Final Exam Review Flashcards
Cognitive Psychology
The area of psychology which seeks to explain behaviour by investigating mental processes and structures that cannot be observed directly (attention, memory, learning, problem-solving, language, etc)
Cognition
Refers to all processes by which sensory input is transformed, reduced, elaborated, stored, recovered, and used.
Cognitive Style
A person’s preferred method of performing cognitive tasks. People differ in the way they perceive information and how they organize information for present and future use.
Field-dependent person
Field-dependent people are especially alert to social cues, and they prefer emotional and physical closeness with others. They are sociable, gregarious, like being with others, want to help others, know many people, and are known by many people. (Ex: Fred and George, Orihime Inoue, Sayaka Miki, Quinlan Vos, Scanlan Shorthalt)
Field-independent person
Field-independent people tend to perceive objects or situations from an internal base; independent of the environment in which the information is presented (Ex: Byakuya Kuchiki, Severus Snape, Wednesday Addams, Percival De Rolo)
Thinking
Manipulating information (forming concepts, solving problems, and making decisions)
Concepts
Mental categories, semantic memory, adaptation for survival, guide behaviour
Dual-Process Theory
The theory that thinking (including social thinking) involves two systems: Systems 1 and 2 respectively. System 1 is cognitively efficient, fast, automatic, involves heuristics, is vulnerable to bias, and is domain-specific. System 2 is cognitively demanding, slow, controlled, limited, and domain-general.
Schemata
Schemata (schema in the singular) are knowledge structures that represent substantial information about a concept, its attributes, and its relationships to other concepts.
Knowledge structures
Organized packets of information that are stored in memory.
Self schema
Our memory, influences, and information about other people.
Person schema
Beliefs about other people, their traits, and their goals.
Role schema
Behaviours that are expected of people in particular social situations or in particular occupations/roles.
Event schema
Scripts for well-known situations.
Priming study by Bargh, Chen & Barrows (1996)
In a 1996 study, researchers Bargh, Chen, and Barrows had participants complete a word task (unscrambling sentences) involving and were primed with a rude, polite, or control condition. They were then timed on how long it took for them to interrupt a conversation between the experimenter and a confederate seemingly having a difficult time. It was found that participants with a rude condition were significantly more likely to interrupt than participate in the polite conditions.
Heuristic
An heuristic is a mental shortcut used to form a judgment or make a decision - not necessarily a form of biased thinking, but the use of the shortcut introduces the possibility of biased thinking.
Availability Heuristic
An availability heuristic is a form of bias (there’s a trade-off, in that we get speed and conserve effort) which refers to the tendency to judge the frequency/likelihood of an event by the ease with which relevant instances come to mind. This heuristic is used when one is trying to judge the frequency or probability of an event.
Representativeness Heuristic
An representativeness heuristic is a form of bias (there’s a trade-off, in that we get speed and conserve effort) wherein the user exhibits the tendency to judge the frequency or likelihood of an event by the extent to which it represents a typical case.
Decision-Making
Controlled thinking
Controlled thinking is conscious, intentional, voluntary, and effortful.
Automatic thinking
Automatic thinking is often non-conscious, unintentional, involuntary, and effortless.
Priming
The activation of certain associations when a neutral frame is cued. The accessibility to a given concept/schema is increased due to a prior experience.
Confirmation bias
Confirmation bias is the tendency to search for and use information that supports ideas rather than refutes them.
Belief perseverance
Belief perseverance is the tendency to hold onto a belief in the face of contradictory evidence.
Overconfidence bias
Overconfidence bias is the tendency of people to have more confidence in judgments and decisions than is appropriate.
Hindsight bias
Hindsight bias is the tendency of people to believe they have predicted an event after it has occurred.
Cognitive interactionist approach to language acquisition
The cognitive interactionist approach to language acquisition asserts that language development is just an aspect of natural cognitive development that comes with a child’s growth and maturity.
Social communication interactionist approach to language acquisition
The social communication interactionist approach to language acquisition asserts that language develops because humans are social animals and communication is vital to our social world (a functional approach).
Emergentist interactionist approach to language acquisition
The emergentist interactionist approach to language acquisition asserts that the young brain is still maturing and forming, and that the connections are still emerging, as the child is still exposed to language and has a chance to try language, their brain will solidify and consolidate connections that support this development.
Five traits of language
Language is symbolic (representative of objects, events, and ideas). Language is semantic (meaningful), generative (limited number of symbols can be combined in an unlimited number of ways), and also structured (rules govern arrangement of words into sentences), as well as hierarchical.
Phonemes
Smallest units in speech that can be distinguished (40 phonemes).
Morphemes
Smallest units of meaning (50 000 in English).
Semantics
Area of language combined with understanding the meaning of words and word combinations.
Syntax
The system of rules that specify how words can be arranged into sentences. The syntax acquisition of children progresses very quickly.
Language acquisition at 3 months of age
Infants can distinguish phonemes from all of the world’s languages. This ability deteriorates between 4-12 months of age.
Language acquisition at 8 months of age
Infants recognize and store common word forms. Werker suggests optimal periods for the different subsystems involved in language acquisition (not as rigidly absolute as sometimes thought).
Language acquisition in first year
Language acquisition systems become tuned to the speech properties of their native language. This is because the question of the existence of critical periods has been answered in the form of the affirmative. In first six (6) months, babies vocalize primarily by crying, cooing, and laughter- after which they start babbling- this gradually becomes more complex and increasingly resembles the language spoken boy parents and others in their enivronment. This first year is critical to language acquisition.
Critical period
A critical period is the time span in the development of an organism when it is optimal for certain capacities to emerge because the organism is responsive to action-experiences.
Language acquisition at 10-13 months of age
Most children begin to hear sounds that are similar to words (similar in phonetic form and meaning, even in different languages).
Receptive vocabulary and productive vocabulary with reference to toddler language acquisition
The receptive vocabulary of a toddler is larger than their productive vocabulary. That is to say, they can comprehend more words spoken than they can produce. Early words refer to objects, second to social actions (that is to say, nouns before words).
Language acquisition at two (2) years of age
Two-year-olds learn as many as 20 new words each week. They do this using fast mapping, which can result in overextensions and underextensions. Toward the end of their second year, children combine words into sentences. Their early sentences are characterized by telegraphic speech.
Language acquisition at three (3) years of age
At three, children can express plural and past tenses (more complex), but still make mistakes, such as overgeneralization.
Overextension
Overextension occurs when a child incorrectly uses a words to describe a wider set of objects than is appropriate. For example, a child using the word “ball” for oranges, apples, and the moon. These appear between ages one and two and a half.
Underextension
Underextension occurs when a child incorrectly uses a word to describe a narrower set of objects or actions than it is meant to. For example, a child using “dog” to refer to a horse, cat, or non-dog stuffed animal.
Fast mapping
Fast mapping is the process by which children map a word onto an underlying concept after only one exposure.
Telegraphic speech
Telegraphic speech consists mainly of content words, omitting articles, prepositions and other critical words. Characterizes the early sentences of two-year-olds.
Overgeneralization
Grammatical rules that are incorrectly generalized to irregular cases where they do not apply. These occur in all languages and do linger, but demonstrate that the child is working to develop and master language.
Language acquisition at four to five (4-5) years of age
At four to five years of age, the biggest strides in language acquisition are made. Children generate longer and more complex sentences as they learn to write.
Language acquisition at around school-age
School-age children begin to appreciate ambiguities in language. This means they are developing metalinguistic awareness.
Language acquisition at around six to eight (6-8) years of age
Children appreciate irony and sarcasm at ages 6-8.
Metalinguistic awareness
Metalinguistic awareness refers to the ability to reflect on the use of language. This grows as children begin to play with language (for example, puns and jokes).
Theories of language acquisition
Schools of thought governing language acquisition are behaviourist, nativist, and interactionist.
Behaviourist theory of language acquisition
According to behaviourists like BF Skinner, children learn language through imitation and reinforcement. Ergo, vocalizations that are not reinforced gradually decline in frequency, and remaining vocalizations are shaped with reinforcement until they are correct. The same applies for syntax: if a request is made right, a need is met- reinforcing their verbal behaviour.
Nativist theory of language acquisition
According to nativists like Noam Chomsky, there are infinite sentences in a language. Therefore, children cannot learn solely by imitation- they learn rules of language, not specific verbal responses. They propose an alternative theory, that humans have an in-born “native” propensity to develop language- by means of a Language Acquisition Device (LAD), which is an innate mechanism or process which facilitates the acquisition of language.
Interactionist theory of language acquisition
Interactionists argue that the concept of LAD is incredibly vague, but assert that the human organism is biologically equipped for learning language. Much of this involves the acquisition of rules, but like social exchange plays a critical role. The human brain hardwired the sound patterns that make up human languages.
Problem-solving
Active efforts to discover what must be done in order to achieve a goal that is not readily attainable.
Three basic classes of problems
Problems of inducing structure, problems of arrangement, and problems of transformation
Insight
Sudden discovery of the correct solution following incorrect attempts based primarily on trial and error.
Problems of inducing structure
Problems of inducing structure require people to discover the relationship among numbers, words, symbols, or ideas.
Problems of arrangement
Problems of arrangement require people to arrange the parts of a problem in a way that satisfies some criterion (only one or a few of the arrangements form a solution).
Problems of transformation
Problems of transformation require people to carry out a specific sequence of transformations in order to achieve a specific goal.
Common obstacles to effective problem-solving
Common obstacles to effective problem-solving include irrelevant information, functional fixedness, mental set and the imposition of unnecessary constraints.
Irrelevant information
What it says on the tin. Leads people astray.
Functional fixedness
Functional fixedness is the tendency to perceive an item only in terms of its most common use.
Mental set
Mental sets exist when people persist in using problem-solving strategies that have worked in the past. This is often demonstrated in chess experts working on chess problems. This can explain why having expertise in an area sometimes backfires and hampers problem-solving.
Schools of thought on how the cognitive process leads to insight
Special process view, the business-as-usual-view, and the integrated view.
Special-process view of insight
Insights arise from sudden restructurings of problems as that at the unconscious level.
Business-as-usual view of insight
Insights arise from normal, step-by-step, analytical thinking that occurs at a conscious level.
Integrated view of insight
Sudden, unconscious restricting and gradual, conscious, analytical thinking can contribute to the emergence of insights.
Trial and error
Trying possible solutions and discarding those that are in error until one works.
Subgoals
Immediate steps toward a solution. Useful strategy in trial and error.
Analogies
Similarities between problem and previously solved problems. Can help facilitate effective thinking. Useful strategy in trial and error.
Incubation effect
Incubation effect occurs when new solutions surface for a previously unsolved problem after a period of not consciously thinking about the problem. This has a positive effect on changing problem-solving context.
Eastern cognitive styles vs Western cognitive styles
Eastern cognitive styles are holistic, focusing on context and relationships among elements, whereas Western cognitive styles are analytic, focusing on objects and their properties.
Choice overload
Choice overload occurs when people feel overwhelmed by decisions involving a large array of choices.
Choice mindset
The choice mindset is is the tendency to think about and interpret behaviour as a matter of choice. This can lead people to more easily accept wealth inequity, as well as discrimination against minority groups.
Risky decision-making
Risky decision-making involves making choices under conditions of uncertainty, involves expected value, weighing known outcomes, and subjective utility/probability.
Three key processes in memory
Encoding, storage, and retrieval are the three key processes in memory.
Encoding
Attention plays a decently-sized role in encoding. Encoding shows that one must pay attention to remember, as it involves focusing awareness on a narrowed range of stimulus and events. Attention in this case is likened to a filter that screens out most partial stimuli while allowing a select few to pass on to conscious awareness (selective attention).
Short-term memory
Short-term memory has a limited capacity store of memory that can maintain unrehearsed information for up to 20 seconds.
Chunking
Working memory
Baddeley’s model of working memory
Long-term memory
Flashbulb memories
Flashbulb memories are usually vivid and detailed recollections of momentous occasions, related to traumatic events.
