Cognition

Question 1

What is cognition?

Answer 1

the study of how our brains process and react to the incredible information overload presented to us by the world

Question 2

What are the four pillars of information processing model?

Answer 2

(1) Thinking requires sensation, encoding and storage of stimuli
(2) Stimuli must be analysed by the brain to be useful in decision making
(3) Decisions made in one situation can be extrapolated and adjusted to help solve new problems
(4) Problem solving is dependent not only on the person’s cognitive level, but also on the context and complexity of the problem

Question 3

What is Jean Piaget known for?

Answer 3

Stages of cognitive development - insisted that there are qualitative differences between the way that children and adults think

Question 4

What is a schema?

Answer 4

can include a concept, a behavior, or a sequence of events

Question 5

What is assimilation?

Answer 5

process of classifying new information into existing schemata

Question 6

What is accommodation?

Answer 6

process by which existing schemata are modified to encompass this new information

Question 7

What is the stages of Piaget’s Cognitive Development?

Answer 7

(1) Sensorimotor
(2) Preoperational
(3) Concrete operation
(4) Formal operational

Question 8

What is the sensorimotor stage?

Answer 8

Birth - 2 years of age
Child learns to manipulate his or her environment in order to meet physical needs; ends with the development of object permanence

Question 9

What are primary circular reactions?

Answer 9

the repetition of a body movement that originally occurred by change (ie. sucking thumb)

Question 10

What are secondary circular reactions?

Answer 10

manipulation is focused on something outside the body (ie repeatly throwing toys from a high chair)

Question 11

What is object permanence?

Answer 11

the understanding that objects continue to exist even when out of view

Question 12

What is representational thought?

Answer 12

the child begins to create mental representations of external objects and events

Question 13

What is the preoperational stages?

Answer 13

2 yrs - 7 yrs

Characterized by symbolic thinking, egocentricism and centration

Question 14

What is symbolic thinking?

Answer 14

the ability to pretend, play-make believe, and have an imagination

Question 15

What is egocentrism?

Answer 15

refers to the inability to image what another person may think or feel

Question 16

What is centration?

Answer 16

the tendency to focus on only one aspect of a phenomenon or inability to understand conservation

Question 17

What is the concrete operational stage?

Answer 17

7 yrs - 11 yrs

Can understand conservation and consider the perspective of others; engage in logical thought with concrete information

Question 18

What is the formal operational stage?

Answer 18

11 yrs - end of life
Marked by the ability to think logically about abstract ideas; ability to reason about abstract concept and problems solves

Question 19

What is Lev Vygotsky known for?

Answer 19

the engine driving cognitive development is the child’s internalization of his or her culture, including interpersonal and societal rules, symbols, and language.

Question 20

What is fluid intelligence and its peak age?

Answer 20

problem solving; early adulthood

Question 21

What is crystallized intelligence and its peak age?

Answer 21

knowledge; peaks middle adulthood

Question 22

What is delirium?

Answer 22

rapid fluctuation is cognitive function that is reversible and caused by medical (nonpsychological) causes

Question 23

What are the three steps in information processing model?

Answer 23

encoding, storage, and retrieval

Question 24

What is a mental set?

Answer 24

the tendency to approach similar problems in the same way

Question 25

What is functional fixedness?

Answer 25

the inability to consider how to use an object in a nontraditional manner

Question 26

What are four approaches to problem solvign?

Answer 26

trial-and-error
algorithms
deductive reasoning
inductive reasoning

Question 27

What is trail-and-error?

Answer 27

a less sophisticated type of problem solving in which solutions are tried until one is found that seems to work

Question 28

What is an algorithm?

Answer 28

a formula or procedure for solving a certain type of problem

Question 29

What is deductive reasoning?

Answer 29

aka “top down” - starts from a set of general rules and draws conclusions from the information given

Question 30

What is inductive reasoning?

Answer 30

aka “bottom up” - theory through generalizations; starts with specific instances and then draw conclusions

Question 31

What are heuristics?

Answer 31

simplified principles used to make decisions; “rule of thumb”

Question 32

What is the availability heuristic?

Answer 32

used when we try to decide how likely something is

Question 33

What is a representativeness heuristic?

Answer 33

involves categorizing items on the basis of whether they fit the prototypical, stereotypical, or representative image of the category

Question 34

What is the base rate fallacy?

Answer 34

using prototypical or stereotypical factors while ignoring actual numerical information

Question 35

What is the disconfirmation principle?

Answer 35

when a potential solution fails during testing and should be discarded

Question 36

What is confirmation bias?

Answer 36

the tendency to focus on information that fits an individual’s beliefs, while rejected information that goes against them

Question 37

What is belief perseverance?

Answer 37

the inability to reject a particular belief despite clear evidence to the contrary

Question 38

What is intuition?

Answer 38

the ability to act on perceptions that may not be supported by available evidence; aka “recognition-primed decision model”

Question 39

What is emotion?

Answer 39

the subjective experience of a person in a certain situation

Question 40

What is Gardner’s Theory of Multiple Intelligence?

Answer 40

Seven defined intelligences:

(1) Linguistic
(2) Logical-mathematical
(3) Musical
(4) Visual-spatial
(5) Bodily-kinesthetic
(6) Interpersonal
(7) Intrapersonal

Question 41

What is the IQ formula?

Answer 41

mental age/chronological age