Chapter 1 - Intro to Cognitive Psych

Question 1

Cognitive Psychology

Answer 1

the scientific study of how the mind encodes, stores, and uses
information; the study of cognition

Question 2

Speech Perception

Answer 2

understanding language and requests

Question 3

Objection Recognition

Answer 3

the ability to recognize objects based on visual input

Question 4

Attention

Answer 4

concentration/awareness of something to the exclusion of other stimuli

Question 5

Memory Retrieval

Answer 5

stage of memory in which the information saved in memory is recalled

Question 6

Judgement

Answer 6

process of making decisions and form conclusions

Question 7

Reasoning

Answer 7

process of thinking critically towards the situation of a problem based on previous experiences and observations

Question 8

Speech Production

Answer 8

process by which thoughts are translated into speech

Question 9

History of Cognitive Psychology - Introspection

Answer 9

19th century

subjects were trained to report their conscious experiences, and used their reports to decompose mental processes

but introspection is empirical, not objective and there is no way to verify by independent observer

Question 10

History of Cognitive Psychology - Behaviorism

Answer 10

early 20th century

Watson and later Skinner argued that psychology should be restricted to the study of observable
events

behaviorism used animal models

focused on classical and operant conditioning

Question 10

Classical Conditioning

Answer 10

learned association between stimuli in the environment

Question 11

Conditioned Stimulus

Answer 11

elicits response due to learned association with unconditioned
stimulus

Question 12

Unconditioned Stimulus

Answer 12

naturally elicits response

Question 13

Operant Conditioning

Answer 13

learned association between behaviors and outcomes

behavior followed by reward - behavior increases in frequency

behavior followed by punishment - behavior decreases in frequency

Question 14

Limits of Behaviorism

Answer 14

1950’s

could not explain all aspects of behavior without evoking mental events

Question 15

“Cognitive Maps”

Answer 15

Edward Tolman

found evidence that rats developed “cognitive maps” when in a maze to find cheese; rats understood layout of maze

performed sequences of behaviors without being rewarded

Question 16

History of Cognitive Psychology - Cognitive Revolution

Answer 16

late 1950’s

Chomsky criticized Skinner’s book on language development and behaviorism

Skinner claimed that children learned rules of language through operant conditioning, they were rewarded for grammatically correct sentences; punished for incorrect sentences

Chomsky argued behaviorism couldn’t explain the development of language because children were not always corrected for incorrect language and there wasn’t enough systematic feedback for children to learn

Chomsky argued that all humans are born with cognitive mechanism for learning language

Question 17

The Mind as an Information Processor

Answer 17

information permeates the social world and many fields of study

understanding the rules and systematic processes
the mind uses to encode, transform, store, interpret, and act on information

Question 18

Representations

Answer 18

encoded and stored information about the environment

takes a different form from the original object, but can capture aspects and information about the original

Question 19

Mental Representations

Answer 19

how your mind encodes and stores information about environment

Question 20

Computations

Answer 20

processing steps performed on representations

Question 21

Cognition at Multiple Levels

Answer 21

1. computational level analysis: seeks to understand what the mind is trying to compute and why
2. algorithmic level of analysis: aims to understand the rules, mechanisms, and representations the mind
   uses
3. implementational level of analysis: seeks to know what happens in the brain to enable cognition

Question 22

Data in Cognitive Psychology

Answer 22

observing people’s behaviors

behavioral measures are used because people’s mental processes can not be directly observed

use observable behaviors to make inferences about mental processes

Question 23

Data in Cognitive Neuroscience

Answer 23

attempt to use information about behavior AND the brain to understand human cognition

Question 23

Data in Cognitive Neuropsychology

Answer 23

attempt to understand human cognition by studying brain-damaged patients (tests on neurologically impaired patients)

typically use case studies of individuals

Question 24

Reaction Time

Answer 24

how quickly someone performs a task

provides a measure of difficulty, number of mental steps involved, and interference in processing

Question 25

Accuray

Answer 25

how many errors someone makes when performing task

more difficulties, more steps, and more interference can lead to more errors

Question 26

Problem with Reaction Time and Accuray

Answer 26

can’t observe mental processes directly