Cognitive Psychology Keywords

Question 1

What is cognitive psychology?

Answer 1

Cognitive psychology- study of mental processing (Language, perception, problem solving, thinking, memory)
Cognitive psychologists see the human mind as similar to a computer in terms of its processes.
Cognitive psychology uses experiments (RESEARCH METHOD) to test the functioning of the brain and mind and so uses very controlled conditions to try and work out how it all works
Cognitive neuropsychology (Effects of brain damage on cognitive processing) is concerned with studying people whose cognitive function is distorted or damaged in some way- such as through an accident or brain damage.

Question 2

What is memory?

Answer 2

Memory is the process of retaining information after the original stimuli has been removed

Question 3

Why may we not remember information?

Answer 3

We may not remember information due to interference (other memories obscure the information) or retrieval failure

Question 4

What is sensory information?

Answer 4

Sensory memory is the momentary/ temporary memory store for sensory information (Taste ,touch, sight, hearing ,smell)

Question 5

What is short-term memory?

Answer 5

Short-term memory- Storing short amount of information for a short amount of time
involves acoustic encoding, it has a 30 second duration and can store 5-9 chunks of information

Question 6

What is long-term memory?

Answer 6

Long-term memory-Storing large amounts of information for a long amount of time
Involves mainly semantic encoding, has an unlimited duration and capacity

Question 7

What is encoding?

Answer 7

Encoding means Changing information into a suitable format. Again, each store has a different method of encoding (changing) information and some have more than one

Question 8

What is duration?

Answer 8

Duration-How long something lasts- In terms of memory, this is how long information stays in a particular memory store before it is either transferred or lost (displaced or decays)

Question 9

What is capacity?

Answer 9

Capacity means ‘how much’ – In terms of memory, this means how much can be stored in each memory store. Each store has a different maximum capacity

Question 10

What is decay?

Answer 10

Decay-Loss of memory/information overtime to the point where original trace is lost, due to lack of rehearsal