cognition Flashcards
What were Neisser’s three beliefs about perception?
- visuals experiences mirror an external stimulus
- visual experiences starts and ends with the onset and offset of the external stimulus
- visual experiences are reflective of what we are seeing and true, passive copies of the outside world
what is a naive realist?
a person with a tendency to believe our perception of the world reflects exactly how the world is
key example of a naive realist?
Neizzer
Descartes view on perception
dualist
what we see is not exactly what we see
how can we be sure a chair is a chair
all we can be sure of is our capacity to think
what is a bottom-up approach towards perception?
information from stimulus then to different levels of processing until we decided what the process is. information goes from the bottom (stimulus) to higher processing.
what is the law of effect?
the effect of an outcome influences wether the behaviour is repated
e.g., good coneuqnce = repeated more
bad = not
low of exercise
the more a situtaion is followed by the same respnse the stronger the association bond and thus more/less behaviour will be repeated.
Constructivism
people construct their own understanding and knowledge of the world through their experiences and their reflections on those experiences.
watson
physcology is the study of behaviour and psychologists should only study what is obseravble. correlation between stimuli and response. Needs to be measurable.
latent learning
earning without reward. rats just being in a maze allowed them to find they, layout even though they hadn’t been rewarded fir anything
rats given food straight away at end of maze, three days after and 9 days after
reward reduced number of erros learned faster than if the reward was given on the 9th day
rat in t shape maze results
they would use the shortcut because they had understanding of the paths advantages and that it was quicker to gain their reward
rate maze with blocked off paths results
rat knew to go via a different route if a particular route was blocked off suggesting they had a cognitive map
skinner view on language
we make association between things to , learn language.
chomsky on language
doesnt argue for SR bonds
language isnt perfect
you are born to aquire language
language aquisition divice
we are predisposed to learn language
The modularity of mind hypothesis
input modules work on a different feature of that sense. ig input module working on the colour accept of seeing. this is passed onto central processors of thought interpretation. splitting up sensory info into different modules.
what did the gestalt psychologists believe ?
argued visual experiences aren’t copies of the outside world they are experiences of something else we group things together and reorder visual information.
gestalt argued this grouping happens automatically and doesnt require info of images
grouping by proximity?
grouping things close together
common fate
grouping things that are commonly grouped
gestalt 3 month infant study
infants fixated on things that werent already grouped
what is a top down approach
active and knwoeldge driven, experience and empirical
bruner experiment
patterns that are easier to recognise draw on our experiences of the world so we can describe them
epstein and rock
is the way we experience a stimulus influenced by how we’ve recently experienced that stimulus or by what we expect.
results of you and old woman study
most people see it as a an old woman suggesting recency drives perception
Minksys frame theory of perception - role of expectancy
Based on our knowledge of the world we actively generate expectations about what will occur next.
Such ideas are present in both theories of vision and audition.
bruner perceptual readiness theory
need and value determine our perceptions of the world.
bruner readiness study
To alter the size of a spot of light so that it matched a comparison disc.
The disc varied in size and nature.
Generally good estimates of size when the discs were neutral, but this changed dramatically when the discs were replaced with coins.
PP overestimated size of coin with its value. value of coin influenced perception. need has an influence, non rich chidlren had a greater over estimation of the size.
the minimum principle
“We perceive whatever object or scene would most simply or economically fit the sensory pattern”
the likelihood principle
“We perceive whatever object or scene would, under normal circumstances, most likely fit the sensory pattern”
the crude to fine distinction
global vs local prefernce
local information
the detail
global info
the information as a whole
global precedence effect
global info effects local info but not the other way around, we process this information a lot quicker.
iconic memory
the visual sensory memory register pertaining to the visual domain and a fast-decaying store of visual information
visual code
fast
low capacity
flexible decay
not maskable
visual info
name code
moderate capacity
negligible decay not maskable
auditory info
michael posner study
Present a pair of visual letters on a screen, immediately start a clock and wait for the participant to press a response key.
- Are these pairs physically identical
- Do the letters share the same name?
- Are they vowels/consonants?
are the pairs identical findings
took half a second
do the letters share the same name finding
more than half a second, better when they were a visual match
are they vowels or consonants finding
consonants was the slowest response - same responses are faster to vowels, since there is less of them
what are the two possibilities for the visual code?
is it mental pictures and images or is it language describing the features of the image? i.e. structural coding.
mental rotation expeirment
- showed people various orientations of the letter r
- they were able to identify that it was an r if quicker when it was closer to its original orietnation because they can mentally move it
- suggesting we have mental images
learning a map study - what they did
- learn map and draw from memory
- timed
- focus on named plcae on the map then name somwehere else on the map
findings of learning a map study
ook them longer to name things that were further away from the named area. scanning time was directly proportional to the distanced between landmarks on the map.
reed study and findings
- gave PP a shpae
- asked if other shapes were aprt of the main shape
- PP acknowledged some where
conclusion: we naturally divide images in to its constitute parts rather than having a mental copy of an image
palmer mental synthesis
quicker at tasks and questions with a ‘higher goodness’ split of an image. we seem to have a natural way of interpreting and dividing images in terms of their key features. Rather than viewing the image as a whole.
The law of exercise
the more a situtaion is followed by the same respnse the stronger the association bond and thus more/less behaviour will be repeated.
classical conditioning
association
operant
rienforcement
skinner pigeon study
pigeon study, pressing lever for food, them playing against each other in table tennis and being rewarded with food if they get it to the other side.
operant conditioning used to shape behaviour which means people are nothing more than machines.
what is constructivism ?
people construct their own understanding and knowledge of the world through their experiences and their reflections on those experiences.
what is an SR bond
stimulus - response bond
what is latent learning?
earning without reward. rats just being in a maze allowed them to find they, layout even though they hadn’t been rewarded fir anything
what is the rat, reward study on different days?
rats were given a reward every trial of trying to ifnd way tgrough a maze or they were given a reward from day three or day 7
find: takes longer without reward less dead ends enetered in the maze if given earlier
tolman rat study on t shaped maze
t shaped maze - with a diagnal cut through - rats went through cut because they knew it was shorteer to food
what is the cognitive map?
- is a cognitive construct,
- is an abstract (mental) entity that is not directly observable or measurable,
- does have explanatory power.
With his cognitive construct, testable predications can be made.
emergence of cognitive psychology
- miller - magic number 7+- 2
- newell and simon —> general proboem solver to work out what goes on when we process information
- broadbent, information processing thery. how does info flow between different info processes
- flow diagrams of perceptual, memory
- neisser - first text book on cognitive psych in 1967
info process theory
input —> the mind (storage and processing) —> output
explain the early stages of visual information processing regarding letters
display –> iconic memory –> fast processing to the visual code –> slow processing to the name code
what is iconic memory?
- high capacity
- fast decay
- maskable
- visual info
visual code
- low capacity
- flexible decay
- visual info
- not mask
name code
- medium capacity
- negligable decay
- not mask
- audio
michael posner reaction time study procedure?
Present a pair of visual letters on a screen, immediately start a clock and wait for the participant to press a response key.
- Are these pairs physically identical
- Do the letters share the same name?
- Are they vowels/consonants?
michael posner findings
or the first test they found it took about half a second to say whether they were identical or not
for the second test the reaction times are more than half a second. not just name but a visual match - respond faster when they are the same.
for the third test consonants was the slowest response - same responses are faster to vowels
physical aspects —> name/identity —> semantic categorical information.
what is the debate around visual coding?
is it mental pictures and images or is it languages describing the features of the image
R study arguing visual code is mental pictures
showed picture of R in different orientations and had to state wether normal or backwards
how long you would have to physcially move it correlated to how long you mentally move and give answer - suggesting images
analogical represebtation evidence for visual code being imagery
- PP had to learn a map and draw from memory
- this was timed
- they were told to imagine a plce on the map then name somwehre else on the map
- took them longer to name places that were far away from the origin
- suggesting we use imagery
mapping task without scanning
- did mental scanning task
- then Pp told to image a location on map that was signalled by a light then you have to press a kay when light reaches new location
- they now had been given two locations
- they had tp describe the direct of the second from the first e.g., east
- found the same as first condition
reed shape study
- gave people a basline shape then asked them if other shapes fitted into the baseline shape
- concluded, we divide images into constitute parts rather than having a mental copy of an image
palmers mental synthesis study?
- PP given a figure and divided images had to say if they fitted into the figure
- quiker when the division was with a ‘higher goodness’
- meaning there is a natural way we divide images in terms of their key feautres
structural descriptions
fit comfortably with the notion of interpreting ambiguous figures
have been used to explain why only one interpretation of an ambiguous figure is seen at once
code key features and important structural relations between those features
what were thorndikes two laws of explaining
1) law of effect
2) law of exercise
law of effect
any behaviour that is followed by pleasant consequences, in a particular situation will most likely be repeated I that situation, any behaviour that is followed by unpleasant consequences in a particular situation will most likely not be repeated.
Bowers paired associate (PA) imagery task
- give PP a list of pairings they must learn
- the first word in the pair is S and the second is R
- study for ten seconds
- in the test phase the s words were mixed with a list of random words
- the Pp had to state how confident thehy were that the word was in original list
- then if they were confident state what word they believed to be paired with it
what were the three groups in bowers study
Interactive imagery – imagine each word’s referent interacting with one another in a vivid way in an integrative scene,
Separation imagery – imagine each word’s referent next to each other side by side,
Rote repetition – overt repetition of word pair whilst the pair is presented.
what were bowers findings?
- recall was best for interactive imagery group
- recall was worst for seperation imager group
- recognition was not effected for the stimulus words (first word) this means s words were equally well coded
mandler and pearlstones study into the importance of organisation in memory
Two groups of subjects (just consider word learning conditions)
1) Free sorting
2) Constrained sorting
free sorting group organised 52 words into their own groups
in constrained group they had to match the grouping of their free sorting college
findings of organisation study
- constraied took many more trials
- but both groups recall same number of words at the end
- ## so repetition did not produce a memory benefit
Craik and tulving unanounced memory task
pp given a question
‘ is this word an animal?’
CAMEL
yes/no
they were given case, rhyme and category questions
reults of tukving unanauced memory test
categories best answered
then rhyme then case
when told to remeber war of the gosts story what happened over time?
The general form of a subject’s first reproduction is preserved throughout the repeated reproductions.
There is a strong tendency to rationalise unconnected or disturbing elements for example make the young man sleep through and unexplained interval or changing the “something black” to “foamed at the mouth”.
Certain dominant details serve as anchor points for organising recall and these may become embellished.
Various preconceptions are worked into the reproduction.
The reproductions became shorter and more coherent – No trace of a supernatural element is left; we have a perfectly straightforward story of a fight and a death.
what was Kays study - adaptation of ghost study?
Repeat Bartlett’s approach but …
Read two passages out loud to subjects twice after 5 mins reproduce both passages.
Now read out passages again and leave it at that.
One week later – reproduce both passages.
Now read out passages again and leave it at that.
Do this six times with at least a week between tests.
Now much more careful textual analyses carried out on subjects reproductions.
kay findings
- 60-70% of content reproduced
- words not close
- repetition didnt help
spitzer - importance of testin gfor learning
Tested 3605 sixth grade students (11-12 year olds) studied 600 words from articles similar in nature to material that they learnt about in school.
Then given 25 MCQs
findings
- longer first test delayed the worse perfomance on the test is
- tests had similar scores
- sooner test - better
- feedback fast has positive effect
what is critical for memory in reodiger study ?
repeated testing of memory
reodiger important findings
- no difference accros groups in terms of learning rate or final perfoemnace
- difference rose when, test was done a week later
- testing improved LTM
when PP had to learn a 4oo word passge roediger found …
Taking an initial test (even without feedback) tripled final recall relative to the study only group. With immediate feedback for each question, test performance increased another 10%.
Best performance was observed in the condition where the feedback was presented at the end of the test itself.
what do reoudiger findings allow them to conclude?
- retrieval processes that are activated during test are responsible for improving learning
- elaborative encoding, deepful encoding and different routes can account for effect
what is rote learning?
the process of memorizing information based on repetition
what is a molecular achievement?
smaller parts
molar achievement?
whole thing
what is cognition?
All aspects of knowing
eg. sensation, learning, remembering, perception, reasoning, decision making …
who said tabula rasa
blank slate
william james
who came jp with associtionism
william james
what is continguity
Co-ocurrence of things in space and time
what is learning on the basis of frequency
How often things occur together
what do the continuity and frequency associtions allow us to do?
predict and control behaviour
who was tolman
emphasis on molar achievments rather than molecular
goal directed behaviour
explaining animal behaviour in terms of mental states and processes
competence vs perfomance
‘competence’ as an idealized capacity that is located as a psychological or mental property or function and ‘performance’ as the production of actual utterances.
what is passive perception?
stimulus response
who came up with modularity of mind hypothesis?
fodor
what is modulrity of mind hypothesis?
- parts of mind are made up of different sub units
- sesnory info is made up of touch etc
- this inputs into cognition - central processors
what was bruner and postman card study?
- cards were briefly presented
- ## nomal cards were remembered more than incongrous (incompatible)
frame theory of perception
Based on our knowledge of the world we actively generate expectations about what will occur next.
Such ideas are present in both theories of vision and audition.
what is analysis by synthess
A recognition process in which hypotheses are formulated and compared with input data and what you think will happen then compare what actually occurs and see if there is a match
do we percieve what is most simple or most likely?
minimum = what simply fits
liklihood- what is most likley to fit the patter
why do you get global-local interefence?
bc we process global info faster at some pojnt we have more global than local therefore it interes with the local
example of active processsing ?
processing info - making a hypothesis - going back to the info - processing more
what is “The pandemonium model”?
idea that there are demons in the brain (analogous to neurons) that process different features of vision of letters, i.e curve of an r the stick.
demons are selective to different features.
