Unit 10: Cognitive psychology Flashcards
What does cognitive psychology focus on?
Human intelligence
Language
Thinking & problem solving
memory
attention
perception
What is the current role of cognitive psychology?
currently dominates academic psycholgy
Where was it developed and what were the most important schools?
Europe
Soviet and Geneva school
What did Vygotski come up with?
theory of social origin of intelligence, thought and language
Vygotsky and consciousness
accepts study of consciousness with objective methods
cosnciousness doesnt determine behaviour
-> social behaviour shapes consciousness
What did Vygotsky conduct and why?
cross-cultural studies
demonstrate influence of social on consciousness
What was Vygotskys main contribution?
Child development
-> higher functions like thinking emerge from interaction with adults and more competent children
Thought and language
from evolutionary POV
-> language prior to thought
Who was the main representative of the Geneve School?
Jean Piaget
What was Piaget’s biggest project and what is cognitive development according to him?
General Theory of Knowledge
Logical-rational thinking doesnt depend on language
-> closely linked to action
development as adaptive process
-> child tunes behaviour to way the world works
2 Processes according to Piaget
Assimilation: child absorbs external reality by adapting it to structures of organism
Accomodation: organism adapts to external demands
Who was the first psychologist to recognise the importance of ‘Information Theory’?
George A. Miller
What did Miller study and how did he think people organise information?
memory
in packages
-> chunks
Other important contributions
Simon & Newll: key work for development of AI
Broadbent: first theory of attention (filter system)
Miller, Galanter and Pribram: Cybernetic concepts replace S-R model
AI
invented by Turing
-> Turing test to assess whether machines can think or not
Positions:
- weak AI: computer simulates human attributes
- strong AI: computer duplicates mental processes
