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Cognition > History of Problem Solving > Flashcards

History of Problem Solving Flashcards

1
Q

What is a problem?

A

a situation where one is required to accomplish a goal and the resolution is not clear

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2
Q

What are the three major aspects to problem solving?

A
  1. It is goal directed
  2. It involves controlled processes and is not totally reliant on ‘automatic’ processes
  3. A problem exists when someone lacks the relevant knowledge to produce an immediate solution
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3
Q

What do well defined problems have?

A

Well defined problems have specific goals and clear expected solutions whereas ill-defined problems do not

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4
Q

What does most psychological research focus on and what are most everyday problems?

A

· Most psychological research focuses on well defined problems whereas most everyday problems are ill-defined (Goel, 2010)

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5
Q

Who can knowledge rich problems be solved by?

A

by those people having some relevant specific knowledge – e.g. in chess

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6
Q

Who can solve knowledge lean problems?

A

Anyone - doesn’t have to have specific knowledge

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7
Q

What is the behaviourist approach to problem solving?

A

The approach is only concerned with observable stimulus-response behaviours and states all behaviours are learnt through interaction with the environment

  • Behaviourist psychologists thought that problem solving involved the reproduction of learned knowledge
  • Characterised problem solving as
    1. Trial and error
    2. Reproduction of previously learned responses
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8
Q

What was Edward Lee Thorndike’s behavioural experiment with cats and problem solving?

A
  • In series of experiments which required cats to escape from ‘puzzle boxes’ he rejected notion that cats might be using insight to open the box in favour of learning through conditioned responses (trial and error)
  • Key idea is law of effect: responses that are closely followed (‘recency’) by gaining a reward, become associated with the situation and are more likely to be repeated. Negative consequences can lead to weakened association
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9
Q

What are the criticisms of the behaviourist approach of problem solving?

A
  • Conformity: outcomes often conformist: what about free thinkers, innovation and creativity?
  • Neglects cognitive (thinking) processes: potentially limiting learning
  • Agency of learning is external: learners are not encouraged to act independently and to make their own choices during learning
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10
Q

What did Gestaltists distinguish between?

A

· Gestaltists distinguished between reproductive and productive thinking

  • Reproductive thinking involves the systematic reuse of previous experiences
  • Productive thinking involves a novel restructuring of the problem and is more complex
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11
Q

What is insight according to the Gestalt approach?

A

Insight involves a sudden restructuring of a problem and is sometimes accompanied by the ‘ah-ha experience’

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12
Q

What does Ohlsson’s representational change theory emphasise the importance of?

A

emphasises the importance of changing representations through elaboration, constraint relaxation and re-encoding for insight to occur.

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13
Q

What is reproductive thinking not useful for?

A

functional fixedness problem-solving set

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14
Q

What is productive thinking characterised by?

A

insight into structure of problem and restructuring

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15
Q

What is the functional fixedness candle problem?

A
  • ‘support the candle on the wall so that it doesn’t drip on the table below’
  • Ps often tried to nail the candle to the wall or glue the candle with wax
  • Ps are fixated on the boxes normal function of holding nails – unable to re-conceptualise it as a candle holder
  • Easier if the drawing pins are emptied out of the box before the P has arrived
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16
Q

Do people use a longer solution based on familiar strategy or a shorted solution?

A

Longer solution

17
Q

Ohlsson’s representational change theory suggests we need to change the problem representation for insight to occur. What three ways can this happen in?

A
  1. Constraint relaxation: inhibitions on what is regarded as permissible are removed
  2. Re-encoding: some aspect of the problem representation is reinterpreted
  3. Elaboration: new problem information is added to the representation
    Can look at insight when conducting fmri – neural correlates of the aha moment
18
Q

Give an evaluation of the Gestalt theory of problem solving

A
  • Thought problem solving more than reproduction of learned responses and involves production processes of insight and restructuring
  • Showed that problem solving that relied on past experience often led to failure
  • But insight and restructuring unclear
19
Q

What was Newell and Simon’s problem space theory of problem solving?

A
  • In this theory, people solve problems by searching in a problem space
  • The problem space consists of the initial (current) state, the goal state and all the possible states in between
  • The actions that people take in order to move from one state to another are known as operators
  • The Tower of Hanoi problem has been used to illustrate the theory
20
Q

What is the problem with thinking about problems in terms of their problem spaces?

A

· The problem with thinking about problems in terms of their problem spaces is that these get very large
· The key issue is how people navigate through the problem space in order to get to the solution, given that they have limited working memory capacity and cannot consider all possibilities

21
Q

What are heuristics in the problem space theory?

A

Short cuts

22
Q

What is the hill climbing heuristic?

A

people take the action that leads to the biggest similarity between current state and goal

23
Q

What is the ‘means-ends analysis’ heuristic?

A

looks for the greatest reduction in difference between the current state and goal state but also specifies what to do if that action cannot be taken.

24
Q

What is the information processing framework?

A
  • Newell and Simon produced one of the first computational models of psychological phenomena: problem space theory of problem solving
  • Problem starts with an initial state – intermediates states- goal state
  • ‘operators’ applied to move from state to state
  • Numerous alternative states = problem space
    People use strategies and knowledge to search through problem spac
25
Q

How can the problem solving behaviour of participants be analysed?

A

by looking at the path which they follow through the state space

26
Q

What else apart from problem structure have an effect on problem solving strategies?

A
  • Psychological factors, such as instructions and the number of mental steps involved in solving the problem both have an effect on problem-solving strategies
27
Q

What is analogical problem solving?

A

Occurs when we extract information from a previous problem and relate that to a new problem we are trying to solve

28
Q

What is positive and negative transfer?

A

· Positive transfer = improved performance as a result of solving a number of similar problems
· Negative transfer = previous experience interferes with the solution to the current problem

29
Q

What are isomorphic problems?

A

Problems that have identical state spaces (the same underlying structure)

30
Q

What are homomorphic problems?

A

Problems with similar but not identical structure

31
Q

Does experience of a particulate problem facilitate further attempts at an isomorphic problem?

A
  • Experience of particular problem can facilitate further attempts at an isomorphic problem
  • Experience of a problem can aid more difficult version of the same problem
  • Positive transfer
32
Q

Does experience on a given problem make it easier for participants to solve a new homomorphic problem?

A
  • Experience with an earlier problem only facilitates a second homomorphic problem if:
    a) Second problem simpler than first
    b) Hint given that two problems related
33
Q

Do transfer effects work will ill definted problems?

A
  1. Experience on a problem does not necessarily transfer to another problem of the same type
  2. Gick and Holyoak (1980) found that most participants used analogy only when given a hint that they’re related
    The difficulty of spontaneously noticing the relevance of distant analogs even when more naturalistic materials are employed
34
Q

What memory system is involved in analogical problem solving?

A

The working memory system

35
Q

Why is analogical performance poor when combinations of high problem complexity and interference resolution are given?

A

because this overloads the central executive

Cognition (8 decks)

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