CH 9 - Thinking and Language Flashcards
Cognition
Mental activities associated with thinking, knowing, remembering, and communicating
Conceptual Knowledge
Knowledge that enables us to recognize objects and events and to make inferences about their properties
Concept
Mental grouping of similar objects, events, ideas and people that is used for a variety of cognitive functions (memory, reasoning, etc.)
ex. Mental representation of cats involve appearance, behaviour, and what they are
Categorization
Process by which things are placed into groups called categories
Why are categories useful?
Categories help us understand individual cases not previously encountered
Prototype theory
Theory that membership of a category is determined by comparing the object to a prototype that represents a category
Ex. “Stereotypical” abstract representation (bird - think of stereotypical bird)
Typicality ratings
Category members rated as most typical are also those that share features with many other members of the category
Normative Accounts of Judgement
The way we draw conclusions based on known facts in order to follow certain rules
Ex. Rules of logic, math, stats, scientific method
Descriptive Accounts of Judgement
Describes the way people ACTUALLY draw conclusions based on what they know
Essential tenet of all communication
What we present 1st changes the way people experience what we present to them next
Ex. Mentioning a large number before affects people’s preception
Anchoring
When provided with a potential answer to a question, people use that answer as a reference point in selecting their answer
Heuristics
Fast, simple rules people use that often lead to accurate conclusions
- ppl often rely on heuristics in making judgements instead of relying on normative rules
- can lead to erroneous conclusions
Availability Heuristic
Tendency to make judgements about the frequency or likelihood of an event based on the ease with which evidence or examples come to mind
- determined by ease of coming up with examples from memory
- Accuracy depends on whether the ease of coming up with examples is related to actual frequency
Ex. People believing planes are more dangerous than cars bc of the news reports on it, when in reality driving is far worse
Salience
How prominent or emotionally striking something is
Availability entrepreneurs
People who capitalize on human tendency to gauge a danger according to how many examples are readily available in our minds
Ex. Journalists, politicians, activists
Representativeness Heuristic
Involves treating examples of a category as homogeneous or possessing essentially same characteristics
The probability that A comes from B can be determined by how well A resembles properties of B
Dilution effects
Including non-diagnostic information along with diagnostic information, leads people to rely less on diagnostic information in making judgements
Conjunction rule
The probability of 2 events cannot be higher than the probability of the single constituents
- Bc feminist bank tellers are a subset of all bank tellers, it is always more likely that a person is a bank teller rather than a bank teller AND feminist
Conjunction fallacy
The probability of co-occurence of 2 outcomes cannot be greater than the probability of each outcome alone
Covariation detection
Perceiving relations between variables
- If two variables “covary” that means they
rise and fall together
Confirmation bias (AKA The positive test strategy)
Formal - Testing a hypothesis by seeking cases that match it
Informal - The tendency to look only at the cells that confirm your hypothesis
Why does confirmation bias happen?
- Biased memory search
- Only recruit memories that confirm hypothesis
- Used in child star example
- Biased evidence seeking
- Observe world looking for information that confirms our hypothesis
- OR only pay attention to information that confirms our hypothesis
Loss Aversion
The willingness to take a large risk to avoid losing, but not willing to take a small risk to gain
Not willing to take a small risk to gain, but willing to take a large risk to not lose
Losses hurt around 2.25x more than equivalent gains
Framing Effects
The way alternatives are worded which influence decision-making
- Specific wording can affect what features we focus our attention on when making decisions
Unconscious vs. Conscious Thought
Unconscious - very large processing capacity, may make it more effective when making important decisions bc it can take all relevant information into account simultaneously
Conscious - has a low processing capacity, may make it limited when making complex decisions because it cannot take all the relevant information into account
What is Language?
Involves our spoken, written, or signed words and the ways we combine them to communicate meaning
Language is (4 things):
Symbolic - sounds and written words to represent objects, events, and ideas
Semantic - meaningful
Structured: Rules governing arrangement of words into phrases and sentences
Generative: limited # of symbols can be combined endlessly to create messages
Phonemes
Smallest units of speech that can be distinguished perceptually
- most languages use 20-40; English uses ~ 40
Morphemes
Smalles units of meaning in a language; consisting of root words, prefixes, and suffixes
Ex. cats = 2 morphemes
“s” has meaning beyond letter
Grammar
Rule system that enables humans to communicate with one another
Semantics
The meaning of words and word combinations
- involves learning a variety of objects and actions to which words refer
Syntax
A system of rules for arranging words into sentences
Receptive Language
What babies can understand
- exceeds their production language
- Ex. By 4-5 months infants attend to their own names but not other names
Productive language
What babies can produce themselves
- Prelinguistic communication = newborns communicate thoughts and needs with body posture, gestures, and facial expressions
- Intentional vocalizations = infants begin to vocalize and repeat vocalizations within first couple months
- Babbling = around 4 months
Holophrases
One-word expressions to express a complete thought
Fast-mapping
A process of quickly acquiring and retaining a word after hearing it applied a few times (improves with age)
Naming explosion
Period of rapid vocab learning occurring between 16-24 months
2 kinds of mistakes in learning words:
- Underextension - applying a word more narrowly than it is usually applied so that the word’s use is restricted to a single object
Ex. “ball” might only refer to soccer ball but not any other ball - Overextension - Applying a word too broadly
Ex. naming all farm animals “cow”
Telegraphic speech
Speaking like a telegram, only including a few essential words
Ex. “give baby ball”
Noam Chomsky
Argued children do not only learn language through imitation and reinforcement
Over-generalization errors
Children say things that are incorrect and have not been rewarded for
Ex. I goed, I runned
Universality of language
The use of language develops in absence of formal instruction
Ex. Deaf children develop sign language
Universal grammar
Rules that apply to all human languages
Nature vs. Nurture
Infants’ brains are genetically attuned to language VS. Infants must be taught
Learning theory and language acquisition
B.F. Skinner (1957) proposed that language is learned through operant conditioning: reinforcement and punishment
Nativist Theory and language acquisiton
The human brain has an innate capacity to learn language. Therefore, language develops as long as it is exposed to it
Social Pragmatics Theory
Emphasizes the child’s active engagement in learning the language out of a need to communicate
- The child seeks information, memorizes terms, imitates the speech heard from others, and learns
to conceptualize using words as language is acquired
Biological contributions to language acquisition (2):
Brain (left hemisphere):
- Broca’s Area - Controls ability to use language for expression (speaking words)
- Wernicke’s Area - Responsible for language comprehension (hearing words)
Infant-directed speech (“motherese”)
- shorter words
- higher pitch
- slower rate
Canonical babbling
A type of babbling with well-formed syllables that sound like language
Expansions
Parents enrich versions of the child’s statement
Ex. “Bottle fall” | “Yes, the bottle did fall”
Recast
Children’s sentences are restated into new grammatical forms
*Child: “Kitty go”
*Parent: “Where is the kitty going?”
