Cognitive Psych

Question 1

cognitive psych

Answer 1

• branch of psych studying the differences in how people think
• ex. when asked to describe their dog, why does one person talk about its physical attributes while another talks about its behaviours?

Question 2

cognition (and its 2 subtypes)

Answer 2

• cognition: awareness, thinking, and specific mental acts like anticipating, judging, believing, etc.
• personalizing cognition: recalling a similar event in your own life (ex. this reminds me of when I broke my arm)
• objectifying cognition: recalling factual information (ex. broken arms can take up to 10 weeks to heal)

Question 3

information processing

Answer 3

• transformation of sensory input into mental representations
• mental manipulation of those representations

Question 4

3 levels of cognition

Answer 4

• perception: ordering info our sense organs take in
• interpretation: making sense of/explaining events in the world
• conscious goals: standards that people develop for evaluating themselves and others

Question 5

Rod and Frame Test (RFT) and Embedded Figures Test (EFT)

Answer 5

• determine cues people use for judging orientation in space

- designate people as either field dependent or field independent

Question 6

Field Dependent vs. Field Independent (in RFT/EFT, career, social life, etc.)

Answer 6

• Field dependent:
• • person uses cues from visual field in RFT
• • struggle to find hidden figures in EFT
• • tend to pursue careers in social sciences/education
• • more social
• • better at processing info in chunks and seeing connections between categories
• Field independent:
• • person uses their own bodily sensations in RFT
• • quickly spots hidden figures in EFT
• • tend to pursue careers in science/engineering
• • less social
• • better at ignoring distractors and focusing on details, noticing and decoding facial expressions and patterns, learning a second language, and learn better through media

Question 7

Petrie’s research on pain tolerance

Answer 7

• reducer/augmenter theory: people with high pain tolerance have nervous systems that reduce pain, whereas people with low pain tolerance have nervous systems that amplify pain
• reducers motivated to seek more stimulation (consume more coffee, smoke more, lower tolerance for boredom, listen to louder music, take more drugs, and are more delinquint than augmenters)

Question 8

personal constructs

Answer 8

• constructs people often use to interpret, understand, or predict events
• lead to unique interpretations of the social world
• ex. what someone notices about a person the first time they meet them; a construct of “good” vs. “bad” marriage

Question 9

locus of control

Answer 9

• a person’s perception of responsibility for events in their life
• external locus of control: generalized expectancy that events are out of one’s control
• internal locus of control: generalized expectancy that events are in your control; you are responsible for them (condusive to well-being; have more positive outcomes -> less obesity, finish degrees faster, better credit scores, take charge more, etc.)

Question 10

generalized expectancies

Answer 10

• the notion that a person’s expectations persist across a variety of situations
• when people encounter a new situation, they rely on their generalized expectancies to predict whether they’ll be able to influence events
• ex. someone with external locus of control who is just starting university would likely believe their grades are due to fate and that they can’t influence them

Question 11

specific expectancies

Answer 11

• emphasize locus of control in specific areas of life

- ex. one might have an internal locus of control in academics, but an external locus of control in health

Question 12

learned helplessness

Answer 12

• accepting an unpleasant fate; not trying to remove yourself from the situation
• ex. dogs that got shocked stopped trying to escape; study participants who generalized learned helpnessness from doing math problems with unpleasant noise to doing new math problems later on did worse

Question 13

fundamental postulate

Answer 13

• a person’s processes are psychologically channelized by the ways they interpret events
• ex. if 2 people have similar contruct systems, they’ll be more psychologically similar

Question 14

transgenerational trauma

Answer 14

• trauma felt by past generations have effects that are still visible today
• due to passing of learned behaviour patterns between generations
• 2 outcomes: learned helpnessness and less internal locus of control
• ex. Indigenous peoples of Canada -> effects of trauma from colonialism, genocide etc. still seen today (higher poverty, unemployment, substance abuse, depression, suicide, etc.)

Question 15

personal project

Answer 15

• set of relevant actions intended to achieve a goal
• provide insight into how people navigate life and their personality
• ex. losing weight, writing grad school applications, etc.
• connection between PP’s and Big 5: neurotic people more likely to rate PP’s as stressfull, difficult, outside of control, and likely to fail
• happiness is related to feeling in control of PP’s and feeling like you can succeed

Question 16

cognitive social learning approach

Answer 16

emphasizes the cognitive and social processes by which people learn to value and strive for certain goals over others

Question 17

self-efficacy

Answer 17

• Bandura
• notion that one can execute a certain course of action to achieve a goal
• • ex. a child who beliefs they could hit most baseballs pitched to them has high self-efficacy
• high self-efficacy -> high performance
• can be influenced by modelling (seeing other people engage in the behaviour and get positive results)

Question 18

Carol Dweck: Mindsets

Answer 18

• entity theory of intelligence: seeing intelligence as unchangable and fixed; more likely to take easy way out and suffer big hit to self-esteem in face of challenges/failure
• incremental theory of intelligence: belief that intelligence can be improved through effort and persistence; more likely to set goals and persist in face of challenges/failure

Question 19

Higgings: theory of regulatory focus

Answer 19

• people regulate goal-directed behaviour in 2 ways:
• • promotion focus: person concerned with advancement, growth, accomplishments -> eager, “go for gold” (correlates with extraversion), less likely to make errors of omission (not making right choice)
• • prevention focus: person concerned with protection, safety, and preventing negative outcomes -> vigilant, cautious (correlates with neuroticism), less likely to make errors of comission (making wrong choice)

Question 20

Michel: “If…then…” propositions

Answer 20

• contextualized view of personality; if situation A, the person does X, but if situation B, the person does Y
• ex. if an adult criticized a child, they’ll cry, but if a peer criticizes them, they’ll get aggressive

Question 21

aptitude view of intelligence vs. achievement view vs. general intelligence

Answer 21

• aptitude view: ability to learn (ex. IQ)
• achievement view: the knowledge one has aquired relative to their age cohort
• general intelligence: intelligence was once thought of as a single broad factor (“g”)

Question 22

Multiple intelligences

Answer 22

• Howard Gardner
• 7 types of intelligence (ex. interpersonal, intrapersonal, kinesthetic, musical, intelligence, etc.)
• others added on factors (ex. emotional intelligence)

Question 23

cultural context of intelligence

Answer 23

• what is considered “intelligence” varies cross-culturally

- ex. Western cultures see mathematical ability as intelligence, whereas the Inuit see map-making as intelligence

Question 24

The Flynn effect (and reverse-Flynn effect)

Answer 24

• phenomenon that IQ scores have been rising over time within populations (1 point every 4-5 years)
• • may be due to better education or nutrition
• however, worldwide and in some places specifically, IQ scores have been decreasing recently (reverse Flynn) -> concerning because low IQ correlated with negative outcomes (ex. lower well-being, education, technological advancement, more poverty, delinquency, crime, overpopulation, etc.)

Question 25

inspection time

Answer 25

• variable in intelligence research
• time it takes a person to make a simple discrimination between 2 displayed objects (ex. the difference in length between 2 lines)
• faster inspection time correlates with higher IQ and general intelligence