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PSYC 339: Origins of the Mind > Midterm 1 > Flashcards

Midterm 1 Flashcards

1
Q

Black plague changed the world

A

changed social dynamics, the government, economics, politics, etc.

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2
Q

John Locke

A

empiricist; believed our knowledge comes from learning, the environment, and experience; we are born as blank slates and experience shapes our minds; experience in the world necessary to develop knowledge

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3
Q

Immanuel Kant

A

believed experience is important, but knowledge is more than just experience; we are born with innate organizational and learning systems of the mind that determine how that experience is used

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4
Q

three areas to look when determining where cognitive systems form

A

in infants, imperative psychology (looking across species), cross-cultural studies

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5
Q

invariant information

A

information that is not changed over generations (ex. general face shape)

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6
Q

variant information

A

information/things that change over time (ex. politics, technology, social dynamics)

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7
Q

underlying modular systems

A

social modules, biological modules, physical modules

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8
Q

social modules

A

being able to communicate

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9
Q

biological modules

A

what’s biological and what’s not, what we do and don’t do

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10
Q

physical modules

A

being able to identify tools and process how to use them

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11
Q

two information domains of the mind

A

social information and ecological information

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12
Q

social information

A

information about who I am

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13
Q

ecological information

A

having information about the biological world

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14
Q

self schema

A

the idea of me; based on your experiences; your idea of youself

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15
Q

person schema

A

how we understand other individuals and how they affect us

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16
Q

group schema

A

whether groups are cooperative vs. hostile; who is in-group and who is out-group; different types of groups

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17
Q

innate cognitive functions

A

space perception, navigation, object representation, numbers, social cognition, culture, morality and religion, humor, intelligence, face processing

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18
Q

visual perception relies on…

A

light, our eyes, and how we act based on what we see

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19
Q

visual needs

A

hunting, precision in visual acuity, ability to read other people, ability to navigate the world

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20
Q

importance of vision for the human mind

A

primary source for information about the world, survival, protection, social interactions, mental representations

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21
Q

properties of light

A

reflection, transmission, absorption, scattering

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22
Q

cornea

A

outer, clear layer; basic transmission of light

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23
Q

iris

A

muscle with color

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24
Q

lens

A

focuses the light so that it ends up on the retina correctly

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25
retina
two-dimensional membrane; image is upside down and mirrored on the retina; contains receptor cells
26
receptor cells
designed to pick up certain stimuli
27
rods
primary role is for night vision, movement, and peripheral vision
28
cones
primary role is for visual acuity and color perception
29
three types of vision
scotopic, mesopic, photopic
30
scotopic vision
starlight, moonlight; rods activated only; night time vision
31
mesopic vision
both cones and rods activated; during sunrise and sunset; makes colors more grand
32
photopic vision
color perception; cones activated; under white light; rods not as activated
33
fovea
an indentation on the retina; center of the eye; where the most visual acuity is and where the most cones are
34
optic disc
the beginning of the optic nerve; blind spot
35
development of vision
as a newborn, you can see general shapes up to 12 inches away but no color; color does not come in until about 3 or 4 months of age
36
optic radiation
a projection tract that connects the lateral geniculate nucleus to the primary visual cortex in the optic tract
37
primary visual cortex
processes basic parts of vision like lines, shadows, and contours
38
visual association cortex
associates what you are looking at; integrates and processes the material
39
V1 area
visual field representation
40
V2 area
feedback loop between V1 and other areas
41
V3 area
sensitive to motion and color
42
V4 area
color processing
43
V5 area
sensitive to motion
44
dorsal pathway
sends the information in the occipital lobe to the parietal lobe; processes spatial information
45
ventral pathway
sends information in the occipital lobe to the temporal lobe; identifies visual information
46
visual system evolved to solve these problems
stable visual picture (our eyes jump when moving from side-to-side), continuous feed, 3D spatial layout
47
some problems of visual spatial perception
perceiving motion is highly complex, size is another problem our vision has to solve, object motion vs. observer motion
48
monocular depth cues
cues about space that you can perceive with just one eye
49
interposition
cues that tell us where something is located in space
50
linear perspective
cues that tell us there is depth
51
depth illusions
can be created with shadows and lighting
52
binocular depth cue
close objects cause convergence of the eyes; farther objects cause more divergence of the eyes; move the eyes in relation to how close or how far an object is from you
53
two possibilities for mechanisms that lead to interpretation
humans have special-purpose cognitive systems (core knowledge of space) and humans endowed with general-purpose capacity (no core knowledge of space, but have the capability to learn about our surroundings)
54
nativist theory of space perception
René Descartes; the observer is able to determine visual angles through muscular responses that direct the eyes toward an object and the brain doing geometrical calculation to judge the distance between self and object
55
rationalism and nativism + vision perception
-the mind and brain are built to perceive space -perceptual processes like reasoning -geometric inferences
56
empiricism and associationism + visual perception
-the mind and brain are built to sense impinging stimuli (effort) -learn to interpret stimuli by association and touch -no reasoning process
57
proprioception
the sense that lets us perceive the location, movement, and action of parts of the body
58
space perception is...
innate
59
white light
sunlight
60
different colors
different wavelengths
61
color doesn't exist in nature
our ability to see colors is a results of a biological electrochemical process; color only exists in our brains
62
photoreceptors
rods and cones
63
rods
peripheral vision, detects motion, does not detect color
64
cones
allow us to see color, three types of cones, majority are on the fovea, allow us to have high visual acuity
65
S-cones
blue, short wavelengths
66
M-cones
green, medium wavelengths
67
L-cones
red, long wavelengths
68
if we only had one type of cone
we would be completely colorblind; the cone would be unable to perceive which color it is meant to, so it wouldn't
69
protanope
no L-cones; red-green color blindness
70
deuteranope
no M-cones; red-green color blindness
71
tritanope
no S-cones; cannot perceive lower wavelength colors like blue and green; blue-blind
72
three components of color
hue, saturation, brightness
73
hue
type of color
74
saturation
richness of a specific color
75
brightness
lightness
76
color constancy
no matter the context of lighting or filter, the colors of objects will always remain noticeably the same; context is important
77
one fundamental question of cognitive science
Which theory best explains the origin of the mind, the origin of knowledge, and how inborn knowledge and experience come to shape us as humans and other animals as what they are: John Locke or Immanuel Kant?
78
two main ideas of cognitive science
1) all animals are endowed with innate cognitive systems 2) humans, not animals, evolved an ability for cultural evolution
79
result of natural and sexual selection
brain evolved with cognitive, affective, and conscious psychological systems to process dynamic environment
80
conscious-psychological systems
how the world should operate = cognitive mechanisms to reduce difference between ideal and actual states
81
cognitive systems
evolutionary function to generate and manipulate conscious-psychological systems
82
affective systems
emotions provide feedback to others; particularly positive emotions
83
brain systems
not just the size of the brain, but the organization of the neurons and neural pathways
84
folk systems
source of information represented in immediate memory as the content for conscious-psychological simulations
85
folk psychology
social information related to the self, other individuals, and groups
86
folk biology
information about natural environment
87
folk physics
information about how the physical world works (ex. sharper objects cut meat more effectively)
88
ganglion cells
the first neurons in the visual pathway with axons, which are gathered into a bundle called the optic nerve
89
optic chiasm
axons in the optic nerves cross to the left and right hemispheres and travel to visual areas of the thalamus and then to the primary visual cortex in the occipital lobe (blind spot)
90
inferior temporal cortex
responds to shapes
91
continuity over development
common mechanisms in infants and adults
92
continuity over evolution
common mechanisms in humans and non-human animals

PSYC 339: Origins of the Mind (4 decks)

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