Thinking And Reasoning (Ch 8)

Question 1

Cognition

Answer 1

• means “to know”

- refers to mental processes involved in acquiring, processing and storing knowledge

Question 2

Cognitive psychology

Answer 2

-the science of how people think, learn, remember and perceive.

Question 3

Mental representations

Answer 3

• a structure in our mind - such as an idea or image - that stands for something else, such as the external object or thing.
• used to represent ideas, knowledge, or memories
• allows us to think about and remember things in the past or imagine things in the future, and abstract ideas (love, truth, justice)
• usually represent thoughts verbally and visually

Question 4

Visual representation

Answer 4

• visual system located in the occipital lobes is older than the verbal system
• only animals with significant cortex are able to keep and store visual sensations in mind after stimulation stops
• visual imagery: involves visual representation created by the brain after the original stimulus is gone
• brain is active in same way during visual imagery as visual perception
• priming the brain to imagine success actually helps us be successful

Question 5

Mental rotation

Answer 5

• process of imagining an object rotating in 3-d space
• boys and men generally do better than females
• gender identification may affect this difference
• levels of testosterone affect this ability (non-linear relationship)

Question 6

Verbal representation

Answer 6

-humans organize sensory experience by putting like with like and then distinguishing that group from other groups

Question 7

Concept

Answer 7

• most basic unit of knowledge
• mental grouping of objects, events, or people
• help us organize our perceptions of the world
• store and process concepts in a hierarchy or by parallel distributed processing

Question 8

Concept hierarchy

Answer 8

-lets us know that certain concepts are related in a particular way, with some being general and others specific

Question 9

Parallel Distributive Processing (PDP)

Answer 9

• associations between concepts activate many networks or nodes at the same time
• concepts are activated in the network based on how strongly associated or connected they are to eachother
• also arranged by similarity and hierarchy
• location of concept based on its relationship to other concepts
• relationship between nodes can be HAS, CAN, or IS A.

Question 10

Category

Answer 10

• a concept that organizes other concepts around what they all share in common
• can be concrete or abstract
• best fitting examples of category called prototype

Question 11

Prototypes

Answer 11

-the best fitting examples of a category

Question 12

Reasoning

Answer 12

• the process of drawing inferences or conclusion from principles and evidence
• 2 types of reasoning: deductive and inductive

Question 13

Deductive reasoning

Answer 13

• occurs when we reason from general statements of what is known to specific conclusion
• the specific conclusion is always correct of the general statement is true

Question 14

Inductive reasoning

Answer 14

• draws general conclusion from specific evidence
• such conclusions are less certain than those drawn from deductive reasoning because may different conclusions might be consistence with a specific fact
• scientists who develop theories employ inductive reasoning
• using indicative reasoning is often using causal inferences (judgements about whether one thing causes another)

Question 15

Confirmation bias

Answer 15

• the tendency to selectively attend to information that supports one’s general beliefs while ignoring information that contradicts one’s beliefs
• tested by Wason with number rule… students rarely tested against their hypothesis
• best way to test an idea is to try and tear it down but people rarely do this

Question 16

Critical thinking

Answer 16

• ability to analyze facts, generate and organize ideas, defend opinions, make comparisons, draw inferences, evaluate arguments, and solve problems
• must be objective and skeptical in solving problems
• requires evaluation of evidence and arguments independently of one’ prior beliefs and opinions
• critical thinking allows use to counter assert action that have little basis in reality, and know the difference between sound and faulty reasoning
• requires that we be open to evidence that bears on whether our ideas are correct or not, even if we are not happy with the evidence

Question 17

Scientific thinking

Answer 17

• involves cognitive skills required to generate, test, and revise theories
• what we believe and theorize about the world and what the world actually is, in the form of evidence, are two different things
• scientific thinking keeps these two things separate

Question 18

Metacognitive thinking

Answer 18

• requires the ability first to think and then to reflect on ones own thinking.
• able to question their own thinking

Question 19

Heuristics

Answer 19

• mental shortcuts we use to make decisions
• methods for making complex and uncertain decisions and judgements
• 2 types: representative heuristic and availability heuristic

Question 20

Representative heuristic

Answer 20

• a strategy used to estimate the probability of one event based on how typical or representative it is of a another event.
• eg. Concluding that joe could be a real estate agent based on knowing that he is friendly, often works weekends, and knows his way around town very well.

Question 21

Availability heuristic

Answer 21

• a strategy we use when we make decisions based on the ease with which estimates come to mind or how available they are to our awareness
• eg. When people make judgements about the aggressiveness of dog breeds.
• vividness and availability lead us to overestimate how likely certain events are

Question 22

Rational choice theory

Answer 22

• given a choice between 2 options, humans will choose the one that is most likely to help them achieve their particular goals
• based on principles of behaviourism

Question 23

Cost-benefit analysis

Answer 23

-ask: do the costs outweigh the benefits?
-if yes, we dont buy
If no, we do buy
-however this usually isn’t the case

Question 24

Evidence against rational choice theory

Answer 24

• not all reasoning is rational (eg. Confirmation bias)
• if people were rational they would realize that the odds of 2 events can never be higher than the odds of one of those events alone
  
  • sometimes we get information that can be so representative of a stereotype that it biases us and we are likely to forget this rule
• leads to conjunction fallacy
• people also ignore base rates, biased by stereotypes etc

Question 25

Conjunction Fallacy

Answer 25

• occurs when people say the combination of 2 events is more likely than either event alone
• example with Linda being a bank teller and feminist.
• example of a representative heuristic