Unit 7B Flashcards
Creativity
The ability to produce novel and valuable ideas.
Three storage areas of memory
sensory memory, short-term memory, long-term memory
What could keep someone from problem solving? (4 terms)
-Confirmation Bias
-Hindsight Bias
-Belief Perseverance
-Framing
Belief Perseverance
The tendency to maintain ones beliefs even in the face of evidence that contradicts them.
EX: People who are atheists will hold strong to the belief even when evidence of God is clearly presented.
Confirmation Bias
The tendency to only seek out information that supports one position or idea. We will ignore evidence that doesn’t support our beliefs.
Hindsight bias
Our tendency to look back at an event and think it was easily predictable.
EX: after attending a baseball game, you might insist that you knew that the winning team was going to win beforehand.
Framing
The cognitive bias in which people decide between options based on whether they are presented with positive or negative connotations.
EX: People are more likely to pick the yogurt that says 80% fat free then one that says 20% fat even though they are the same.
How does functional fixedness limit ones ability to problem solve?
It causes a person to look at a problem only in a specific way.
Four components of memory
Encoding, consolidation, storage, retrieval
Consolidation
How short term memories turn into long term
Ex. if you repeat something over and over, your more likely to remember it
Sensory memory is the gateway between…
Perception and memory
Echoic Memory
Ability of the ears to store info for 3-4 seconds
Iconic Memory
Ability of the eyes to store info for a few tenths of a second
What is the insight solution to problem solving?
When a “light” turns on and you suddenly know the solution to the problem.
Representativeness Heuristics
A mental shortcut that we use when estimating probabilities
EX: Thinking that someone wearing a suit and carrying a brief case is automatically a lawyer.
George Sperling and his row and columns with letters experiment thingy
Basically, Sperling conducted an experiment in which a screen of letters was flashed for 1/20th of a second
Most could only report back 4 or 5 letters but insisted that they saw all the letters
He then made another experiment where there were three rows of 4 or 5 letters the flash of the screen was followed by a low sound, medium sound, or high sound. If subjects heard the high sound, they were too report the top row, medium sound the medium row and so on.
He found that subjects could recall all the letters only if the sound was made within 1/3 of a second after the flash, longer than 1/3 second = ability to recall declined significantly. Over one second made it virtually impossible to remember the letters.
This proves the sensory memory is itty bitty.
Heuristic
A mental shortcut commonly used to simplify problems and avoid cognitive overload
How do heuristics compare to algorithms?
-Algorithms are step-by-step procedures to solving a problem
-Heuristics are shortcut strategies or rules-of-thumb.
Difference between divergent thinking and convergent thinking.
-Convergent thinking focuses on finding one well-defined solution to a problem.
-Divergent thinking is the opposite and focuses on creativity.
Inductive Reasoning
Inductive reasoning makes a generalization from specific observations and facts.
EX: If you notice that every time you spicy food your stomach hurts you might conclude that spicy food causes stomach aches.
What did Sperling call Iconic Memory in his day?
Quickly fading visual memory. Later, in 1967 Neisser labeled this as iconic memory.
Syllogisms
Arguments that involve drawing conclusions from two premises.
George Miller discovered that…
Mostly acoustically coded information is used for short term memory.
According to Miller, how many items in a list can we store in short term memory?
7 +/- 2
Deductive Reasoning
Uses available information, knowledge, or facts to make a valid conclusion
EX: All dolphins are mammals. All mammals have kidneys. All dolphins have kidneys.
Maintenance rehearsal V Elaborative rehearsal
Elaborative rehearsal improves long-term recall of information through associations, visual imagery and personalized organization of concepts. In contrast, maintenance rehearsal involves repetition of information in its original form and is less likely to result in effective long-term recall
Mnemonic devices in memory
Help learners recall larger bits of info
Ex. There is a song to the alphabet
Rhymes - I before e except after c
Making up words or phrases to remember ex. trouble clef spaces spells FACE trouble clef lines makes the phrase Every Good Bird Does Fly
Reasoning
The ability to asses things by applying knowledge from new or existing information.
Subordinate Concept
Subordinate means under the control of something else. All mansions are houses, but not all houses are mansions. Therefore, the concept of mansion is under the umbrella of houses. It is subordinate to the more general concept.
Dual Coding Hypothesis
Allan Paivio: memory utilizes two separate channels to store information: visual and verbal. While these channels function independently, they can also work together to establish connections between words and images.
Basic Concept
Method of Loci
Envisioning a place in your brain, visualizing putting bits information down by certain places within that space. Then envision yourself picking up the terms.
envisioning a location or physical space that you are extremely familiar with. In this location you attach the terms and information you are memorizing to various locations/spots within that place.
Language
Flexible system of symbols that enables us to communicate
Self-Reference Effect in memory
a tendency for people to encode information differently depending on whether they relate to the information or not
Displacement
Language allows you to talk about things that are not immediately present.
Arbitrariness
Symbols of language are chosen at random
Encoding - meaning in memory
initial learning of information
Generativity
Meanings can be created
Flexibility of symbols
Meanings will change
Basic Concept
A verbal or written understanding of abstract thought.
Decay - meaning in memory
memories that are not frequently retrieved tend to fade naturally with time
Interference: proactive and retroactive
proactive interference - old memories disrupt the retrieval of new memories
retroactive interference - in which new memories disrupt the retrieval and maintenance of old memories
Primacy v Recency Effect
Primacy - you remember the beginning because that is where you started
Recency - you remember the end because it is the most recent
Mirror Neurons
Watching a physical activity activates the same brain regions as when you practice it.
Phonemes
Smallest distinctive sound unit in a spoken language
Bat has three phonemes b - a - t
Serial Position Effect
Serial-position effect is the tendency of a person to recall the first and last items in a series best, and the middle items worst.
Morpheme
The smallest unit that carries a meaning. It may be a word or part of a word.
EX: Pumpkin: pump - kin
EX: Milk: milk
EX: Unforgettable: Un - for - get - table.
Words
meaningful units
Phrase
short combination of words
Superordinate Concept
Something in the most abstract way possible.
EX: If someone were to use superordinate concept to refer to a flower they would call it a plant.
Surface structure
How we order the sentence
Deep structure
The underlying meaning of a sentence
Prototype
A mental representation of an object or concept. Relates to an individual’s perception of what something should look like, sound like, feel like, etc.
EX: A robin or a sparrow would be more prototypical examples of the category ‘bird’ than a large vulture or a penguin
