chapter 9 - info processing perspectives and connectionism

Question 1

information flows through what three processing units

Answer 1

• sensory store
• short term store (STS)
• long term store (LTS)

Question 2

what is the sensory store

Answer 2

holds raw sensory information from senses

Question 3

what is the short term store

Answer 3

also called “working memory”
- stimuli retained for several seconds

Question 4

what is the long term store

Answer 4

examined information stored for future use

Question 5

how do we actively channel information input

Answer 5

• executive function
• attention
• inhibitory control
• set-shifting

Question 6

what is executive function

Answer 6

planning and executing strategies used on information from long term store

Question 7

what is attention

Answer 7

process of selecting stimuli to detect or work on

Question 8

what is inhibitory control

Answer 8

intentionally choosing to not attend to information

Question 9

what is set-shifting

Answer 9

moving from one strategy to another

Question 10

development of the short term store

Answer 10

includes STS capacity, changes with age, and differences in processing speed, that are influenced by:
- memory span
- span of apprehension
- domain-specificity

Question 11

memory span

Answer 11

amount of information that can be held in short term store

Question 12

span of apprehension

Answer 12

the number of items that can be kept in the mind at any one time

Question 13

domain-specificity

Answer 13

specialized learning mechanisms for different domains or areas

Question 14

strategies

Answer 14

goal-directed and deliberately implemented mental operations used to facilitate task performance

Question 15

strategic memory

Answer 15

processes involved as one consciously attempts to retain or retrieve information

Question 16

mnemonics

Answer 16

effortful techniques used to improve memory, including rehearsal, organization and elaboration

Question 17

production deficiency

Answer 17

failure to spontaneously generate and use known strategies that could improve learning and memory

Question 18

utilization deficiency

Answer 18

when children experience little or no benefit when they use a new strategy

Question 19

implicit cognition

Answer 19

thought that occurs without awareness that one is thinking; is unconscious

Question 20

explicit cognition

Answer 20

thinking and thought processes of which we are consciously aware; is conscious

Question 21

metacognition

Answer 21

knowledge about cognition and about the regulation of cognitive activities

Question 22

attention span

Answer 22

capacity for sustaining attention to a particular stimulus or activity
- increases with age and partly due to increasing myelinization of the central nervous system and reticular system

Question 23

reticular formation

Answer 23

area of the brain that activates the organism and is thought to be important in regulating attention

Question 24

selective attention

Answer 24

capacity to focus on task-relevant aspects of experience while ignoring irrelevant or distracting information

Question 25

cognitive inhibition

Answer 25

dismissing irrelevant information

Question 26

inhibition

Answer 26

the ability to prevent ourselves from executing some cognitive or behavioural response

Question 27

fuzzy-trace theory

Answer 27

offers an alternative to the multistore model proposed by brainerd and reyna

Question 28

gist

Answer 28

fuzzy representation of information that preserves the central content but few precise details
- easily accessed
- requires relatively little effort

Question 29

verbatim traces

Answer 29

memory representations
- more susceptible to interference
- more easily forgotten

Question 30

schema theories

Answer 30

emphasize how memories of events are manipulated

Question 31

script

Answer 31

general representation of the typical sequencing of events (i.e., what occurs and when) in some familiar context

Question 32

event memory

Answer 32

long-term memory for events
- children from individualistic cultures tend to recall events from their own perspective and retrieve information related to their personal goals
- children from collectivist cultures encode, retain, and retrieve more social aspects of events

Question 33

when does autobiographical memory improve

Answer 33

during the preschool years
- parents strengthen it by discussing past events

Question 34

retrieval of information

Answer 34

actions and strategies aimed at getting information out of the long-term store

Question 35

free recall of information

Answer 35

recollection that is not prompted by specific cues or prompts

Question 36

cued recall of information

Answer 36

recollection that is prompted by a cue associated with the setting in which the recalled event originally occurred

Question 37

suggestibility

Answer 37

the likelihood that false information that is suggested is incorporated into ones memory
- all ages susceptible to false memories
- children younger than 8 to 9 years more suggestible than older children and adults

Question 38

reasoning

Answer 38

a particular type of problem solving that involves making inferences

Question 39

analogical reasoning

Answer 39

reasoning that involves using something you already know to help reason about something not known yet

Question 40

relational similarity

Answer 40

the relation between two analogues (ex. a parent feeding a child is relationally similar to an adult bird feeding its chicks)

Question 41

connectionism

Answer 41

field of cognitive science that seeks to understand mental processes as resulting from assemblies (or groups) of real or artificial neurons

Question 42

the origins of connectism

Answer 42

• modern connectionism emerged in the 1980s
  -approach called parallel distributed processing where
  parallel: many things being processed at the same time
  distributed: information being encoded across neurons in the brain