What is observational science? (Part 2) (1.2)

Question 1

What are cognitive processes?

Answer 1

Involve trajectories of information transmission and transformation.

Question 2

What is the traditional view of cognitive processes?

Answer 2

• Cognition occurs in the brain.

Question 3

What is the distributed cognition view?

Answer 3

• Cognition occurs in whatever systems transmit and transform information
• Cognitive processes are “delimited by the functional relationship among the elements that participate in it, rather than the spatial location of the elements.”
• Broadened the unit of analysis for cognition

Question 4

What are some examples of cognitive processes in social groups?

Answer 4

• Jurors deliberating on a verdict

- Working on a lab assignment as a group.

Question 5

How does cognitive processes involve coordination between internal and external structures?

Answer 5

-Embodiment:
We engage the world through our bodies
•Minds and brains are for physical action
-The mind is not a passive representational mechanism
-It is the byproduct of evolution where success is based on interactions in the world

Question 6

How does cognitive processes involve coordination between internal and external structures? (2)

Answer 6

Earlier cognitive processes can influence later
ones
- memory and cognition at multiple timescales:
- personal memories, cultural knowledge…

Question 7

What is cognitive ecology?

Answer 7

The study of cognitive phenomena in context.

- Cognition occurs in a web of mutually dependent elements

Question 8

What is cognitive ecology in a historical context?

Answer 8

-Traditional: mind as a computer metaphor (Body, environment, culture was peripheral noise)
•Bateson’s (1972) Steps to an Ecology of Mind
-Analogy to organisms
-Cognition extends beyond the brain
•Gibson’s (1979) Ecological Approach to Perception
-Invariant information
-affordances
•Soviet Cultural-Historical Activity Theory
-Culture and history are critical
•Vygotsky (1978) the culture experienced during development shapes the ideas of adults and
this in turn influences the culture (cultural change over time)
Cognitive ethnography of ship navigation (Hutchins, 1980s;
1995)
-used methods from multiple disciplines to describe and understand cognitive events, proof of distributed cognition

Question 9

How does internet play a role in cognitive ecology?

Answer 9

•The internet and cognitive ecology
•Near constant access and frequent engagement
to digital information
•Devices often on or near our bodies
•Shapes what we think about & how we do it
•Extends and augments our cognition
•Information searching and sense of self knowledge

• Learning
• Declarative knowledge
• Instrumental conditioning and app addiction
• Offloading memory
• Lists, reminders, navigational apps, etc.

Question 10

What is the Multi x4 approach?

Answer 10

Studying cognition in the wild benefits from it.

• Multiple methods
• Multiple modalities
• Multiple participants
• Multiple timescales

Question 11

Summary of 1.2

Answer 11

• Cognitive processes involve the transmission and transformation of information
• Traditional and distributed views of cognition differ in the scope of analysis and points of view
• Traditional – in the brain
• Distributed – the brain and beyond
• Inside and outside of the body (embodiment)
• Withing groups of people and their use of technology
• Across time
• Cognitive ecology benefits from multi, multi, multi, multi approaches