COGNITION FINAL EXAM

Question 1

Describe the influence and accomplishments of Donders.

ch.1

Answer 1

Donders was one of the founders of cognitive psychology.
In 1868 he conducted a study focused on the reaction times of simple and choice tasks in order to measure how long it took to make a decision

• simple RT task: participant would indicate whether they saw a light or not appear on the screen
• choice RT task: participant would indicate whether they saw a light or not appear on the right or left side of the screen. (choice RT was 1/10th longer than simple RT)
• Concluded that [choice RT- simple RT] = time to make a decision

mental responsese CANNOT be measured directly, but can be INFERRED from participants behavior

Question 2

Describe the influence and accomplishments of Helmholtz

ch.1

Answer 2

Helmholtz (~1860s) is also another founder of cogntive psychology.
Spoke about unconscious inference:
which claims that some of our perceptions are the result of assumptions we make about our enviornment
- a lot of what we think we know about the world is inferred

Question 3

Describe the influence and accomplishments of Ebbinghaus

ch.1

Answer 3

Ebbinghaus (1885) is another founder of cognitive psych.
He discovered that by using short intervals which required fewer repetitions to relearn, he could learn a list of nonsense syllables
- savings = = [(initial repetitions) – (relearning repetitions)]/ (initial repetitions)

Question 4

Describe the influence and accomplishments of Wundt

ch.1

Answer 4

Wundt (1879) is another one of the founder of cognitive psych.
He created the first psych lab in Germany, where he conducted many RT experiments.
Created structuralism: experience is determined by sensations.

Question 5

What was the paradigm shift from behaviorism to cognition in the 1950s. List major events

ch.1

Answer 5

In the 1950’s the cognitive revolution began in 1954.
Switching from behaviorism to cognition.
- done by measuring observable behavior and making inferences about underlying cognitive activity

Major events:
- 1954: birthday of cognitive revolution because the first commerically available digital computer
- 1957: Skinner published Verbal Behavior
- 1959: Chomsky published a review of Skinner’s “Verbal Behavior”
- 1961: Breland published “The Misbehavior of organisms”

• *add iin all important info about the papers published

Question 6

Describe the behavioral approach to studying the mind.

ch.1

Answer 6

Behavioral approach to studying the mind was taking note of observable behavior and a participants response or actions to stimuli

Shepard and Metzler (1971) conducted a spatial experiment, by having participants rotate objects in their mind. Discovered that the greater the angle of seperation, the longer it took to mentally rotate object (longer RT)

Subtraction technique: it measured the amount of time it takes for someone to mentally process something while completing a task.

Question 7

Describe Shepard & Metzler’s “Mental Rotation” experiement.

ch.1

Answer 7

Created by Shepard and Metzler (1971): conducted a study where participants rotated an image of an object in their mind to compare whether it was similar or different from another object.
- Discovered that participants took longer to compare two objects separated by a larger angle than a smaller angle.

Question 8

Describe Davachi’s study of remembered vs. forgotten words

ch.1

Answer 8

Davachi’s study explored the physiological approach to studying the mind.
He measured brain activation while participants were asked to create 20 images of 200 words inside FMRI
Discovered that when the participants were asked to remember the words, FMRI showed that their peririhinal cortex was activated.
- peririhinal cortex is heavily involved in memory.

Question 9

List the major functions of the four lobes.

ch.2

Answer 9

Frontal lobe: involved with executive control of behavior
- ○ Planning, inhibition, motor control, cognition, memory, language, personality, emotion
*frontal and parietal lobe are separated by the central sulcus

Temporal lobe: memory, hearing, language, higher visual function

Parietal lobe: spatial representation.
Vision, touch, control of attention

Occipital lobe: vision

Question 10

be able to label a figure showing the lateral surface of the brain.

ch.2

Answer 10

label: all four lobes, central sulcus, lateral fissure

Question 11

What is the basic structure of the neuron. What are the three basic types?

ch.2

Answer 11

Neuron are made up of dendrites, axons and cell bodies.
- Dendrites receive information
○ The more the are the more info
Cell body integrates information, and potentially releases an action potential through the axon

- 3 types:
	○ Sensory (afferent) neuron: carries info to CNS
	○ Interneuron: receive from a neuron and send info to a neuron (most common)
	Motor (efferent) neuron: sends info from CNS to muscles

Question 12

What the processes of sensory transduction?

Ch.2

Answer 12

Sensory transduction: receptors trasnforming energy from enviornment into electrical energy.

Process:
1) sensory receptor detects stimulus from enviornment
2) information from stimlus travels through nerve fiber to synapse of a neuron in CNS
3) then an action potential is potentially released if threshold is reached.

Question 13

what is an action potential?

Answer 13

An action potential: a brief reversal of electrical charge that travels rapidly down the axon (electrical signal) when there’s rapid changes in membrane potential.
- Requires excitatory information (graded potentials), inhibitory information doesn’t allow AP to fire
- ALL OR NOTHING
- Resting membrane potential: -70mV
- Threshold: -50 mV
- Depolarizes: +30mV
- Hyperpolarizes: -90mV
Repolarizes: -70mV

Question 14

Describe the synapse and its involvement in neurotransmission. What are the steps of neurotransmission?
| ch.2

Answer 14

the synpase is the gap of space between dendrites of pre and post synaptic neurons.
the synapse allows for information to travel through in the form of neurotransmitters.
Information is only passed across the synpase if membrane potential reaches threshold (-50v)

- 4 steps 
	○ Synthesis: creation of neurotransmitters 
	○ Storage: vesicles contain NTs and reach the axon terminal 
	○ Release: vesicles bind to the membrane and are released into synaptic cleft (exocytosis) 
	○ Receptor action: NT crosses cleft and binds to a receptor on the post-synaptic neuron 
	○ Inactivation: NT can be inactivated by reuptake (SSRI's) or enzymatic degradation Reuptake: neuron that released NT, absorbs the NT back into the axon terminal for storage and reuse

Question 15

be able to label synapse figure

ch.2

Answer 15

Be able to label
- synaptic vesicle
Storage granule
Neurotransmitter
Post synaptic receptors
Post synaptic membrane
Pre synaptic membrane
Synaptic cleft

Question 16

What are the parts of the nervous system?

ch.2

Answer 16

There is the peripheral and central NS.

Peripheral is composed of autonomic (controls of self regulated action)
and somatic (controls voluntary movments of skeletal muscles).

• Autonomic is composed of sympathetic (arousing) and parasympathetic (calming)

Question 17

what are the 8 major principles of functional brain organization?

ch.2

Answer 17

Principle 1: In -> integrate -> out
Principle 2: Sensory and Motor Divisions exist throughout the NS
- Principle 3: brain’s circuits are crossed
- Principle 4: Brain is both symmetrical (both hemispheres) and asymmetrical (one hemisphere)
- Principle 5: NS works through excitation and inhibition
- Principle 6: CNS has multiple levels of function
- Principle 7: Brain Systems are organized both Hierarchically (different levels of function) and in parallel (all areas run at the same time)
- Principle 8: functions in the brain are both localized & distributed

Question 18

How is information represented within a single neuron? Between neurons?

Answer 18

Information within a neuron is represented electrically (action potential)
Information between neurons is represented chemically (neurotransmitters)

Question 19

Why is detecting edges fundamental for object recognition?

ch.3

Answer 19

important because objects need to be distinguished from surroundings and each other. Edges help provide spatial structure.

Question 20

compare algorithms vs heuristics

ch.3

Answer 20

• Algorithm: guaranteed to solve a problem
  ○ used by computers and are slow, always accurate - not constructive
  ○ Disadvantages
  § Don’t know how to differentiate what is important in the image or not to then define with edges (think of the elephant picture)
  § Object recognition isn’t great
  § I can’t determine the main thing in the image
  
  • Heuristic: “rule of thumb”
    Fast, usually right-but error prone, used by people - constructive

Question 21

why do computers sometimes have difficulty recognizing objects?

ch.3

Answer 21

computers can be programmed to detect edges, however they are not able to distinguish changes that are due to properties or different parts of the scene.

Question 22

What is the template theory of object recogniton? What is the major problem with this theory?

ch.3

Answer 22

having a specific template for each potential object.
However there are too many objects.

Question 23

What’s the “recogntion by components” theory of object recogniton?

ch.3

Answer 23

all objects can be made up of similar 3D forms called geons.
*simple, efficient theory

Question 24

What is the “feature integration model” of object recognition?

ch.3

Answer 24

Invented by Treisman (1986). Claims that there are two stages to object recogntion:
- preattentive stage: immediately extracts and processes sensory information (primitives).
- focused attention stage: requires conscious effort, examining each element.

Question 25

what is the computational approach to object recogniton?

Answer 25

Three stages to the approach: - The primal sketch: computing differences in reflected light between objects/background - the 2.5D sketch: based on primal sketch, computation of orientations, depth, and structures relative to the viewer. - The 3D model representation: 3D perspective is indpendent of viewing perspective. Associated with how objects relate to each other. "Old view"- structuralism (involves adding up sensations) "new view" - mind group patterns according ot law of perceptual organization.

Question 26

What is the law of Pragnanz and its importance? | ch.3

Answer 26

law is that we automatically percieve the simplest, most stable figure out of all the alternatives.

Question 27

what happens when trick the brian into applying the law of pragnanz inappropriately? | ch.3

Answer 27

we usually see optical illlusions.

Question 28

what is the area of the brain involved with facial perception and recogntion? What happens if this area is destroyed? | ch.3

Answer 28

inferotemporal cortex, espeically on the right (fusiform face area). when there's damage to this area, agnosia or prosopagnosia. - agnosia: failure to recognize an object/class of objects due to brain damage. - prosopagnosia: inbility to recgnize fases.

Question 29

compare the "what" and "where/how" pathways. | ch.3

Answer 29

- Ventral pathway (what): from occipital lobe to the temporal lobe - involved with object identification ○ If damaged, may result in visual agnosia (you can see your keys but your brain won't actually know that they are your keys) Dorsal pathway (where): from occipital lobe to parietal lobe and is involved with object location and visually guided movements

Question 30

what is meant by limited capacity in relation to attention? | ch.4

Answer 30

limited capacity parallel process: this refers to the idea that our brains can process multiple streams of information simultaneously, but our ability is restricted because of limited capacity (dependent on perceptual load) This can result in change blindess

Question 31

compare and contrast "early selection" and "late selection" theories of selective attention. | ch.4

Answer 31

it is whether or not relevant information gets processed for meaning.

Question 32

What is Lavie's "hybrid" model of selective attention. Why is perceptual load important for this theory? What neuroimaging evidence supports her theory? | ch.4

Answer 32

- Lavie's Hybrid Model (1995) ○ If difficulty task is hard, irrelevant information is not analyzed for meaning (early selection) § High perceptual load § Task-irrelevant information cannot be processed. § From Lavie's experiments, she found that people are always slower in the hard tasks § The incompatible distractor doesn't affect the response time as all resources are devoted tot the task. ○ If difficulty of task is easy, irrelevant information is analyzed for meaning (late selection) § Low perceptual load § Leftover resources are in charge of processing task-irrelevant information automatically. The incompatible distractor slows down the response due to response competition

Question 33

Describe innatentional/change blindness | ch.4

Answer 33

change blindess: the failure to notice something change in an object or scene

Question 34

What is contralateral neglect? List symptoms, what and what areas when damaged lead to phenomenon. | ch.4

Answer 34

damage on the right parietal lobe will cause contralateral neglect: ○ Contralateral neglect is when a person ignores the left half of space in all modalities. § Not a sensory problem § Symptoms include: □ Bumping into objects on the opposite side of lesion □ Failure to groom on opposite side of lesion □ Failure to eat food on opposite side of lesion *occasionally, individual might believe that the neglected side of body is someone else's (limb denial)

Question 35

Compare and contrast automatic vs controlled processing | ch.4

Answer 35

automatic processing: unconsious, can't be shut off and does not interfere with the processing of other information controlled processing: conscious, must make the decision to do it, requires effort.

Question 36

what are results from Poser's (1980) experiment? | ch.4

Answer 36

conducted a simple probe detection experiment.

Question 37

Describe Atkinson and Shiffrin's (1968) modal model of memory | ch.5

Answer 37

claimed that there are 3 different types of memory: sensory - the initial stage that holds all incoming info for seconds or fractions of a second short-term - holds 5-7 items for about 15 to 20 seconds. This is where rehearsal is used as a control process. long-term - can hold a large amount of information Also claimed that control processes: are active processes that can be controlled by the person. Such as rehearsal, strategies used to make a stimulus more memorable and strategies of attention Also claimed that components of memory do not act in isolation.

Question 38

Describe sensory memory. What is the capapcity and duration of iconic memory? Include study of iconic sensory memory (sperling,1960) | ch.5

Answer 38

Sensory memory: retention of information for brief periods of time from sensory stimulation. (information decays very quickly) Sensory memory is short-lived and registers all of most information that hits our receptors. - iconic memory = visual - echoic memory = auditory So overall, sensory memory hold a large amount of information for a short period of time. It collects info, then holds info for initial processing which then allows us to fill in the blanks. Sperling study (1960) - participants were flashed quickly an array of letters on a screen and were then asked to report as many as possible. - Involved the same stimulus set as the whole report method, but different response set - estimated capacity is 9-10 items, lasting a second or fraction of second -whole report: asked to report as many letters could be seen: reported 4.5/12 letters immediate partial report: participants heard tone which told them which row of letters to report: reported 3.3/4 letters delayed partial report: presentation of tone was delayed for fraction of a sec after letters were extinguished: reported 4.5/12 letters. *both partial reports involved a smaller response set.

Question 39

How does the report method influence what participants report? | ch.5

Question 40

Describe short-term memory; including duration and capacity | ch.5

Answer 40

short-term memory: the intermediate stage between sensory memory and long-term memory. It is limited in both duration and capacity. Duration: information lasts about 15-20 sec or less without rehearsal. Miller's Magic #: short-term memory only holds about 7 +/- 2 items

Question 41

how can chunking improve the capacity of short-term memory? | ch.5

Answer 41

chunking improves short term memory because it organizes multiple pieces of information into larger manageable chunks. This allows us to find patterns and connections making it easier for us to remember and recall the information.

Question 42

what is working memory and its major components? | ch.5

Answer 42

Working memory is a limiited capacity system for temporary storage and manipulation of info when learning, reasoning . It consists of multiple parts. *it is concerned with the manipulation of information occuring during complex cognition

Question 43

What is the evidence supporting the existence of the phonological loop | ch.5

Answer 43

phonological loop is associated with verbal and auditory information. Evidence: -phonological similarity effect: letters or words that sound similar are confused -word-length effect: memory for lists of words are better for short words than long words. this is because it takes longer to rehearse long words and produce them during recall. -articulatory suppression: prevents one from rehearsing items to be remembered. It reduces memory span, eliminates word-length effect and reduces phonological similarity for reading words.

Question 44

What evidence supports the existence of the visuospatial sketchpad (brooks 1968) | ch.5

Answer 44

Brooks (1968) PART 1 had participants memorize a sentence and then consider each word (mentally) and respond to 2 questions - found that pointing was easier than speaking. pointing involved the visuospatial sketchpad and phonological loop. - speaking involved two verbal tasks which overloaded the phonological loop. PART 2: had participants visualize an uppercase "F" and mentally trace it. As they traced it, they'd point to "Y" for outside corner and "N" for insid corner. OR had them to do the same task but verablly respond yes or no. Conclusion of both parts of the study: the central executive controls operation of both the phonoligical loop and the visuospaital sketchpad. It also controls the suppression of irrelevant information

Question 45

Describe the function of the central executive | ch.5

Answer 45

the central executive has the ability to suppress irrelevant information that results in better memory capability for relevant information

Question 46

Describe Gazzely's (2005) experiment on the suppression of irrelevant information. | ch.5

Answer 46

had participants in face relevance task remember faces and ignore scenes. participants in passive task were told to look at the face AND scenes using fMRI, they found that - good suppressors had less brain activity when ignoring scenes - poor suppressors had greater brain activity when ignoring scenes

Question 47

what's the episodic buffer? | ch.5

Answer 47

episodic buffer is backup storage that communicates with long-term memory and working memory components. it holds information for longer and has greater capacity than the phonological loop or visuospatial sketchpad.

Question 48

What is meant by "long-term" memory? How does it relate to short-term (working memory)? How is it different from long-term memory? | ch.6/7

Answer 48

Long-term memory: - Declarative (conscious) ○ Episodic: involves mental time travel, but there's no guarantee of accuracy ○ Semantic : doesn't involve mental time travel, involves general knowledge ○ Episodic and semantic show a double dissociation § DD: means processes likely involve different mechanisms - Implicit (not conscious) ○ Repetition ○ Procedural - 3 stages: encoding, storage & retrieval ○ Encoding § Automatic - occufs without effort or awareness. Finds difficult to shit off □ Itsn' t doesn't interfere with the process of other infomration § Effortful □ Related to rehearsal: conscious repition □ May because automatic with tim Coding is how information is represented

Question 49

What are the serial postion effects | ch.6/7

Answer 49

primacy effect: recency effect: von restorff effect: | ch.6/7

Question 50

Distinguish the various types of long-term memory. | ch.6/7

Answer 50

- Declarative (conscious) ○ Episodic: involves mental time travel, but there's no guarantee of accuracy ○ Semantic : doesn't involve mental time travel, involves general knowledge ○ Episodic and semantic show a double dissociation § DD: means processes likely involve different mechanisms

Question 51

What is Korsakoff's syndrome? | ch.6/7

Answer 51

korsakoff's syndrome: when the mammilary bodies are degraded, therefore interrupting hipocampal neural circuits, which affects our memory. causes: (insert answer here)

Question 52

What was Warrington (1968) study? What are the implications of their findings? | ch.6/7

Answer 52

In this study they found that regardless of patients with this syndrome, they were still able to acquire new skills and find improvement of that skill even though they were unable to remember ever learning that skill. This shows that our declarative memory works seperatley from our non-declarative (procedural)/ implicit memory.

Question 53

what is procedural memory? | ch.6/7

Answer 53

examples:

Question 54

what is encoding? What are the 2 types of rehearsal? | ch.6/7

Question 55

What is the levels-of-processing theory? | ch.6/7

Question 56

what is long-term potentiation? (LTP) | ch.6/7

Question 57

Describe the neural circuitry underlying explicit, procedural and emotional memory | ch.6/7

Question 58

What are the four major reasons we forget information? | ch.6/7

Answer 58

1) issues with encoding 2) retrieval failure 3) decay: long periods of time without recalling information 4) (insert answer)

Question 59

Compare prospective vs.autobiographical memory | ch.8

Question 60

What are the findings of Cabeza (2004) study? Implications on autobiographical memory? | ch.8

Question 61

what is the reminscence bump? Describe possible explanations. | ch.8

Question 62

What are "flashbulb" memories? How do they differ from everyday memories? What is the relationship between memory vividness and/confidence and memory accuracy? | ch.8

Answer 62

Flashbulb memories have significance and a strong emotional attachment. Everyday memories are mundane and not significant, just the day-to-day. Due to the big emotional trigger from the memory, it is so vivid in people's heads. Because its so vivid peopple have more confidence in the memory and its accuracy. However flashbulb memories, proven by studies lack detail and accuracy.

Question 63

What is source monitoring? Describe evience related source monitoring errors. | ch.8

Answer 63

Evidence:

Question 64

What evidence suggests that memory is constructive? | ch.8

Question 65

How can misinformation lead to memory errors? | ch.8

Answer 65

evidence: -loftus & palmer (1974) - lindsey (1990)

Question 66

What are the four major causes of errors in eyewitness testimony?

Question 67

What is the prototype approach to categorization? | ch.9

Question 68

What is prototypicality? What are typicallity effects?

Answer 68

typicality effects: sentence verifcation results, priming

Question 69

What is the examplar approach to categorization? | ch.9

Question 70

What conditions prompt us to use the prototype approach? Examplar approach? | ch.9

Question 71

What are the major properties of semantic networks? | ch.9

Question 72

What evidence supports the semanitc network theory of categorical organization? | ch.9

Question 73

What is the connectionist approach to categorization? How does learning take place in such networks? | ch.09

Question 74

what are the advantages of the connectionist approach? | ch/9

Question 75

Describe Shepard & Metzler's (1971) study and Kosslyn (1973 &1978) study. What fundamental conclusion regarding visual imagery can be deduced from them? | ch.10

Question 76

Describe how Kosslyn(1978) and Farah (1985) support the spatial representation model of visual imagery | ch.10

Answer 76

relative image size priming

Question 77

What are category specific neurons? What can these cells tell us about the mechanisms of visual imagery? | ch.10

Question 78

What fMRI and TMS evidence suggests that visual perception and imagery are largely involved in overlapping mechanisms? | ch.10

Question 79

What makes language universal? | ch.11

Answer 79

language is universal and hard-wired, meaning that is gentically used to... Language is universal because all languages have: - rules - nouns & verbs - questions - ability to use it to talk about past, present & future - flexibility to create an unlimited amount of words

Question 80

what is the behavioral position vs nativist positon (skinner vs chomsky) | ch.11

Answer 80

B.F Skinner claimed the behavioral position which stated that language is learned through reinforcement Chomsky claimed the nativist position, which stated that language is gentically coded

Question 81

Describe the lexical decision task. How does word frequency affect RT in this task? | ch.11

Answer 81

lexical decision task: having somone read a list of words and have them identify which are real or non-real words. high frequency words: words we see or hear all the time low frequency words: words we don't see or hear all the time frequency of a word affects reaction time because low frequency words cause someone to fixate longer on the word, because their brain takes longer to identify the meaning of the word. Which means that there's an increase in RT.

Question 82

What is syntax and semantics? What effects do syntactic and semantic violation produce in the brain? | ch.11

Answer 82

syntax: grammer semantics: meaning of a word syntactic violation- creates p600 semantic violation - creates larger N400

Question 83

Describe the syntax-first (a.k.a. “garden path” model) and the interactionist approach to sentence parsing. What evidence supports each model? | ch.11

Question 84

what is the situation model of understanding stories. What evidence supports this model? | ch.11

Question 85

What are the brain areas involved with the production and comprehension of spoken language? location? effects if damaged? | ch.11

Question 86

What is meant by reasoning? | ch.13

Question 87

what is deductive reasoning? | ch.13

Question 88

What are valid and invalid conclusions? Does validity = truth? Why? | ch.13

Question 89

Describe the Wason selection task. How do people typically perform on it? | ch.13

Question 90

What role do concreteness and permissions play in terms of people’s accuracy on the Wason selection task? | ch.13

Question 91

What are the major differences between inductive and deductive reasoning? | ch.13

Question 92

what are representativeness and availability heuristics? including how they can lead to errors in reasoning.

Question 93

what is the base rate problem? | ch.13

Question 94

explain how Lavie's "hybrid" theory of attentional selection can resolve the debate between early and late selection. | ch.4

Answer 94

The theory suggests that high-perceptual load is related to early selection and low-perceptual load is related to late selection. This manner of thinking can explain why different perceptual loads will affect when our brain is able to filter out irrelevant information from the enviornment.

Question 95

What is back-propogation?

Answer 95

include information about weights

Question 96

what is the neurophysiological and neuropsychological evidence for the relationship between visual imagery and perception in relation to similar brain mechanisms?

Question 98

what are two phenomena discussed in class showing that humans are NOT rational? Not good at estimating probability?

Answer 98

Not rational: - deciding whether to go on a trip or not depending on an exam score. People need justification to either celebrate or wallow to go. - getting a vaccine when there's a small % chance that you might catch the infection if you do get the vaccine. So people end up not getting the vaccine, however the rational thing to do is to get it. Not good at estimating probability: (insert answer)