PSYC*2650 Chapter 11: Visual Knowledge Flashcards
What is self-report data?
A form of evidence in which a person is asked directly about their own thoughts or experiences
What type of data did Francis Galton use to study people’s “mind’s eye”/capacity for visual imagery?
Self-report data
What do chronometric studies of imagery measure?
The amount of time a task takes
T or F: Imagery researchers rarely ask participants to do something with their mental images, instead they are asked to describe them.
False. Other way around.
What are respond characteristics?
Cues within an experiment that signal to participants how they’re “supposed to” respond
What occurs during an image-scanning procedure?
Participants are instructed to form a specific mental image, then are asked to scan, with their “mind’s eye,” from one point in the image to another
T or F: In an image-scanning procedure, participants scan across images at a constant rate.
True
What occurs during a mental rotation task?
Participants must determine whether a shape differs from the target only in its position and orientation, or if the shape is of a different form than the target
Does the amount of time needed to perform the mental rotation task correspond to the amount of rotations actually needed to line up the shape with its target?
Yes
What is the difference between a picture-plane rotation and a depth rotation?
- Picture plane rotation: Rotations that leave the picture on the 2D plane in which they are drawn
- Depth rotation: Rotations that involve spinning the image around a vertical axis (lifting it off the page)
Why can visualizing and perceiving be used to prime each other?
Because they draw on similar brain mechanisms
Are people able to visualize and perceive simultaneously?
No
In which brain area is activation high both when visualizing and actually seeing a stimulus/
Occipital cortex
What is area V1?
The brain area where axons from the visual system first reach the occipital cortex
T or F: Disrupting area V1 using transcranial magnetic stimulation causes problem in vision, but not visual imagery.
False. Causes problems in both.
T or F: Patients with Unilateral neglect syndrome show the same pattern of neglect when seeing and imagining.
True
T or F: Blind people seem to have normal imagery.
True
How does mental imagery differ between people with vision and people who are blind?
Blind people use spacial imagery to perform mental imagery rather than visual imagery
Does damage to brain areas involved in visual imagery cause parallel disruptions in spatial imagery?
No
How does mental imagery affect “non-imager’s” autobiographical memory?
They are less likely to feel as if they can “relive” their memories
What is aphantasia?
The inability to create or visualize mental pictures
What occurs during a mental-folding task?
Participants are shown six connected squared, two of which have arrows on them, and are asked to determine whether, when folded into a cube, if the arrows would line up with each other
T or F: People successful in the mental folding task are more skilled in tasks like mental rotation.
False. Skill in one is not indicative of skill in the other.
Mental rotation relies more heavily on mechanisms in which hemisphere?
The right-hemisphere
T or F: Mental folding draws on both hemispheres
True
What is the gender difference seen in mental rotation tasks?
Men tend to be faster and more accurate than women
Did training using action video games benefit men or women more in their capacities to perform mental rotation tasks?
Women
T or F: Training can reduce the gender difference in spatial imagery.
True
Can visual imagery be improved through training?
No, only spacial imagery
What is eidetic memory?
The capacity to retain long-lasting and detailed images of scenes that can be scrutinized as if they were physically present
What are percepts?
Internal representations of the stimuli being perceived
What is the main distinction between percepts and mental “pictures”?
Percepts are unambiguous in the way that pictures aren’t
T or F: Percepts are organized depictions.
True
Are percepts easily reinterpreted, or are they resistant to reinterpretation?
They are strongly resistant to reinterpretation
Are images stored in memory as a whole, or in a piece-by-piece fashion?
In a piece-by-piece fashion
How are images retrieved from memory?
Nodes specifying the “image frame” are activated, then elaborations are added with information from other nodes to create a full and detailed image
What is an alternate way for visual information to be represented in long-term memory, that is not in the form of an actual image?
As a verbal label
T or F: Generally, imagery improves memory.
True
What do imagery mnemonics need to demonstrate in order to be helpful?
They need to show the objects to be remembered interacting with each other
What does the dual-coding theory propose?
That imaginable materials, such as high-imagery words, will be doubly represented in memory
According to the dual-coding theory, what are the two ways in which information can be stored in long-term memory?
- As memories that represent the content of symbolic materials
- As memories that represent imagery-based materials
T or F: Primacy and recency effects are not seen when learning a series of pictures.
False
T or F: Spreading activation is demonstrated with both verbal and nonverbal materials.
True
Is visual imagery influenced by schema-based, generic knowledge in the same way as other types of memory?
Yes
What is boundary extension?
A tendency for people to remember pictures a being less “zoomed in” (having wider boundaries) than they actually were
What is binocular rivalry?
Occurs when competing visual information is presented to the eyeballs
How does the brain interpret binocular rivalry?
The brain will pick one stimulus to reach conscious awareness over the other and may alternate between them, but never merges the competing information
What is perceptual stability?
The tendency to have the same dominant image appear during binocular rivalry
Can perceptual stability be altered through training?
Yes
