chapter 1: introduction to cognitive psychology Flashcards
what is cognition
conscious experience (thoughts)
(studying the mind)
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what is cognitive processes
mental operations (attention, learning, thinking)
what are ways to define cognitive psychology?
1) The study of mental processes, which includes determining the
characteristics and properties of the mind and how it operates
(Goldstein, 2019).
2) Refers to all processes by which the sensory input is
transformed, reduced, elaborated, stored, recovered and used
(Neisser, 1967).
Neisser’s definition
Refers to all processes by which the sensory input is
transformed, reduced, elaborated, stored, recovered and used
(Neisser, 1967).
- Mr. Neisser wrote the first cognitive psychology textbook and their definition captures both the properties and process is of the mind
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There is more than one way to define Cognitive Psychology….
Simply put, it is the study of mental operations that support
people’s acquisition and use of knowledge
mental operations are processes such as attention perception learning thinking also known as cognition
who conducted the first cognitive psychology experiment?
Donders (1868): Conducted the first cognitive psychology experiment.
- Donder’s study examined the time it takes to make a decision using simple and choice reaction time tasks
Reaction time (RT) experiment in which the time interval between
the onset of a stimulus and a response is measured.
- reaction time is a measure of the speed at which one can respond after the presentation of a stimulus ; it is the interval of time between stimulus onset and a response
Compared reaction times on simple RT task and choice RT task. The
difference reflects the time it takes to make a decision
Donder hypothesized that it would take a longer time to respond to a choice task than it would on a simple reaction time task because the mind has to engage in mental processes involved with decision making
donder’s experiment
(simple reaction time task)
here we have a laptop and displayed in the middle is the onset of a light stimulus
the researcher instructs participants to press the J key as quickly as they can once the stimulus
(choice reaction time task)
compared to a simple reaction time task the choice reaction time task requires that the participants select one of two or more possible responses
in this example there is only two possible responses a light flashes on the left or right of the screen
participants are required to respond by pressing J if the light appeared on the left and the K key if it appeared on the right
Donders’ simple vs choice reaction results
the time difference between the simple and choice reaction time tasks reflects the time needed to decide between the two button presses
donders found evidence in support of their hypothesis they found that it took longer on the choice reaction time task then the simple reaction time task
who established the first psychology laboratory and adopted an approached known as structuralism?
WUNDT (1879): Established the first psychology laboratory and adopted
an approach known as** structuralism. **
Structuralism is an approach to studying the mind using the method
of **analytic introspection **in which, participants describe their
thoughts when presented with various stimuli.
who measured the rate of forgetting using 13
nonsense syllables (e.g., DAX).
he is famous for his work on memory and forgetting
EBBINGHAUS (1885): Measured the rate of forgetting using 13
nonsense syllables (e.g., DAX).
Ebbinghaus learned the list of syllables and then relearnedthe list
after various intervals of time to determine the amount of
“savings” in relearning.
- Savings = the amount of time saved from having to relearn the
list - Greater savings after short delays
ebbinghaus lesson 1 notes
An important figure in the history of cognition is that of Ebbinghaus (1885). Ebbinghaus is famous for their work on memory and forgetting
interestingly Ebbinghaus used themselves as the subject of their study
a list of 13 nonsense syllables such as DAX was constructed commonly these syllables were called CVC’s an acronym for consonant vowel consonant
by generating these nonsense syllables also known as CVC’s which were pronounceable yet held no meaning
what do you think using syllables with no meaning was necessary for a forgetting study? the answer is that words have meaning and could differ in how memorable they are based on their meaning
forgetting might occur for less meaningful words and retention might be more likely for distinctive words thus Ebbinghaus used nonsense syllables that held no meaning
Ebbinghaus learned a list of syllables and then at various delays determined how long it would take them to relearn the list
their study revealed that shorter delays between these steady phase and testing phase was associated with faster re learning times
Ebbinghaus (1885): savings curve
Greater savings in relearning when the
delay between the original study session
and the relearning session is short.
*Less forgetting after a short delay
notes:
after delay of 19 minutes, which means that Ebbinghaus didn’t need to spend a lot of time re learning the list after 19 minutes because most items were still in memory
you will also notice the steep drop from a delay of 19 minutes to one hour” that is most forgetting occured in the first hour and savings and re learning had dropped
in other words Ebbinghaus needed a lot of time to relearn the list after one hour
I’ll point out that after a 2 day delay there was only a 27% savings in re learning, in other words most of the items were forgotten which meant that Ebbinghaus needed to spend a very long time re learning the list after a 2 day delay
who wrote the first psyc textbook?
James (1890) : Wrote the first Psychology Textbook
Self-reported observations of experience (e.g., consciousness, emotion).
(abandoning the study of the mind)
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