Exam 1

Question 1

What is Cognitive Psychology?

Answer 1

• Cognitive psychology attempts to explain how humans
  perform cognitive activities.
  ❖Cognition is any mental activity related to acquiring, storing, transforming or using
  knowledge.
  ❖The scientific study of how we acquire, store, transform, and use knowledge.
  ❖A discipline within psychology on which an individual’s knowledge & mental processes is
  the focus

Question 2

What are cognitive activities?

Answer 2

❖ Seeing objects and events in one’s surroundings: sensation & perception
❖ Selecting information from (the internal or the external) environment: attention
❖ Remembering something, e.g., facts, personal experiences, etc: memory
❖ Communicating through spoken and written language: language
❖ Learning something new, e.g., how to use a computer,
ride a bike, use public transportation, introductory statistics, etc.: learning (& memory)
❖ Problem Solving
❖ Decision Making
❖ Drawing inferences: Logic