neurons that are responsible for processing the lines activated by the pine tree
Example 2 (from textbook): when asked about your computer, many nodes representing “computer” have to manage collectively to activate the many nodes representing “iBook” (or whatever computer you have).
Conclusion = there is no one place or node where the content is stored. Instead, the content is represented via a pattern of simultaneous activity across many nodes. These same nodes (places) will also be part of other patterns

Front 56

27. What are some major shortcomings or criticisms of connectionism?

Back 56

(from Power Point): Is it real biologically? Initial learning is from examples; are examples picked, stacked to be particularly helpful? Connectionism models have only been able to stimulate specific memory tasks and focuses.
(from textbook): In a connectionist model, different parts of a process are carried out by different (and largely independent) operators, and there is no mechanism in place to coordinate the overall process. With no local representations, there can be no centralized pooling of information and no centralized control.

Front 57

28. Understand the theories of category representation such as prototype, exemplar, and mixed exemplar/prototype. Make sure you understand the example employing the word stem – AVE. Study handouts thoroughly on categories.

Back 57

Prototypes (Abstract)
Associated with the “ideal” – also could be the average (accumulation) of the various category members you have encountered
Prototypes tend to be more complex and more abstract than what is derived from a simple statistical mean or mode.
Example (from Power Point): when recalling words within the category of “fruits” – will recall the most typical member, the item that shares the most features with other items in the category and the fewest features with items outside of the category
Exemplar (Concrete)
Does not have to be the most typical, it may be based off what comes to mind. The exemplar theory predicts that what comes up as the standard may actually vary from time to time (a specific instance that happens to be the most active in memory).
Example (from class lecture): If working with a sheep dog and at the moment asked to name a dog, you would probably name a sheep dog (even though it’s not the most common)
Mixed Exemplar/Prototype
At times, depending on the context, a person will come up with prototype or exemplar.
Asked to pronounce “TAVE”
Pronouncing TAVE like cave, dave, save = most people pronounce it this way (these results look good for the prototype theory)
Pronouncing TAVE like have = 20-30% of people will say it this way with no priming, but 70% with say it this when primed with “have” (supports the exemplar theory)
Conclusion = People will say it like “cave” IF considering the vast variety of words and options that are similar to the “cave” pronunciation. But if people were considering the large frequency and times used of the “have” pronunciation, they would then choose the “have” way. Exemplar theory predicts that people should pronounce TAVE like have.

Front 58

Prototypes (Abstract)

Back 58

Associated with the “ideal” – also could be the average (accumulation) of the various category members you have encountered
Prototypes tend to be more complex and more abstract than what is derived from a simple statistical mean or mode.
Example (from Power Point): when recalling words within the category of “fruits” – will recall the most typical member, the item that shares the most features with other items in the category and the fewest features with items outside of the category

Front 59

Exemplar (Concrete)

Back 59

Does not have to be the most typical, it may be based off what comes to mind. The exemplar theory predicts that what comes up as the standard may actually vary from time to time (a specific instance that happens to be the most active in memory).
Example (from class lecture): If working with a sheep dog and at the moment asked to name a dog, you would probably name a sheep dog (even though it’s not the most common)

Front 60

Mixed Exemplar/Prototype

Back 60

At times, depending on the context, a person will come up with prototype or exemplar.

Front 61

Asked to pronounce “TAVE”

Back 61

Pronouncing TAVE like cave, dave, save = most people pronounce it this way (these results look good for the prototype theory)
Pronouncing TAVE like have = 20-30% of people will say it this way with no priming, but 70% with say it this when primed with “have” (supports the exemplar theory)
Conclusion = People will say it like “cave” IF considering the vast variety of words and options that are similar to the “cave” pronunciation. But if people were considering the large frequency and times used of the “have” pronunciation, they would then choose the “have” way. Exemplar theory predicts that people should pronounce TAVE like have.

Front 62

What are rigid definitions?

Back 62

satisfies NECESSARY and SUFFICIENT conditions

Front 63

necessary:

Back 63

if object A doesn’t have feature X, then it CANNOT be an instance of thing (it can’t be in the category)

Front 64

sufficient:

Back 64

if object A has feature X, then it MUST be an instance of thing (then it must be in the category)
(from Power Point): Does the human mind represent THINGS (objects and categories) in terms of rigid definitions? Probably not, at least for most THINGS.

Front 65

What are the advantages of categories?

Back 65

Categories allow us to make assumptions, call for quick decisions and appropriate actions. We all have different assumptions, and we therefore, make categories. Then we can infer visible properties from invisible properties.
*Categories greatly reduce learning and memory requirements.
Categories enable us to order and relate objects and events.

Front 66

Be familiar with Berlin and Kay’s color experiment.

Back 66

They tested the universality in color words. The results proved “all people PRECEIVE color the same, regardless of how many basic color terms a person’s language might have.”

Front 67

What are the advantages of heuristic strategies?

Back 67

Categorization via resemblance is a heuristic strategy, a relatively efficient way to think about categories. (Humans process information in heuristic manner for efficiency, time constraints, etc.) In most cases, resemblance to a prototype or an exemplar can be judged on the basis of relatively superficial features rather than on the basis of more abstract knowledge about a category. This emphasis on superficial characteristics is precisely what we want for a categorization heuristic: These traits can generally be judged swiftly, allowing comparisons that are quick and easy.