Midterm 2

Question 1

behavioral ecology

Answer 1

observation and field experiments

Question 2

experimental psychology

Answer 2

laboratory experiments on spatial learning

Question 3

three core navigation processes

Answer 3

path integration, scene recognition, and reorientation

Question 4

path integration

Answer 4

how do you get from one point to another

Question 5

scene recognition

Answer 5

how we recognize and use the scene around us to navigate

Question 6

reorientation

Answer 6

if you do get mixed up or turned around, what do you use in the environment and how do you reorient yourself to get back?

Question 7

two uniquely human navigational abilities

Answer 7

flexible reorientation; pictures, models, and maps

Question 8

flexible reorientation

Answer 8

humans can reorient themselves based on a number of factors

Question 9

bee navigation

Answer 9

bees assess direction traveled by optic flow (reflection of light on eyes varies from if the bee is going straight to if they are going sideways, etc.); communicate with each other about where they traveled through the waggle dance

Question 10

the waggle dance

Answer 10

tells the distance and direction to a food source to other bees

Question 11

limits of path integration

Answer 11

subject to cumulative error –> correction occurs through enduring representations of environment

Question 12

representations that underlie place learning

Answer 12

representations are like real maps or representations are like photographs

Question 13

representations are like real maps

Answer 13

capture locations of places; relationships of different places; independent of the observer’s viewpoint

Question 14

representations are like photographs

Answer 14

capture appearance of each place; particular point of observation

Question 15

morris water maze task

Answer 15

place a rat in a tank filled with water that looks like the shade of diluted milk; let it swim around until it can find the platform to stand; results found the rat can find the platform from any viewpoint based on external cues on the walls surrounding the tank

Question 16

Tunisian desert ant

Answer 16

the pedometer hypothesis; ants count the amount of steps they took to get to a food source and take that same amount of steps to get home; have an internal clock to base the direction of home on the sun’s position

Question 17

hippocampal region

Answer 17

crucial for memory consolidation

Question 18

parahippocampal place area

Answer 18

near hippocampus; central to navigation in rats

Question 19

place learning in insects and rats

Answer 19

view-dependent representations of places; linking those places together as routes

Question 20

scene representations are not like…

Answer 20

real maps

Question 21

humans form…

Answer 21

view-dependent representations

Question 22

three components of reorientation

Answer 22

domain specific; task-specific; encapsulated

Question 23

reorientation in young children

Answer 23

children reorient by shape of the room; fail to reorient by color of wall

Question 24

three systems of navigation

Answer 24

path integration, view-dependent scene recognition, and geometric module

Question 25

geometric module

Answer 25

domain-specific --> geometry of surfaces, not patterns task-specific --> reorientation, not other tasks encapsulated --> detect and remember other cues but don't use them

Question 26

what is unique about human spatial representation?

Answer 26

humans have unique ways of combining information; spatial language; other representational devices also may give us unique spatial abilities (pictures, models, maps)

Question 27

problems of object representation

Answer 27

unity and boundaries; occlusion

Question 28

unity and boundaries

Answer 28

what goes with what?

Question 29

occlusion

Answer 29

what is the complete shape of each object?

Question 30

nativist perspective of object representation

Answer 30

the developmental primitives of object representations go beyond information from our senses; some parts of object representations are not learned; core knowledge of objects

Question 31

empiricist perspective of object representation

Answer 31

the developmental primitives of object representation are sensory representations; learning is accomplished by general learning mechanisms such as the capacity to form associations, to detect correlations, etc.; all parts of object representation (except senses) are learned; knowledge of objects is constructed from sensory representations

Question 32

two object representation systems

Answer 32

object tracking system; object recognition system

Question 33

object tracking

Answer 33

ability to track objects; "mental finger" pointing to an object; operate over spatiotemporal information; can track multiple objects at once

Question 34

object recognition

Answer 34

ability to recognize kinds of objects; operates over feature information

Question 35

signatures of object tracking system

Answer 35

only 3-4 objects can be tracked at once; objects survive occlusion; tracking operates over entire objects, not parts; cohesion and rigidity influence object tracking

Question 36

objects survive occlusion

Answer 36

signature of object tracking; we are still able to track an object even when they go behind something/disappear

Question 37

tracking operates over entire objects, not parts

Answer 37

signature of object tracking; more difficult to track an individual part of an object, rather than the whole object

Question 38

cohesion and rigidity influence object tracking

Answer 38

signature of object tracking; objects disappearing and appearing somewhere else is difficult to track

Question 39

object recognition is viewpoint invariant

Answer 39

we can recognize an object regardless of its orientation; we have sensitivity to non-accidental features

Question 40

object tracking under various conditions

Answer 40

people able to track under conditions of no occlusion, virtual occlusion, and occlusion; not able to track under conditions of implosion/explosion

Question 41

signature limits of object recognition

Answer 41

sensitive to non-accidental properties in a visual image; objects are learned by associating patterns of neural activity over time; we recognize things as kinds of things

Question 42

objects are learned by associating patterns of neural activity over time

Answer 42

signature of object recognition; neural paths adjust to what they're used to --> can lead to visual illusions; ex. recognizing an object as a box when it is arranged in a certain way because it has the features of the box, when it actually is not a box

Question 43

we recognize things as kinds of things

Answer 43

signature of object recognition; recognize species of dogs as kinds of dogs

Question 44

non-accidental properties

Answer 44

qualitative differences

Question 45

metric properties

Answer 45

quantitative differences

Question 46

around 4.5 months of life

Answer 46

infants begin to discern shapes and sizes

Question 47

around 7.5 months of life

Answer 47

infants begin to discern patterns

Question 48

around 11.5 months

Answer 48

infants begin to discern colors and luminance

Question 49

experiment proving newborns learn caregiver's face quickly

Answer 49

2-choice visual preference; two displays, one showing the infant's mother and the other showing another infant's mother; the infant will look longer at the image of their mother than the other mother; visual system is not fully developed, but they recognize their mother better

Question 50

is the empiricist or nativist perspective correct in the case of object recognition

Answer 50

nativist

Question 51

imprinting

Answer 51

phase-sensitive learning that is rapid and apparently independent of the consequences of behavior

Question 52

can chicks recognize objects immediately after being hatched?

Answer 52

place the chicks in an environment without any objects; show them a display with an object and the chick imprints on the object; then, show the chick two displays: one of the original object rotated and the other of a completely different object; continue showing the same two objects on the two displays but in different orientations each time; for each trial, the chick preferred the original object; results show that the chick was able to tell that the object they imprinted on was the same object in each trial despite any changes in orientation

Question 53

cross-cultural experiment with a Himba tribe

Answer 53

Himba tribe has few words for simple shapes in language; compared Himba tribe to USC students; showed participants two displays, one with non-accidental properties and the other with metric properties and they were told to match-to-sample; participants had to say which object matched the main object; results: non-accidental properties are lower in their error rate than metric properties and both groups follow the same trend --> thus, both groups had the same kind of processing of the objects

Question 54

does the cross-cultural study support the nativist or empiricist perspective of object recognition?

Answer 54

nativist

Question 55

conclusions of object representation

Answer 55

-many signatures of object recognition found in humans are also found in nonhuman animals -object recognition signatures are culturally universal -infants innately perceive object shape -evidence suggest object recognition is innate

Question 56

energy hypothesis of how ants represent distance traveled

Answer 56

ants measure their distance through the energy required for locomotion; experiment where the ants carried varying loads, but ants were found to still be able to assess the walking distance with great accuracy regardless of the load they carry

Question 57

optic flow hypothesis of how ants represent distance traveled

Answer 57

they take into account how light reflects off of different objects and scenery as they make their route; experiment where the ants' eyes were covered during homebound runs, but the ants were still able to assess traveling distance correctly despite not being able to see

Question 58

pedometer hypothesis experiment

Answer 58

after the ants have reached the food, the experimenters cut off half the legs of some ants (stumps), put some ants on stilts, and left the rest the same; as the ants walked home, the ants with stumps ended up short of the nest, the ants of stilts ended up passing the nest, and the normal ants got back to the nest like normal; proves that the ants count their steps