Chapter 9-David Myers 9Th Edition

Front 1

Define cognition

Back 1

The mental activities associated with thinking, knowing, remembering, and communicating.

Front 2

Define a concept

Back 2

A mental grouping of similar objects, events, ideas, or people.

Front 3

Define a prototype

Back 3

A mental image or best example of a category. Matching new items to a prototype provides a quick and easy method for sorting items into categories (as when comparing feathered creatures to a prototypical bird, such as a robin.)

Front 4

Define an algorithm

Back 4

A methodical, logical rule or procedure that guarantees solving a particular problem. Contrasts with the usually speedier-but also more error-prone-use of heuristics.

Front 5

Define a heuristic

Back 5

A simple thinking strategy that often allows us to make judgments and solve problems efficiently; usually speedier but also more error-prone than algorithms.

Front 6

Define insight

Back 6

A sudden and often novel realization of the solution to a problem; it contrasts with strategy-based solutions.

Front 7

Define confirmation bias

Back 7

A tendency to search of information that supports our preconceptions and to ignore or distort contradictory evidence.

Front 8

Define fixation

Back 8

The inability to see a problem from a new perspective, by employing a different mental set.

Front 9

Define a mental set

Back 9

A tendency to approach a problem in one particular way, often a way that has been successful in the past.

Front 10

Define functional fixedness

Back 10

The tendency to think of things only in terms of their usual functions; an impediment to problem solving.

Front 11

Define the representativeness heuristic

Back 11

Judging the likelihood of things in terms of how well they seem to represent, or match, particular prototypes; may lead us to ignore other relevant information.

Front 12

Define the availability heuristic

Back 12

Estimating the likelihood of events based on their availability in memory; if instances come readily to mind (perhaps because of their vividness), we presume such events are common.

Front 13

Define overconfidence

Back 13

The tendency to be more confident than correct-to overestimate the accuracy of our beliefs and judgments.

Front 14

Define belief perseverance

Back 14

Clinging to one's initial conceptions after the basis on which they were formed has been discredited.

Front 15

Define intuition

Back 15

An effortless, immediate, automatic feeling or thought with explicit, conscious reasoning.

Front 16

Define framing

Back 16

The way an issue is posed; how an issue is framed can significantly affect decisions and judgments.

Front 17

Define language

Back 17

Our spoken, written, or signed words and the ways we combine them to communicate meaning.

Front 18

Define phoneme

Back 18

In language, the smallest distinctive sound unit.

Front 19

Define morpheme

Back 19

In a language, the smallest unit that carries meaning; may be a word or a part of a word (such as a prefix).

Front 20

Define grammar

Back 20

In a language, a system of rules that enables us to communicate with and understand others.

Front 21

Define semantics

Back 21

The set of rules by which we derive meaning from morphemes, words, and sentences in a given language; also, the study of meaning.

Front 22

Define syntax

Back 22

The rules for combining words into grammatically sensible sentences in a given language.

Front 23

Define the babbling stage

Back 23

Beginning at about 4 months, the stage of speech development in which the infant spontaneously utters various sounds as first unrelated to the household language.

Front 24

Define the one-word stage

Back 24

The stage in speech development, from about age 1 to 2, during which a child speaks mostly in single words.

Front 25

Define the two-word stage

Back 25

Beginning about age 2, the stage in speech development during which a child speaks mostly two-word statements.

Front 26

Define telegraphic speech

Back 26

Early speech stage in which a child speaks like a telegram-"go car"-using mostly nouns and verbs.

Front 27

Define aphasia

Back 27

Impairment of language, usually caused by left hemisphere damage either to Broca's area (impairing speaking) or to Wernicke's area (impairing understanding).

Front 28

Define the Broca's area

Back 28

Controls language expression-an area of the frontal lobe, usually in the left hemisphere, that directs the muscle movements involved in speech.

Front 29

Define the Wernicke's area

Back 29

Controls language reception-a brain area involved in language comprehension and expression; usually in the left temporal lobe.

Front 30

Define linguistic determinism

Back 30

Whorf's hypothesis that language determines the way we think.