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Flashcards in Test 1 Deck (56)
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1
Q

Problems with behaviorism

A
  • Applicability to real world
  • Presented challenge to conditioning: applicability to world
  • Ex: How do we reduce plane crashes? Conditioning doesn’t explain something this complicated.
  • Verbal learning research
    • talked about stimulus and response
    • eased way for cognitive revolution to come
  • Linguistics
    • idea: Skinner wanted to explain language with conditioning (ex: you coo, and mom looks you in eye, smiles, and that reinforces you)
    • Chomsky: reviewed Skinner and pointed out they were not even using the proper definition anymore
2
Q

Assumptions of cognitive psychology

A
  • Mental processes exist
  • They’re subject to objective measurement (can’t see your memory, but can give you a test)
  • Animals are active information processors
3
Q

Information processing framework

A
  • Analogy for information processing; looking at mind as a computer
    1. Receive input – stages are one at a time (earlier version)
    2. Transform input into symbolic form (humans: neural transmission… computers: 0s and 1s)
    3. Recode it
    4. Decide (if… then)
    5. Make new expression (ex: change up info – reword)
    6. Save – remembering
    7. Output
  • Save and Output are like “save and print”
  • Early models
  • Serial and Parallel processing
  • Updated models
  • Modal model
4
Q

Early models

A
  • Stages are fixed

- Stages do not overlap = serial processing

5
Q

Serial vs. parallel processing

Serial:

A
  • Stages do not overlap
  • Serial = When things are harder
  • Ex: Modal Model
  • Parallel:
  • Stages can overlap
  • Parallel = when things are easier
  • Ex: constantly taking in info and short-term is working on its own thing
  • Ex: Pandemonium
6
Q

Updated models

A
  • Parallel Processing: stages can overlap
    • Ex: constantly taking in info and short-term is working on its own thing
    • Some processing is serial and other is parallel (serial = when things are harder; parallel = when things are easier)
  • Use brain structure and function in theoretical development
    • When looking at how things work, we take into account the brain-
7
Q

Modal model

A
  • The Modal Model (most common model) (“mode” is statistical term)
    1. Environmental input
  1. Sensory registers
    - (visual, auditory… haptic) (all of different senses)
  2. Short-term store; Temporary working memory
    - control processes: rehearsal, coding, decisions, and retrieval strategies
    - consciousness and a few seconds ago
    - can do response output OR 4.
  3. Long-term store; Permanent memory store
    - can choose to retrieve something from here
  • EARLY information processing model
  • stages are fixed
  • stages do not overlap = serial processing
8
Q

Study methods

A
  • Experiments
  • Quasi-Experiments
  • Individual Differences/Correlational
9
Q

Experiments

A
  • An IV was manipulated
  • Random assignment
  • High control
  • Manipulate a variable
  • Pros:
    • high control
    • isolate cause and effect
  • Cons:
    • ecological validity (has to do with how much experiment is like real world)
  • Ex: Research question: Do people study better with or without a TV on in background?
    • IV: background noise (silence or TV)
    • DV: reading comprehension
10
Q

Quasi-Experiments

A
  • An IV was manipulated, but they also used a quasi-IV (grouping variable)
  • Medium control
  • 1 or more IVs
  • 1 or more variables that can’t be manipulated (quasi IV or grouping variable)
  • Pros:
    • individual differences (things we’re interested in that we can’t necessarily manipulate)
    • high control for the manipulated variable
  • Cons:
    • less control overall
    • ecological validity still possible
  • Ex: Is the effect of background TV noise the same for introverts and extroverts?
    • IV: background noise (silence, TV)
    • Quasi IV: trait
    • DV: reading comprehension
11
Q

Individual Differences/Correlational

A
  • Asks: Is there a relationship between the variables?
  • You haven’t manipulated anything
  • Pros:
    • examine complicated relationships between variables
  • Cons:
    • no control → no cause (only observing, so you can’t make causal declines)
  • Ex: What’s the relationship between age and memory?
    • Variable 1: age
    • Variable 2: memory
    • No IV or DV
12
Q

Brain imaging

A
  • fMRI

- ERP

13
Q

fMRI

A
  • Functional magnetic residence imaging
  • Getting images of brain function through blood flow
  • When brain is active, it recruits oxygenated blood (tells you where brain is active)
  • Cannot get causal explanation, only correlation
  • Benefit: good at spatial localization (where things are happening)
  • Limitations:
  • temporal (bad at timing) - blood shows up 2 seconds after
  • correlational (feedback loop)
  • involved regions - shows only what is involved in a task, not what is critical for it (ex: hippocampus critical for memory, but when fMRI, you’ll see frontal lobe and parietal lobe and hippocampus have blood flow, but parietal and frontal lobe are NOT critical)
14
Q

ERP

A
  • Event-related potential
  • Takes electrical output activity
  • Quick with timing
  • Looks at electrical signals
  • Benefit: good at time
  • Limitations:
    • coarse spatial localization (bad at showing exactly where)
    • involved regions (can only tell us what’s involved, not what’s critical)
15
Q

Neuropsychology

A
  • Prosopagnosia: face recognition deficit; face blindness; can’t really perceive face
  • Agnosia: deficit to perceive visual images – not eye problem; it’s a brain problem; inability to perceive something; visual impairments that aren’t blindness
  • Hemineglect:Failure of attention to left visual field due to damage to right parietal lobe; attention to left visual field is sometimes possible if nothing is in the right visual field; sometimes associated with denial of disorder (anosognosia)
  • Amnesia
  • Aphasia: language disorder; sound normal, but what they’re saying doesn’t make sense
16
Q

Brain basics

A
  • Neurons
  • Dendrites - take in info
  • Soma - regulate cell function (biological stuff)
  • Axon - delivers info
  • Axon terminals - delivers info
  • Myelin sheath - speed up processes
  • Long-term potentiation (LTP)
  • Strengthening connections between neurons
17
Q

Neurons and LTP

A

Neurons:

  • Dendrites - take in info
  • Soma - regulate cell function (biological stuff)
  • Axon - delivers info
  • Axon terminals - delivers info
  • Myelin sheath - speed up processes

LTP

  • Long-term potentiation
  • Strengthening connections between two neurons
  • How we build memories
  • Likes neurotransmitter, so creates growth, and then it’s easier to accept info
  • Ex: Glutamate taken in by receptors, it likes the glutamate, so it creates more receptors
  • Brain plasticity - changing all the time
18
Q

Cortical lobes and subcortical structures

A
  • about 3 mm thick; 2.5 sq. ft. if stretched; most higher mental functions; white matter (more myelinated; grey matter: not as myelinated, darker stuff (cortex))
  • Frontal Lobe
  • Broca’s Area
  • Motor Cortex
  • Somatosensory Cortex
  • Parietal Lobe
  • Occipital Lobe
  • Primary Visual Cortex
  • Wernicke’s Area
  • Temporal Lobe
19
Q

Connectionism

A
  • Corpus Callosum - connects two halves
  • Connectionist models (parallel distributed processing PDP models) refer to a computer-based technique for modeling complex systems that is inspired by the structure of the nervous system
  • Fundamental principle is that simple nodes or units that make up the system are interconnected
20
Q

Sensation vs. perception

Sensation

A
  • Reception of stimulation from the environment and encoding in nervous system
  • Contact between organism and environment
  • Ex: How much light is needed before you detect it?
  • Retina: rods and cones, fovea

Perception

  • Interpreting and understanding sensory information; organizing and interpreting sensation
  • Discontinuous information, but continuous sensory experience
  • Ex: What is it? How far away is it?
21
Q

Proximal/distal stimulus

A
  • Distal Stimulus: thing out there in the world

- Proximal Stimulus: pattern of energy that is contacting our sensory system; upside down; 2-D

22
Q

Blind spot

A

-Big gap at back of retina

23
Q

Saccades

A
  • Quick movement from one fixation to another
  • Variable in speed (250175 ms)
  • About 200 ms to “plan” a saccade
  • Vision is suppressed during saccades
  • 3-4 fixation-saccade cycles a second
  • Input to our visual system is not continuous (but that’s how we experience it)
  • Saccades → Change blindness (vs. inattention blindness)

Change blindness and inattention blindness

24
Q

Depth Perception

A

-We get 2-D information, not three

  • Two kinds of depth cues:
    • Binocular:
    • Monocular:
25
Q

Iconic memory

A
  • A buffer that holds visual information for brief periods of time
  • Allows visual system to integrate information into a continuous experience
  • It’s a memory system, but it’s dedicated to perception
  • Properties:
    • Size: large capacity
  • Duration: very brief (about one second)
26
Q

Echoic memory

A

-Sensory register that’s for auditory, rather than imagery (visual?)

27
Q

Pattern Recognition

A
  • The assignment of meaning to a stimulus (an instance of X)
  • Gestalt Grouping Principles
  • Template Model
  • Feature Detection Model
28
Q

Gestalt grouping principles

A
  • Heuristics by which we organize parts (of an image) into wholes (a whole image)
    • Heuristic is cognitive shortcut
  • They help us resolve ambiguities (in the image)
  • Inferences – a lot of own view is made up of inferences
    1. Figure ground relations (idea that in image something is selected as foreground, and other thing will be background; ex. Of vase vs. faces)
    1. Similarity (we group things based off of similarity)
    1. Proximity (we group things based off of how far apart they are from each other)
    1. Closure (we’re able to close gap in mind)
    1. Good continuation (we like to see things as nice, smooth lines)
    1. Common fate (things that move together tend to stay together)
29
Q

Template model

A
  • Stored models of all categorizable patterns

- Problem: Non-canonical views and forms

30
Q

Feature detection models

A

-RIGHT MODEL

  • Feature: a simple fragment of a whole pattern
    • Starting from individual features and build up from this
  • Pandemonium: a feature detection model
  • Object recognition (recognition by components)
31
Q

Pandemonium

A
  • A feature detection model
    1. Data or image “demons” - encode pattern; get data into system
    1. Computational demons - match the simple features
    1. Cognitive demons - match whole letter patterns; put those features together
    1. Decision demon - decides which letter it is
  • Bottom-up processing model (data driven model)
32
Q

Object recognition (recognition by components)

A
  • Recognition by Components (geons)
  • Think about images of mug and suitcase
  • Only difference between feature and objects is objects are 3-D
33
Q

Problem with feature detection

A
  • Assume the 1st step is feature/geon detection

- Problem: knowledge and context may matter as much or more than features

34
Q

Top-down vs. bottom-up processing

A
  • Bottom-up:
  • Data-driven processing
  • Processing that is driven by feature detection
  • Ex: Putting a puzzle together without knowing what the picture is (Pandemonium and geon models)
  • Top-down:
  • Processing that’s driven by knowledge and context
  • Ex: Putting a puzzle together knowing what the picture is
  • Helps solve perception problems
  • Helps us interpret ambiguous stimuli
    • Knowledge and context (this is what helps us here)
  • Influence of whole pattern on the perception of the part of the pattern
  • Think of word superiority effect (letters better identified in the context of known words; harder to identify because you no longer have your knowledge to help you)
  • Ex: of hearing green needle vs. hearing brain stem
35
Q

Agnosias

A

-1. Prosopagnosia: face recognition deficit; face blindness; can’t really perceive face

    1. Apperceptive agnosia: deficit in perceiving whole patterns (feature combination)
  • Like bottom half of Pandemonium Model
    1. Associative agnosia: deficit in associating a pattern with meaning
      - Can see pattern, but can’t put it together with its meaning
      - Ex: See a table, but can’t recognize and name it that

Agnosias indicate:
-Sensation and feature detection: different processes and brain regions

  • Combining features is critical
    • Getting features alone doesn’t get you far
  • Naming the object: different processes and brain regions
    • Associative agnosia: can see pattern, just can’t recognize
36
Q

Approaches to attention

Purposes?

A
    1. To alert/prepare you → orienting
    1. To focus on some things while ignoring others → selective attention
    1. To coordinate multiple tasks or goals → mental resource/capacity
    1. To override habits → control and automaticity
37
Q

Orienting attention

A
  • Orienting reflex
  • Reflexive redirection and capture of attention
  • Triggered by abrupt changes
  • Ex: lightning, thunder, books falling
38
Q

Selective Attention

A

-Selection of one source of info despite competition from others

  • (arrow pointing down to this) How do we do that?
  • What happens to the info we ignore?
  • (arrow pointing down to this) Dichotic listening research
  • Filter theories of selective attention
  • Dichotic listening task
  • Late filter theory
  • Evidence in favor of or against the models
  • Inhibition and negative priming
  • Hemineglect
39
Q

Dichotic listening task

A
  • Headphones → different messages in each ear
  • Attended channel: info they should be listening to
  • Unattended channel: ignore
  • Shadowing: repeating what they hear in the attended ear
  • Physical characteristics:
    • spatial location (ex: pretend to be listening to one, but actually listen to other)
    • frequency (male vs. female voice)
    • intensity (ex: volume (auditory); brightness (vision)
    • *these allow people to focus on attended channel
40
Q

Early filter theory

A
  • Fundamental Points:
    • selection is based on physical characteristics
    • selection occurs BEFORE pattern recognition, before anything is recognized
  • sensory store → selective filter (people choose something to focus on based on physical characteristics; ex: male and female voice) → pattern recognition meaning → ← memory
    • Pattern recognition and memory influence each other
41
Q

Late filter theory

A
  • Fundamental Points:
    • selection for attention is based on meaning
      • All info is processes for meaning and “gets into” memory (to some degree)
    • attention is limited in terms of HOW to respond

-Sensory store → pattern recognition meaning → selective filter → response selection

42
Q

Evidence in favor of or against the models (Early and Late)

A

Testing Early Filter Model

  • Morray (1959): Cocktail Party Phenomenon
    • Capture of attention by info that’s presented in unattended channel
    • Shouldn’t be able to hear name across room because you’re paying attention to person in front of you (problem with this model)
    • Shadowing breaks down
  • Triesman (1960)
    • priming you for one thing, but supposed to hear another

Corteen and Wood (Late Filter)
-Shock associated words in unattended channel

-Glycemic skin response - anytime shocked, this response increases

43
Q

Inhibition & negative priming

A
  • Suppression of salient but irrelevant information that reduces its activation level
  • Negative priming is one way to test idea of inhibition
  • Naming red object:
    • Unrelated: baseline RT
    • Attended repeat: faster (faster because you just said/saw it)
    • Unattended repeat: slower (slower because you have to name what you just suppressed)
44
Q

Hemineglect

A
  • Failure of attention to left visual field due to damage to right parietal lobe
  • Attention to left visual field is sometimes possible if nothing is in the right visual field
  • Sometimes associated with denial of disorder (anosognosia)
  • There can be varying degrees of hemineglect
45
Q

Attention as Mental Resource

A
  • Cognitive fuel; limited; flexible coordination → coordinate multiple tasks or goals
  • Capacity theory
  • Multitasking
46
Q

Capacity Theory

A
  • Attention as mental resource (cognitive fuel)
  • Limited
  • Flexible coordination
  • (arrow pointing down to this) Coordinate multiple tasks or goals
47
Q

Multitasking

A
  • Easier to combine tasks in different modalities → some small devoted fuel tanks
  • Increasing difficulty to one makes others harder → general fuel tank
48
Q

Automaticity Criteria

Automaticity

A
  • Occurs without intention
  • Not open to introspection
  • Few (if any) resources are used and does not interfere with other processes
  • Tend to be fast
  • Stroop Task
49
Q

Control Criteria

A
  • Occurs with intention
  • Open to introspection
  • Takes attentional resources
  • Slower
  • Ex: surgery
  • Few “pure” situations; most a combination
    • Act in concert → good performance (get home fast to study! Drive on “autopilot” while thinking of everything you have to do)
    • Act in opposition → slow and error prone performance (ex: must go to store before going home)
50
Q

Stroop task

A
  • Related to automaticity
  • Slow-downs and errors due to trying to ignore the word and name the color
  • Difficult because reading is an automatic process
  • 2 things competing to become the response
51
Q

Action slips

A
  • Downside to Automaticity
  • Unintended automatic actions in appropriate for the situation
  • Ex: you’re a passenger, and press brakes even though not driving
52
Q

McCarley et al. (TSA screening). The topic and associated definitions. IVs. DVs. Procedure. Conclusions.

A
  • IVs:
  • target present (20%) or absent (Why? More realistic. Very rare to find threat in many bags)
  • Knife set
  • DVs:
  • target recognition (sensitivity), given fixation (how often do they fixate and recognize the target)
  • RT (how quick when knife is in there)
  • Saccades (how many moves did eyes make before finding it)
  • Probability of fixation
  • False alarms
  • Dwells
  • Conclusions:
  • Sensitivity got better (professor says “recognition” instead of “sensitivity”)
  • Faster to fixate and recognize
  • Efficiency vs. Effectiveness?
    • Scanning was faster (efficiency)
    • No more likely to fixate the target (effectiveness); probability of fixating on new target

-Participants: 16 young adults (mean age = 21; 12 female)

53
Q

McCarley et al. (TSA screening). Visual search.

A
  • Visual Search:
  • Fewer saccades
  • RT improved
  • Recognition (sensitivity) improved
54
Q

McCarley et al. (TSA screening). Effectiveness vs. efficiency

A
  • Efficiency: Scanning was faster

- Effectiveness: No more likely to fixate the target; probability of fixating on new target

55
Q

McCarley et al. (TSA screening). Take home message

A
  • Practice improved the ability to recognize camouflaged targets
    • Problem solving
  • Recommendations to TSA?
    • Focus on ability to recognize (if going to fixate more often, then at least improve recognizing it when they do)
    • Train on a wide array of objects
56
Q

Sensory memory

A
  • Part of modal model
  • At the input end, environmental stimuli enter system, with each sense modality having its own sensory register or memory