Key theories of categorisation (semantic memory)

Question 1

What is exemplar?

Answer 1

particular instance of a category

Question 2

What is a category?

Answer 2

group of objects that have something in common

Question 3

What is a concept?

Answer 3

mental representation of a category of objects

Question 4

What is the common features approach?

Answer 4

Categories tend to be loose and fuzzy with a zone of gradual transition between many related concepts (McClosekey + Glusberg 1978)

Question 5

What is a graded membership?

Answer 5

Some items are more typical of a category than others

Question 6

What is family resemblance?

Answer 6

Category members typically share a set of common features but not all common features are present in all members

Question 7

What is correlated attributes?

Answer 7

Certain features tend to go together or show a relationship but not all members share the same features

Question 8

What is the categorisation of hierarchal view?

Answer 8

categorisation reduces within group differences as well as predicting other features from knowing one property

Question 9

What did Rosch et al (1976) argue about hierarchies?

Answer 9

There are three levels
- more difficult to describe but easier to categorise
- usual level best balance
- more difficult to give distinctive descriptions

Question 10

What is the spreading activation theory?

Answer 10

Knowledge is organised by semantic similarity and semantic distance

Question 11

What is semantic distance?

Answer 11

Number of steps connecting two concepts

Question 12

Who created the spreading activation theory?

Answer 12

Collins and Loftus

Question 13

What is grounded cognition?

Answer 13

Process concepts in different settings and with different goals
Cognition is grounded on perceptual and motor systems

Question 14

Who created the idea of grounded cognition?

Answer 14

Barsalou (2012)

Question 15

What is the hub and spoke model?

Answer 15

Mix of fixed, traditional views of context dependent view and of grounded cognition

Concepts have a stable core and concept processing is context dependent

Question 16

What are spokes?

Answer 16

Modality specific brain regions involving sensory and motor processing

Question 17

What is the hub?

Answer 17

Integrates different representations into conceptual knowledge

Question 18

Where is the hub located?

Answer 18

Anterior temporal lobes

Question 19

What is semantic dementia?

Answer 19

Semantic memory is impaired but other mental abilities are intact

Question 20

What knowledge degrades first in semantic dementia?

Answer 20

Specific knowledge

Question 21

What happens to the hub in semantic dementia?

Answer 21

It is lost and leads to a blurring of boundaries relating to concepts

Question 22

What happened in the repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation study for the hub and spoke model?

Answer 22

Brain lesions were stimulated and in the anterior temporal lobe naming pictures was slowed and in the inferior parietal lobe, naming was slowed for manipulable objects only

Question 23

What is a schema?

Answer 23

Superordinate knowledge structures that reflect abstracted commonalities across multiple experiences

Question 24

What are scripts?

Answer 24

Schemas containing information about sequences of events

Question 25

What conclusion was drawn from schemas?

Answer 25

Information from schemas can influence our episodic memory and expectations

Question 26

What happens if we reduce the amount of information to be processed?

Answer 26

We become inflexible

Question 27

Where is the damage in frontotemporal dementia?

Answer 27

Prefrontal cortex and temporal lobes

Question 28

What difficulties are there with frontotemporal dementia?

Answer 28

Planning and there are more sequencing errors in scripts