PSY1020 - Chap 8 Thought and Language Flashcards
Thinking
Manipulating Mental Representations for a reason.
Mental Images
and
Mental Models
Mental Images: Visual Representations
Mental Models: Representation that describe, explain or predict the way things work.
Concepts
and
Categories
Category: groups based on common properties
Concepts: a mental representation of a category.
Categorisation
The process of identifying an object.
Recognising similarity to some objects and dissimilarity to others.
Defining Features
and
Prototypes
Defining Features: qualities that are essential in order to qualify an object in a certain category.
Although people sometimes categorise objects by comparing them with a list of defining features, people typically classify objects rapidly by judging their similarity to prototypes.
Prototypes: is a representation of a typical example of a category.
Hierarchies of Concepts
Superordinate Mammal
Basic Dog
Subordinate Kelpie
Reasoning:
Inductive
Deductive
Inductive Reasoning: Taking specific observations and applying them generally. Flawed.
Deductive Reasoning: Taking general observations and applying them to specifics. More factual
Syllogism: two premises that lead to a logical conclusion. eg: all dog have hair, Ralph is a dog, therefor Ralph has hair.
Analogical Reasoning
the process by where people understand a novel sitiation by comparing it to a familiar one.
Problem Solving
Transforming one situation into another to meet a gaol. To move from the Initial State to the Goal State.
Operators: Mental and behavioural processes aimed at transforming the initial state until it eventually approximates the goal state.
Mental Simulation
imagining the steps involved in solving a problem before undertaking them.
Barriers to Problem Solving
Functional Fixedness: the tendancy for people to ignore other possible functions of an object when they have a fixed function in mind.
Mental Set: the tendancy to keep using the same problem solving techniques that worked in the past.
Confirmation Bias: the tendancy for people to search for confirmation for what they already believe.
Overcoming Barriers to Problem Solving
- Restructure the problem or present it in a novel way.
Decision Making
The process by which indivisuals weigh the pro and cons of a situation in order to make a choice.
- Define the proble.
- Define the alternatives.
- Decide on the criteria.
- Weigh up the pros and cons.
- Make a decision.
Decision making:
Weighted Utility Value
Expected Utility
Weighted Utility Value:
Is a combined judgement of the importance of an attribute and the extent to which a give option staisfies it.
Expected Utility:
Is a combined judgement of the weighted utility and the expected probability of obtaining an outcome.
Explicit Cognition
Explicit Cognition: conscious manipulation of representations.
Heuristics:
Representativeness Heuristic
Availability Heuristic
Heuristics: Cognitive shorcuts for selecting between alternatives without carefully examining each one. Allows people to make rapid, efficient but sometimes irrational judgements.
Representativeness Heuristic: people categorise by matching the similarity of an object to a prototype without considering the probability of ot occurring.
Availability Heuristic: people infer the frequency of something base on its availabilty in their mind. That is how readily it come to mind. Just because something is familiar it does not mean it is common.
Bounded Rationality
People are rational within the bounds of their environment, goals and abilities.
Implicit Cognition
Implicit Cognition: Cognition outside of awareness.
Reason and Emotion
Assessing Risk
Thinking can somethimes interfere with sound judgement, following one’s instincts can sometimes be more advantagous.
Assessing Risk: People tend to view the risk involved with a greater weighting than the possible gains.
Connectionism (Parallel Distributed Processing)
Most cognitive processes occur simultaneously through the action of mutiple activiated networks.
Parallel Constraint Satisfaction
the tendancy to settle on a cognitive solution that satisfies as many constraints as possible in order to achieve the best fit to the data.
Language
the system of symbos, sounds, meanings and rules for their combination that constitutes the primary mode of communication among humans.
Whorfian Hypothesis og Liguistic Relativity: The idea that language shapes thought.
Language:
Phonemes
Morphemes
Phrases
Sentences
Phonemes: the smallest units of sound that constitute speech and are strung together to create meaningful utterances.
Morphemes: Smallest units of meaning (anti-, house etc..)
Phrases: groups of words taht can act as a unit and have meaning.
Sentences: orgainsed sequences of words that express thought or intention.
Language:
Syntax
Semantics
Syntax: the rules that govern the placement of words and phrases in a sentence.
” semantics — the rules that govern the meanings (rather than the order) of morphemes, words, phrases and sentences — in understanding what people say.”
Pragmatics of Language
“pragmatics of language — the way language is used and understood in everyday life “
How people decode linguistic messages.
Discourse
“discourse — the way people ordinarily speak, hear, read and write in interconnected sentences”
Universal Grammer
“Chomsky argued that the speed and similarity of language acqui- sition around the world suggest a shared set of linguistic principles, or universal grammar, that is innate. When children converse with others, they spontaneously develop linguistic constructions that resemble other languages even if their parents do not provide them. The existence of specialised neural circuits for language also supports a strong innate component to language acquisition. Recent connec- tionist thinking proposes that language emerges in children from the interaction of innate tendencies and implicit learning.”
Language: Critical Period?
“For many years psychologists have debated the existence of a critical period for language learning. The first three years of life seem to be the optimal time to attain native fluency. After age 12, even near-native fluency is difficult to achieve, and language appears to be processed using different neural circuits than in native speakers.”
Language Development in Children
0-24 Months
Months
1–5 Reflexive communication: vocalises randomly, coos, laughs, cries, engages in vocal play, discriminates language from nonlanguage sounds
6–18 Babbling: verbalises in response to speech of others; responses increasingly approximate human speech patterns
10–13 First words: uses words; typically to refer to objects
12–18 One-word sentence stage: vocabulary grows slowly; uses nouns primarily; over-extensions begin
18–24 Vocabulary spurt: fast-mapping facilitates rapid acquisition of new words
Language Development in Children
2-6 Years
“Years
2 Two-word sentence stage: uses telegraphic speech; uses more pronouns and verbs
2.5 Three-word sentence stage: modifies speech to take listener into account; over-regularisations begin
3 Uses complete simple active sentence structure; uses sentences to tell stories that are understood by others; uses plurals
3.5 Expanded grammatical forms: expresses concepts with words; uses four-word sentences
4 Uses imaginary speech; uses five-word sentences
5 Well-developed and complex syntax: uses more complex syntax; uses more complex forms to tell stories
6 Displays metalinguistic awareness
NOTE: Children often show individual differences in the ex”
Telegraphic speech
“utterances composed of only the most essential words for meaning”
