Chpt 9: Conceptual Knowledge (PSY311) Flashcards
Conceptual Knowledge lives in our _________ memory
semantic
Def: conceptual knowledge
Conceptual knowledge: enables us to recognize objects & events.
What’s the concept of conceptual knowledge?
Mental representation used for cognitive functions
Like dogs, cats, ppl, cares, street signs, books, you get the idea.
Explain your brain’s categorization
Process by which things are placed into diff groups that are called categories.
Why are Categories Helpful?
Helps us understand.
Prior comparisons, sets expectations for events & stimuli
Saves processing time for new events & stimuli.
Not all of the prototypes of everyday categories have the same features.
Method of determining categorization based on whether or not the ________ meets the def; which isn’t great.
concept
Not all members of everyday _______ have the same defining _________.
categories, features
Def: prototype
Prototype: an average representation of the typical member of a category.
Characteristic features that describe members.
A fictional, in your mind average.
Imagine a table, just a random one
Def: high prototypicality
High prototypicality: category member that closely resumes that category prototype.
Def: low prototypicality
Low prototypicality: category member doesn’t closely resemble the category prototype.
________ proposed that our typical prototype is based on a n average of members of a category that we commonly experience & see ______ in our daily lives.
Describes these variations within categories as representing _____ in typicality.
Rosch, often, diffs
Rosch & Mervis
Experiment
Had participants list many characteristics & attributes for everyday objects.
There’s a strong relationship between family resemblance & prototypicality.
Participants tend to list the most prototypical members of the category first.
Rosch’s demonstration of the prototypical members
Participants heard the prime first, which was the name of a color.
A couple secs later, they were shown a pair of colors by pressing a key as fast as they could, whether the 2 colors were the same or not.
The colors that participants saw after hearing the prime were paired in 3 ways:
Colors were the same & were good examples of the category
Colors were the same but were poor examples
Colors were diff, with the 2 colors coming from diff categories.
The important result came from the 2 same groups.
Priming resulted in faster same judgements for the prototypical (good) colors than the non prototypical colors.
When participants hear a color word, they imagine a good.
Why is the Rosch demonstration important?
Rosch’s demonstration was important bc it represented a great advance over the definitional approach bc it provided a good amount of experimental evidence that all items within a category aren’t the same.
Def: Typicality effects
Typicality effects: prototypical concepts are processed faster than low prototypical concepts.
Smith et al (‘74)
experiment
Participants took longer to identify a pomegranate as a fruit compared to an apple.
Slower reaction times for less prototypical concepts like fruits & animals.
Takes longer to verify less __________ things bc they have fewer ________ in common.
prototypical, features
Prototypes can _______ when there’s ______ info.
shift/change, new
Def: The Exemplar Approach
The Exemplar Approach explains typicality effect, easily taking into account atypical cases/real comparisons.
Accounts for variable categories
Exemplars might work best for smaller categories bc singular examples best represent the whole group
Prototype might work _______ for larger categories bc there are so many ____________ to be made.
best, comparisons
Def: exemplars
Exemplars are actual members of the category that a person has encountered in their past.
___________________approach can explain many of Rosch’s results, which were used to support the prototype approach.
The Exemplar
Def: Hierarchical organization
larger, more general categories are divided into smaller, more specific categories, creating a number of levels of categories.
Hierarchical organization features of model of conceptual knowledge:
Hierarchically organized
Evaluated in terms of explanatory power
Evaluated in terms of cognitive economy.
Tanaka & Taylor (‘91) experiment on expert categorization V. Novice categorization
Had experts & novices name/categorize diff birds at basic & specific instances.
Experts named more of the specific instances.
The novices categorized more of the basic instances.
Goal of memory models is to _______ map out how info is ________ in our storage memory
accurately, organized
Def: Semantic Network Model
A model for how concepts & properties are organized.
Node - category/concept
Links - relationships.
Specific concepts are shown in color.
Considered a hierarchical model due to the model having levels that are listed off by concepts.
More concepts that are specific are called canaries and salmons which are at the bottom and more general concepts are higher up on the model.
Canary mode:
Canary is just an example.
If you want to obtain info in your mind abt what a canary is, first you’d find that a canary is a bird and they sing. To get to more info abt them, you gotta move up a l ink to learn that a canary is a bird with wings, can fly, and that it has feathers.
If you move along up another level, you can find that a canary is an animal, with skin and can move.
Yes, you can just find out that a canary is a bird on the first level. However, Collins claimed that if you include that a canary can fly, that is true for all birds and it’s inefficient which would use up too much storage space.
This activation spreads to other nearby notes thru the links
Semantic Network Model was made by whom?
Collins & Quillian
