Cognitive Psych 1

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cognitive psychology

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branch of psych concerned with the scientific study of the mind

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mind

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creates and controls mental functions (perception, attention, memory, emotions, language, deciding, thinking, reasoning)

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cognition

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mental processes (perception, attention, memory, etc.) that are what the mind does

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reaction time

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how long it takes a person to respond to the presentation of a stimulus

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savings method

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used to analyze results (subtract # of trials needed to learn the list after a delay from the # of trials it took to learn the list the first time)

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structuralism

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overall experience is determined by the combining basic elements of experience the structuralists call sensations

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analytic introspection

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technique where trained participants described their experiences and thought processes in response to stimuli

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behaviorism

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founded by john watson

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classical conditioning

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pairing one stimulus causes changes in response to the neutral stimulus (Pavlov)

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operant conditioning

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how behavior is strengthened by the presentation of positive reinforcers (Skinner)

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cognitive map

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conception of the maze's layout when the rat was first exploring the maze (Tolman)

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cognitive revolution

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shift in psych from the behaviorists stimulus response relationship to an approach whose main thrust was understanding operation of the mind

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information processing approach

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traces the sequences of mental operations involved in cognition

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artificial intelligence

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making a machine behave in ways that would be intelligent if a human were doin them

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logic theorist

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program created by newell and simon that created mathematical proof theorems that involve principles of logic too complex to describe

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memory consolidation

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info about something was in a fragile state and could become strengthened into a strong memory that is more resistant to interference by events such as taking a hit to the head

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muller and pilzecker

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two groups that learned nonsense syllables (immediate and delay groups - immediate learned list one and immediately list two; delay group learned one list waited 6 mins then learned another)

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perception

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experiences resulting from stimulation of the senses

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bottom up processing

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begins with stimulation of the receptors (ex: hit your head and see stars)

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principle of componential recovery

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if we can see an object's geons, we can identify the objects

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top down processing

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processing that begins with a persons prior knowledge or experience

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multiple personalities of a blob

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blob shown is perceived as different objects depending on its orientation and the context within which its seen

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feedback signals

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signals that travel down from higher centers to influence incoming signals

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size consistency

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we perceive objects as remaining the same size even when theyh move to different circumstances

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speech segmentation

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people can tell where one word ends and another begins due to their knowledge of particular languages

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theory of unconscious inference

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some of our perceptions are the result of unconscious assumptions that we make about the environment

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likelihood principle

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we perceive the object that is most likely to have caused the pattern of stimuli we have received

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gestalt psychologists

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explain how we perceive objects

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perceptual organization

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the way elements are grouped together to create larger objects

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law of perceptual organization

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gestalt psychologists came up with these to indicate how elements in the environment are organized/grouped together

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law of good continuation

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points that when connected result in striaght or smoothyl curving lines are seen as belonging together and the lines tend to be seen in such a way as to follow the smoothest path

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law of pragnanz

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AKA law of good figure/law of simplicity: every stimulus pattern is seen in such a way that the resulting structure is as simple as possible

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law of good figure

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AKA law of pragnanz/law of simplicity: every stimulus pattern is seen in such a way that the resulting structure is as simple as possible

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law of simplicity

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AKA law of good figure/law of pragnanz: every stimulus pattern is seen in such a way that the resulting structure is as simple as possible

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law of similarity

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similar things appear to be grouped together

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law of famliarity

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things that form patterns that are familiar/meaningful are likely to be grouped

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heuristics

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rules of thumb that provide a best guess solution to a problem

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algorithm

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procedure thats guaranteed to solve a problem

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• Regularities in the environment

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Characteristics of the environment that occur frequently

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 Physical regularities

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Regularly occurring physical properties of the environment
• Ex: There are more horizontal and vertical orientations in the environment than angled orientations

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• Oblique effect

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People can perceive horizontals and verticals more easily than other orientations

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• Light from above heuristic

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The assumption that light comes from above

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 Semantic regularities

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Characteristics associated with the functions carried out in different types of scenes

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• Theory of natural selection

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Genetically based characteristics that enhance an animal’s ability to survive, and therefore reproduce, will be passed on to future generations

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• Experience dependent plasticity

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Mechanism through which the structure of the brain is changed by experience

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• Brainablation

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Study of the effect of behavior of people without brain damage

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• Neuropsychology

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Study of the behavior of people with brain damage

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o Ungerleider and Mishkin

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Studied how removing parts of a monkey’s brain affected its ability to identify an object and determine the object’s location

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• Object discrimination problem

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Monkey shown an object, and then presented with 2 choice task that had the presented object and another

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• Landmark discrimination problem

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Monkey’s task is to remove the food well cover that is closer to the tall cylinder

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• What pathway

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Pathway leading from the striate cortex to the temporal lobe

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• Where pathway

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Pathway leading from the striate cortex to the parietal lobe

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• Perception pathway

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Pathway from the visual cortex to the temporal lobe

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• Action pathway

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from visual cortex to the parietal lobe

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• Mirror neurons

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Neurons that respond both when a monkey observes someone else grasping an object and when the monkey itself grasps an object

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• Audiovisual mirror neurons

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In the premotor cortex-Respond when a monkey performs a hand action and when it hears the sound associated with the action

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• Visual imagery

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seeing in the absence of a visual stimulus

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• Mental imagery

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ability to recreate the sensory world in the absence of physical stimuli (occurs in other than just vision)

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• Imageless thought debate

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Link between imagery and thinking; “Thought impossible without an image”

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o Conceptual peg hypothesis

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Concrete nouns create images that other words can “hang onto”
 Ex: Boat-hat creates boat image, which creates many places participants can place the hat in their mind

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mental scanning

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Participants create mental images and scan them in their minds

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Imagery debate

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Debate about whether imagery based on spatial mechanisms or mechanisms related to language (propositional mechanisms)

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• Spatial representation

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representation in which different parts of an image can be described as corresponding to specific locations in space

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epiphenomenon

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something that accompanies the real mechanisms but isn’t actually part of a mechanism
o Ex: lights flashing as a mainframe computer carries out its calculations (indicate something is going on but don’t tell us what)

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• Propositional representation-

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relationships can be represented by abstract symbols (equations, etc.)

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• Depictive representation

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Representations that are like realistic pictures that resemble an object so that part of the representation corresponds to parts of the object

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• Tacit knowledge explanation

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States that participants unconsciously use knowledge about the world in making judgments

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mental walk task

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Imagine they were walking towards the mental image of the animal; Estimate how far away they were when they began to experience overflow (when the image filled the visual field or its edges become fuzzy)

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o Imagery neurons

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Respond to both perceiving an object and to imagining it

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• Transcranial magnetic stimulation

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TMS-Done by Kosslyn

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• MGS

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Patient who had part of her right occipital lobe removed to treat epilepsy

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• Unilateral neglect-

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Patient ignores objects in one half of the visual field

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• Method of loci-

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Method where things are to be remembered are placed a different locations in a mental image of a spatial layout

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• Pegword technique

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Instead of visualizing items in different locations, you associate them with concrete words (One bun two shoe)

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• Mental simulation

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operation of the mechanical system is mentally represented

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• Rule based approach

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Involves applying a rule such as “When one gear turns, the next rotates in the opposite directions so all odd numbered gears rotate the same way”