Thinking & Language

Question 1

Cognition

Answer 1

The mental activities associated with thinking, knowing, remembering, and communicating.

Question 2

Concept

Answer 2

A mental grouping of similar objects, events, ideas, or people.

Question 3

Prototype

Answer 3

A mental image or best example of a category. Matching new items to the prototype provides a quick and easy method for including items in a category (as when comparing feathered creatures to a prototypical bird, such as a robin).

Question 4

Algorithm

Answer 4

A methodical, logical rule or procedure that guarantees solving a particular problem. Contrasts with the usually speedier – but also more error-prone – use of heuristics.

Question 5

Heuristic

Answer 5

A simple thinking strategy that often allows us to make judgements and solve problems efficiently; usually speedier but also more error-prone than algorithms.

Question 6

Insight

Answer 6

A sudden and often novel realization of the solution to a problem; it contrasts with strategy-based solutions.

Question 7

Confirmation Bias

Answer 7

A tendency to search for information that confirms one’s preconceptions.

Question 8

Fixation

Answer 8

The inability to see a problem from a new perspective; an impediment to problem solving.

Question 9

Mental Set

Answer 9

A tendency to approach a problem in a particular way, often a way that has been successful in the past.

Question 10

Functional Fixedness

Answer 10

The tendency to think of things only in terms of their usual functions; an impediment to problem solving.

Question 11

Representative Heuristic

Answer 11

Judging the likelihood of things in terms of how well they seem to represent, or match, particular prototypes; may lead one to ignore other relevant information.

Question 12

Availability Heuristic

Answer 12

Estimating the likelihood of events based on their availability in memory; if instances come readily to mind (perhaps because of their vividness,) we presume such events are common.

Question 13

Overconfidence

Answer 13

The tendency to be more confident than correct – to overestimate the accuracy of one’s beliefs and judgments.

Question 14

Framing

Answer 14

The way an issue is posed; how an issue is framed can significantly affect decisions and judgments.

Question 15

Belief Bias

Answer 15

The tendency for one’s preexisting beliefs to distort logical reasoning, sometimes by making invalid conclusions seem valid, or valid conclusions seem invalid.

Question 16

Belief Perseverance

Answer 16

Clinging to one’s initial conceptions after the basis on which they were formed has been discredited.

Question 17

Language

Answer 17

Our spoken, written, or signed words and the ways we combine them to communicate meaning.

Question 18

Phoneme

Answer 18

In a language, the smallest distinctive sound unit.

Question 19

Morpheme

Answer 19

In a language, the smallest unit that carries meaning; may be a word or a part of a word (such as a prefix).

Question 20

Grammar

Answer 20

In a language, a system of rules that enables us to communicate with and understand others.

Question 21

Semantics

Answer 21

The set of rules by which we derive meaning from morphemes, words, and sentences in a given language; also, the study of meaning.

Question 22

Syntax

Answer 22

The rules for combining words into grammatically sensible sentences in a given language.

Question 23

Babbling Stage

Answer 23

Beginning at about 4 months, the stage of speech development in which the infant spontaneously utters various sounds at first unrelated to the household language

Question 24

One-Word Stage

Answer 24

The stage in speech development, from about age 1 to 2, during which a child speaks mostly in single words.

Question 25

Two-Word Stage

Answer 25

Beginning about age 2, the stage in speech development during which a child speaks mostly two-word statements.

Question 26

Telegraphic Speech

Answer 26

Early speech stage in which a child speaks like a telegram – ‘go car’ – using mostly nouns and verbs and omitting auxiliary words.

Question 27

Linguistic Determinism

Answer 27

Whorf’s hypothesis that language determines the way we think.