cognitive approach

Question 1

What are internal mental processes?

Answer 1

Internal mental processes are operations of the mind such as perception and attention.
- Cognitive psychologists endeavour to work out what thought processes are occurring from the behaviour an experiment elicits.
- They apply the scientific method and have worked out some clever ways in which to examine thought.
- Although we are aware of our thought processes, there are often times when we are actually unaware of what thoughts led us to behave a certain way and so the experimental conditions used widely by cognitive psychologists are really important in understanding those situations.

Question 2

What is the role of schema?

Answer 2

packages of information developed through experience. They act as a mental framework of our beliefs and so influence cognitive processing and behaviours
- Schemas help us to fill in the gaps in the absence of full information about a person, event or thing, for example, if we go to a new restaurant or sit next to an older person on the bus.
- They may distort our interpretation of information and lead to perceptual errors. i.e. Stereotypes.

Question 3

Why are theoretical and computer models used?

Answer 3

• Theoretical models can be used to explain and make inferences about mental processes
• Cognitive psychology advocates the use of theoretical models as it supports a scientific approach to enquiry and testing
• By taking behaviour and considering the thought processes that happen to lead to that behaviour, cognitive psychologists will often describe the process in a series of distinct steps (you will see a number of these in the memory topic, such as the multi-store model of memory)

Question 4

what is the information processing model?

Answer 4

One of the core assumptions of cognitive psychology is that the mind functions like a computer.
The information-processing model is one way that cognitive psychologists apply the idea of computational models to the human mind and draws on the similarities between the two.
INPUT - from environment via senses and coded by the individual
PROCESSING - info once encoded is processes e.g. schemas
OUTPUT - behavioural response

Question 5

Whats the emergence of cognitive neuroscience?

Answer 5

= scientific study of brain structures on mental processes
1) Mapping areas of the brain to specific cognitive functions such as memory (e.g. phrenology heads)

2) Brain imaging techniques used e.g. fMRI and PET scans

3) Systematically observe and describe neurological basis of mental processes – useful in understanding mental disorders

4) Creating computer-generated models that are designed to ‘redrain and help ‘predict’ the future