Thought

Question 1

What is thought?

Answer 1

Thought is the extension of perception and memory.

Question 2

What is thinking?

Answer 2

Manipulating mental representations for a purpose.

Question 3

What is a mental image?

Answer 3

Visual representations such as the image of a street or a circle.

Question 4

What is a mental model?

Answer 4

A representation that describes, explains, or predicts how things work.

Question 5

What are categories?

Answer 5

Groupings based in common properties.

Question 6

What is a concept?

Answer 6

A mental representation of a category.

Question 7

We categorize objects in which two ways?

Answer 7

1. Defining features: qualities that are essential for membership of the category
2. Prototypes: an abstraction (based on shared features or functions) across many instances of a category. (such as magpies, parrots, sparrows).

Question 8

What is one main feature of categorization?

Answer 8

It is functional: there are many ways concepts can represent information. Shape, defining features, characteristic features, exemplars.

Question 9

How do subordinate and superordinate level categories differ?

Answer 9

There are three levels of hierarchical categorization.

1. Basic level: The level people generally use to categorize objects.
2. Subordinate level: The level of categorization below the basic level in which more specific attributes are shared by members of a category.
3. Superordinate level: is an abstract level in which members of a category share few common features.

Question 10

What is categorization influenced by?

Answer 10

Our culture.

Question 11

What is reasoning?

Answer 11

The process by which people generate and evaluate arguments and beliefs.

Question 12

What is inductive reasoning?

Answer 12

Reasoning from a set of observations to general propositions.
Relies on probabilities.
Inferring a conclusion based on a probability rather than a certainty.
We cannot say for certain, there may be other factors.

Question 13

What is deductive reasoning?

Answer 13

Drawing conclusion from a set of assumptions or premises that are based on the rules of logic.
Deduction is the flip side of induction.
The conclusion is true if the premise is true and reasoning logical.

Question 14

Whats is a syllogism?

Answer 14

Two premises that lead to a logical conclusion.

Question 15

What is analogical reasoning?

Answer 15

The process by which people understand a novel situation in terms of a familiar one.

Question 16

What is the process of problem solving?

Answer 16

1. Initial state - (a problem)
2. Operators - (Actions performed to solve the problem.)
3. Goal state - (No problem)

Question 17

What is a well defined problem?

Answer 17

Ones where the initial state, goal state, and operators are easily determined.

Question 18

What is an ill defined problem?

Answer 18

Occur when both the information needed to solve the problem and the criteria for determining when the goal state has been met are vague.

Question 19

What are subgoals?

Answer 19

Mini goals on the way to achieving the broader goal.

Question 20

What are problem solving strategies?

Answer 20

Techniques that serve as guides for problem-solving.

Question 21

What are algorithms?

Answer 21

Systematic procedures that will produce a solution to a simple problem is there is one.
They are guaranteed to find the solution providing that one exists.

Question 22

What is mental simulation?

Answer 22

The mental rehearsal of the steps needed to solve a problem.

Question 23

What us Hypothesis testing?

Answer 23

Making an educated guess about a problem and then testing it.

Question 24

What are three problems with problem solving?

Answer 24

1. Functional fixedness - the tendency to fix on a function for an object and to ignore other possible uses.
2. Mental set - The tendency to keep using the same problem solving techniques that have been successful in the past.
3. Confirmation bias - The process by which an individual weighs the pros and cons of different alternatives in order to make a choice.

Question 25

What is decision making?

Answer 25

The process by which an individual weighs the pros and cons of different alternatives in order to make a choice.

Question 26

What is weighted utility value?

Answer 26

A combine judgement of the importance of an attribute and the extent to which a given option satisfies it.

Question 27

What is expected utility?

Answer 27

A combined judgement of the weighted utility and the expected probability of obtaining an outcome.

Question 28

What are the processes in making decisions?

Answer 28

1. Defining the problem 2. Defining the alternatives 3. Deciding on the criteria 4. Weighing up the pros and cons 5. Making a decision.

Question 29

What is explicit cognition?

Answer 29

Involves conscious manipulation of mental representations.

Question 30

What is Implicit cognition?

Answer 30

Involves the unconscious.

Question 31

How do the behaviorists view implicit cognition?

Answer 31

People learn, generalize and discriminate stimuli without conscious thought

Question 32

How does the psychodynamic view see implicit cognition?

Answer 32

Unconscious motives and emotions impact on problem solving and decision making.

Question 33

What are heuristics?

Answer 33

Cognitive shortcuts for selecting amongst alternatives, without carefully considering each one (sometimes irrational).

Question 34

What is a representative heuristic?

Answer 34

We match an object to its category

Question 35

What is a availability heuristic?

Answer 35

We decide that the events that we can easily recall are common and typical.

Question 36

What is bounded reality?

Answer 36

People are rational within the bounds imposed by their environment, goals and abilities - leads to satisficing. Instead of making optimal judgements people make "good enough" judgements. People are constrained by time and limited information.

Question 37

How does learning occur implicitly.

Answer 37

Most of learning occurs outside of conscious awareness, and people implicitly register regularities in their environment or learn to behave in particular ways with little or no explicit instruction.

Question 38

How does problem solving occur implicitly?

Answer 38

Through the activation of associational networks, as information associated with unresolved problems remains active outside awareness.

Question 39

What is parallel distributed processing?

Answer 39

1. Thought processing occurs in parallel in multiple activated networks. 2. Meaning of a mental representation is distributed throughout the brain (neural networks)

Question 40

What is parallel constraint satisfaction?

Answer 40

The tendency to settle on a cognitive solution that satisfies as many constraints as possible to achieve the best fit to data.

Question 41

What is the role of the Dorsolateral prefrontal cortex?

Answer 41

Central role in working memory and explicit manipulations of representations (conscious thought)

Question 42

What is the role of the Ventromedial prefrontal cortex?

Answer 42

Central role in the use of emotional reactions to guide decision making and behavior.