Midterm (Ch. 5 - Representation of Knowledge) Flashcards
What does the term proposition mean?
The smallest unit of knowledge that can stand as a separate assertion
Pavio’s “dual-code theory” states that we represent information in …
… combined verbal and visual codes.
Describe a finding from Mandler and Ritchey’s experiment on memory for visual information?
Meaning is more important than style. We are more sensitive to meaning-significant changes in a picture
Explain what propositional networks are.
A diagram in which the terms of a proposition and the relations between them are represented as nodes linked to form a network.
In an experimental probe technique, participants are first shown a sentence like: “THE SCOUTS, THE INDIANS SAW, KILLED A BUFFALO,” followed immediately by a pair of words to which they must decide whether the pair was present in the sentence. In this particular example, “SCOUTS KILLED” was responded to faster, than “INDIANS KILLED.” Explain why.
Because the propositional structure is established early on while the person is processing the sentence, not during some later extended retention interval.
If a person commits to memory a sentence such as, “BELLBIRDS CROSSED THE HORIZON AS WIND SHUFFLED THE CLOUDS” which word is likely to provide a more effective “prime” stimulus for HORIZON?
WIND or BELLBIRDS. Justify your answer.
Bellbirds. Because bellbirds is more strongly connected to horizon than wind, because bellbirds and horizon are in the same proposition; whilst wind and horizon are not.
In a study using fMRI, Kelly and his colleagues discovered different peaks of activity in the two hemispheres of the frontal cortex depending on the specific type of stimuli being encoded. Fill in the blanks below with your best guess regarding which hemisphere(s) (Right, Left, or Both) showed the most activity while encoding the following:
__________ words
__________ pictures of common objects
__________ unfamiliar faces
__________ familiar faces
words = left hemisphere
objects = both hemispheres
unfamiliar faces = right hemisphere
familiar faces = both hemispheres
In a follow-up study, Kelly and his colleagues used the “Wada test” to determine what the effects of anesthetizing either the right or the left frontal cortex would have on participants’ memory for words and unfamiliar faces. What did they find regarding memory for words when the left frontal cortex was anesthetized?
When the left hemisphere was injected, the corrected recognition score for words significantly dropped, compared to the recognition score for the faces.
According to Collins and Quillan’s (1969) model of the structure of semantic memory, in what manner or arrangement is the information in semantic memory stored?
Information in semantic memory is stored through a hierarchal network and cognitive economy
Why was the original hierarchical network model of semantic memory proposed by Collins and Quillian referred to as “hierarchical?”
People store information about various categories in a network structure. Each category is associated only to its immediate superordinate and subordinate categories.
Another important component in Collins and Quillian’s original hierarchical network model involved Cognitive Economy. What did cognitive economy refer to in their model?
Cognitive economy refers to how properties of categories are stored only at the highest level for which they are generally true.
Describe a problem with Collins and Quillian’s original hierarchical network model.
- Strict hierarchy was questioned for cases like when the response to “A dog is an animal?” is faster than “A dog is a mammal?”
- Cognitive economy questioned for cases like when the response to “Apples are eaten?” is faster than “Apples have pips”
- Typicality effects - how many links separate due to complexity
Collins and Loftus proposed a semantic network model that was designed to overcome some of the problems with Collins and Quillian’s original hierarchical network model of semantic memory. What were two of the main differences between these models?
Collins and Loftus proposed the Spreading Activation Model, a retrieval system. The differences are that there is no hierarchy or cognitive economy, and it allows links to vary in length to account for typicality effects.
What is a schema?
Schemas organise our knowledge, may include other schemas, allows us to make inferences and helps in encoding, storage, and recall
