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Question 1

what is perception?

Answer 1

the process by which we see, hear, taste or feel objects.

Question 2

what is visual perception?

Answer 2

the process of aquiring knowledge about objects from the light they reflect and prior knowledge

Question 3

how do we physically see objects?

Answer 3

light waves from objects in the environment reach receptors in the eye and then pass through the cornea to the iris.
all 3D visual experience is generated from a 2D array of nerve cells.
the nerve cells code the 2D pattern into neural findings

Question 4

how does prior knowledge affect visual perception?

Answer 4

based on assumptions of what we have learnt through evolution or prior experience. these allow us to predict and not have to re-percieve everything from scratch.
however these arent always accurate.

Question 5

what is perceptual consistancy?

Answer 5

the concept that the brain understands objects and distances, i.e. it knows an object wil remain the same size even know it looks smaller further away

Question 6

what is size consistancy?

Answer 6

perciving an object as having a constant size acroess different viewing distances

Question 7

what the difference between percieving image size and object size?

Answer 7

image size is when 2 objects side by side at different depths, seen by one eye.
object size is when 2 objects are seen widey seperate at different depths by both eyes.

Question 8

describe emmerts law about objects

Answer 8

objects that generate images of the same size, will look different in size if they’re located at different distances

Question 9

what is a blindspot and how is it formed?

Answer 9

the optic nerve is where nervous signals from light receptors gather, a blind spot is generated when light receptors get interupted at the optic nerve. the brain ‘fills in’ information, so we see what we think is there rather than what is actually there.

Question 10

which parts of our vision goes to what part of our brain?

Answer 10

visual informtion from the right size of each eye goes to the right visual cortex
visual information from the left size of each eye goes to the left visual cortex
binocular vision goes to both cortexes

Question 11

how does the degree of light relate to the pattern of visual coding

Answer 11

nerve cells fire more or less depending on the pattern of light coming from the visual field.

Question 12

what specific cells repsond to spots of light surrounded by dark

Answer 12

retinal ganglion cells, therefore they respond very weakly where the field is full of light

Question 13

how does the receptive field (retina) influeunce the firing rate of the neuron

Answer 13

increasing the size of the retina (exitation) or decreasing the size (inhibition)

Question 14

how do we test for the neural correlate of consciousness?

Answer 14

when presented with a stimilus there is a differences is neural activitity depending on whether we are aware or not
we find the NCC by presenting stimulus that has perception changes, e.g. the 3D cube

Question 15

what is inattentional blindness and what does it demonstrate?

Answer 15

when we miss part of a scene because we werent paying attention to it e.g. the gorrilla stimulus
this demonstrates that focuses attention is important for stimuli to be consciously reported

Question 16

what is visuospatial neglect?

Answer 16

when Ps fail to pay attention to the whole scene, they only pay attention to one half of it.Ps with damage to their right hemipshere fail to respond to stimuli on the left

Question 17

what is feature intergration theory

Answer 17

we percieve features of a scene automatically (colour, shape), but we percieve the actual objects in later processing

Question 18

can unconscious stimuni influence us

Answer 18

yes, unconcious stimuli can influence behaviour. Ps who didnt notice the gorilla will be able to finish the sentence “kay went to the zoo and saw a ——-“

Question 19

describe the illusory conjections theory

Answer 19

we feel like we have visual awareness of a whole scene, but infact we dont. what we see is an illusion. distrubuted attention gives us a fleeting awarness, only focused attention gives us meaningful awarenesss.

Question 20

define attention

Answer 20

the process of selecting relevent information. attention facilitates or prevents processing for relevant stimuni

Question 21

what are the two types of attention

Answer 21

involuntary- ‘passive’ control, driven by external stimuni (loud noise) that we werent initally attending too (bottum-up processing)
voluntary- ‘active’ driven by internal stimuni ( goals and expextions) (topdown processing)

Question 22

define selective attention, give an example of how it is studies

Answer 22

process in which only relevant info is selected for further processing
we study is by measuring the effect of ignored stimuli, if this affects performance then it means it wasnt completely ignored e.g. emotional stroop task

Question 23

describe the cocktail party theory

Answer 23

colin cherry- describe the phenomena of being able to focus auditory attention on one stimuli whilst filtering out other stimuli. we are able to do this due to physical differences e.g. sex of speaker, speaker location.

Question 24

describe the 3 different theories of how we process attention

Answer 24

BROADBENT theory- if 2 stimuni are presented at the same time, they will both reach a sensory buffer, then only one will be allowed through the selective filter based on its physical characteristics, whilst the other one remains for later processing. this prevents overloading of information.

TREISMAN theory- she suggested that the place where the selectice filter is (sometimes called the bottle neck) is more flexiable and lets both stimuli through. rather than only one stimuli being processed at a time, they’re processed based on a hierachy of cues.

DEUTSCH & DEUTSCH theory- suggested that all stimuli is fully analysed with most important stimuli determining the response. this places the filter (bottle neck) nearer the response end.

Question 25

what does negative priming and inhibition of return studies demonstrate?

Answer 25

they demonstrate that attention enhances processing of attended stimuli, but suppresses processing of ignored stimuli negative priming- a previously ignored stimuli is harder to process, than a new stimuli inhibition of return- it is harder to detect a stimuli in a locationed that has already been inspected

Question 26

how does single celled studies investigate attention

Answer 26

they measure the activity of neurons studies on monkeys who were taught to fixatate on a certain point they demonstrate that even though we might not be paying attention to a stimui, we are still attending to it.

Question 27

how do we measure attention within the brain

Answer 27

single celled studies, EPR studies and FMRI studies

Question 28

what are the disorders of attention

Answer 28

neglect- Ps fail to repsond to stimulus presented to the opposite side of the brain which is damaged extinction- is a phenomena in neglect patients. if 2 stimuli are presented together on one side of their visual field, they fail to repsond to the object closer to the edge of the visual field.

Question 29

what are the 2 attentional systems

Answer 29

goal-orintated system- inolves top-down processing, voluntary, goal and expectation driven attention stimulus dirven system- involves bottom-up processing, involuntary, stimulus

Question 30

what are the 3 failures of attention without brain damage?

Answer 30

inattentional blindness- when an unattended stimulus goes unnoticed change blindness- when observers miss large parts of visual input attentional blink- obervers miss relevant input if it occurs too quick.

Question 31

define learning

Answer 31

the process by which experience produces an adaptive change in an organisms capacity for behaviour

Question 32

what is involved in simple learning?

Answer 32

habituation and sensitation

Question 33

define habituation

Answer 33

a decline in the tendency to respond to a repeated stimuli | the purpose of this it to divert attention away from irrelevant stimuli

Question 34

define sensitiation

Answer 34

an increase in the tendency to repsond to a repeated stimuli the purpose of this is to alert and prepare us to respond to aversive stimuli

Question 35

what determines whether we habituate or sensitise to a stimuli?

Answer 35

both habituation and sensitisation active when a stimuli is presented. therefore behaviour is H+S if H is bigger than S then there is a decrease in the repsonse if S is bigger than H then thre is an increase in the repsonse behaviour is the net outcome of there 2 learning processes

Question 36

can you 'unlearn' a behaviour?

Answer 36

behaviour isnt unlearnt but rather inhibited, this explaoins relapeses in drug addiction.

Question 37

describe second order conditioning

Answer 37

``` relates to classical conditioning involves adding another stimuli to the association e.g. bell- food -salivation black square- bell- salivation black square- salivation ```

Question 38

describe stimuli substitution

Answer 38

the conditioned stimuli becomes the unconditioned stimuli, as the old conditioned stimulis is replaced with another conditioned stimuli

Question 39

what is associatve learning

Answer 39

a more complex form of leanring which involves classical and operant conditioning

Question 40

describe the 2 studies investgating operant condition

Answer 40

Skinner and thorndike thorndike invented the puzzle box to identify how animals solve problems. he identified the thorndike effect which states that good consequences increase behaviour whereas bad consequences decrease behaviour

Question 41

describe skinners 3 part contingency

Answer 41

3 components 1 antecedent (comes before) stimuli 2 response 3 consquence the relationship between the consequence and the response is called contingency because the consequence is contingent on the repsonse to the antecdent contingency meaning a furture event which is possible but not certain.

Question 42

what is the role of the reinforcer?

Answer 42

postiive and negative reinforcement increases desirable behaviour positive and negative punishment decrease undesirable behaviour

Question 43

describe long-term potentiation in relation to learning

Answer 43

leanring occurs due to the strengthening of neurons, each time a neuron fires the connection is strenghthened, meaning the brain is changing as a results of experience.

Question 44

name the 4 problem solving strageries

Answer 44

problem solving schema which helps us find solutions to problems were experienced before trial and error algorithms which are like formulas heuistrics which are like rules of thumb to simplify problems

Question 45

name the 6 different heuristics

Answer 45

represenativeness- new situations are ased on their resembalence to previous events conjunction fallacy- people assume that specific condtions are more probable than a single general one (the example where a women cant just be a feminist or a banker, shes thought more likely to be both avaliability- a decision is based on info most easiler retrieved from memory the framing effect- the idea that the same problem can be presented in different ways ( the example of medication for life threatening illness) conformation bias- the tendency to look for your own values and beliefs in support overconfidence- tendency to place too much confidence in your own knowledge

Question 46

define satisfers, maximisers, divergent thinking and convergent thinking

Answer 46

satisfers- pleased to settle with good enough results maximers- strive for the best possible outcome divergent thinking- creative different thinking converget thinking- thinking directed to one corrent solution

Question 47

describe the dual processing model of decison making

Answer 47

we either take rational decision making or heuristic deicsion making rational relies on evidence and evaluating info heuristics relies on stratergies and clues

Question 48

why would we choose rational decsion making or heuristics

Answer 48

motivation and ability

Question 49

what did william james do for memory?

Answer 49

the attempted to deligate memory systems in terms of whether their contents were accessible by conscious awareness primary memory- concious memory (STM) secondary memory- unconscious memory (LTM)

Question 50

what is the level of processing theory

Answer 50

``` craik and lockhart they disagreed that memory contains seperate stores, instead memory is a byproduct of attention and attention determines what is retained shallow processsing- simple features deeper processing- semantic elaboration shallow l orthographic l phonological l semantic l deep ```

Question 51

define encoding and retrival

Answer 51

encoding- how memory is stored | retrival- the process by which information is accessed

Question 52

what does MSMM suggest about encoding and retrival

Answer 52

maintanence rehearsal- more rehearsal=better encoding= stronger memories

Question 53

what does level of processing suggest about encoding and retrival

Answer 53

deeper processing= better encoding= stronger memories

Question 54

desribe transfer appropraite processing theory inrelation to encoding and retrival

Answer 54

morris et al suggests that it is impossible to seperate encoding and retrival, therefore we must study their relationship together and its effect on performance. he found Ps cld recall sematnic info after semantic encoding

Question 55

desribe encoding specificty princple (EPS)

Answer 55

tulving the probabality of recall depends on how closely the context at recall matches encoding this theory empathsis contextual overlap extrinsic context= 'conditions' intrinsic context= aspects of a stimulus which are inevitably processed when the stimulus is perceived and comprehended.

Question 56

describe associative network theory

Answer 56

memory is a network of associated, connected ideas. when a person thinks a piece of information activates and a spread of related concept throughout the network. items are organised hierarchically therefore it takes longer to determine the items further down the list

Question 57

define episodic and sematic memory

Answer 57

episodic memory of experience, events and occurances | semantic- memory of meaning

Question 58

describe the feature comparison model for semanitc memory

Answer 58

proposes 2 types of semantic features, defining features and characteristics e.g. birds--feather--wings (defining features) l robin--hops--small (characteristics)

Question 59

describe cognitive economy

Answer 59

complez categorical system | the aim of this is to provide maximum info with minimum cognitive effort

Question 60

what evidence is there of semantic LTM organisation

Answer 60

Hodges et al- progressive dementia that started at the individual item level and progressed towards global categories individual item being swan global categories being animal

Question 61

what evidence is there of episodic LTM relating to amniesia

Answer 61

retrograde amnesia- memory loss for events that took place before the onset of amnesia anterograde amnesia- memory loss for events that took place after the onset of amnesia

Question 62

what evidence is there that episodic and semantic LTM are different or the same memory systems

Answer 62

same--info is registered in both systems in the same way most Ps with anterograde amnesia have problems with both sematic and episodic memory different--- they deal with different info that is Phenomenology different i.e. remembering what you did last weekend and the captial of france are very different double dissosiation- amnesia Ps have intact semantic memory but impaired episodic memory. whereas sematnic dementia have impaired sematic memory

Question 63

define double dissociation

Answer 63

when two related mental processes are shown to function independently of each other. By establishing Double Dissociation, scientists are able to determine which mental processes are specialized to certain areas of the brain.

Question 64

is episodic memory unique to humans?

Answer 64

yes autonoetic consciousness- awareness and subjective experience that accompanies the info retrieved autobiographical self- form of narrative

Question 65

whats the differences between implicit and explicit memory

Answer 65

explicit is conscious memory (sematic and episodic) | implicit is unconscious memory that can influence behaviour

Question 66

how to we meaure implicit memory

Answer 66

using priming which involves exposure to a stimuli without conscious intention, which then influences response to a subseqent stimuli and skill learning which is gradual improvement of performance with practise that generalises to a range of stimuli

Question 67

what evidence is there for implicit memory involving HM

Answer 67

patient HM was abke to learn mirror tracing task, however he had to be told the instructions each time because he had no recollection of doing the task before.

Question 68

what evidence is there for implicit memory involving amnesia Ps and priming

Answer 68

involves an encoding condition- Ps are shown a list of words retrival condition- Ps performed poorly on explicit memory but word-stem tasks suggested evidence of implicit learning meaning Ps were faster completing words they had previously seen

Question 69

what evidence is there that emotional memory is implicit?

Answer 69

HM was introduced to a doctor who was purposely rude to him. HM quickly developed a dislike to this doctor even though he had no memory of previous encounters

Question 70

what sort of memory takes the longest to forget?

Answer 70

proecdural memory, it takes 2 years to forget

Question 71

what sort of memory does brain damage only effect

Answer 71

brain damage only effects emplicit memory

Question 72

how is decay involved in forgetting

Answer 72

sensory memory nvolves iconic memoey which is the type of memory that lasts very breifly before fading also involves echoic memory for sound and lasts for 2 seconds if not attended too

Question 73

how is displacement involved in forgetting

Answer 73

STM has limited capacity | distraction or lack of rehearsal leads to memory loss

Question 74

how is interference involved in forgetting

Answer 74

LTM involved forgetting through retrival failure

Question 75

name some retrival cues

Answer 75

tulving cue dependent forgetting more likely to remember if the cues present at encoding are the same at retrival tulving encoding specificty principle (ESP) the probabality of recall depends on how closely the context at recall matches encoding

Question 76

what types of interference are there

Answer 76

proactive interference- when old memories influence new ones | retroactive interference- when new memories infleunce old ones

Question 77

what is infantile anmesia?

Answer 77

we have no memories for the first 3 years of life | some explanations for this involve maturation of hippocampus, development of self schema to organise memories

Question 78

what are the 2 different pathways relating to perception?

Answer 78

``` perceive objects (ventral pathway) and one that enables us to interact with these objects (dorsal pathway) ```

Question 79

what areas of the brain are assoiciated with the formation of memory

Answer 79

The hippocampus and related temporal areas

Question 80

Brain imaging research has identified which brain region to be involved in working memory

Answer 80

prefrontal cortex