COG PSYC- PROBLEM SOLVING

Question 1

what is problem solving

Answer 1

Mayer (1990) - cognitive processing directed at transforming a given situation into a goal situation when no obvious method of solution is available to the problem solver
It is the identification and selection of solutions to the problem
- involves cognitive processing
- involves directed or purposeful activity

Question 2

What cognitive processes are involved in problem solving?

Answer 2

Reasoning
Decision making
Judgement

Question 3

discuss Kundel et al (2007) explicit and implicit reasoning

Answer 3

Medical experts tend to engage in implicit reasoning while novices engage in explicit reasoning
- Explicit reasoning: slow, deliberate, associated with conscious awareness- analytic, rule based strategies
- Implicit reasoning: fast, automatic, not associated with conscious awareness holistic/ global, gist based

Question 4

What are well defined problems?

Answer 4

• all necessary information available at outset:
• initial state of problem
• goal state
• permissible moves
  operator restrictions
  e.g chess

Question 5

What are ill-defined problmes

Answer 5

• lack of clarity at the outset: you know the goal but doent know how to accomplish it.

Question 6

What are the two types of knowledge rich problems?

Answer 6

Knowledge-rich problems
- can only be solved by individuals possessing a considerable amount of specific knowledge
- most research on expertise involves these types of problems
Knowledge-lean problems
- doesnt require the possession of specific knowledge

Question 7

What is the Monty Hall Problem?

Answer 7

• demonstrates our fallibility as problem solvers
• 85% make wrong decision and stick- why?
  Burns & Weith (2004)
• Problem Representation assumption hosts choice random

Question 8

What is the behaviourist approach- Thorndike (1898)

Answer 8

focuses on the idea that all behaviors are learned through interaction with the environment.
Puzzle box- hungry cats in a cage with food outside
To escape: make an arbitrary response e.g tug loop
they initially ran round the cage, attacked bars, only slowly increased speed to escape
- trial and error learning
- followed by reproduction of previously learned responses

Question 9

What is the Gestalt Approach?

Answer 9

• Reproductive Thinking= applying existing strategy vs
• Productive thinking = destructing problem representation to come up with novel solution
  insight problems require problem to be seen in a novel way, different to how seen initially
  re-structure your initial problem representation to solve