Cognitive Psychology Exam 2

Physical regularities

regularly occurring physical properties of the environment

oblique effect

the finding that horizontal and vertical orientations can be perceived more easily than other orientations

light-from-above assumption

assumption that light is coming from above, inluences how we perceive three-dimensional objects that are illuminated

Why can people perceive and recognize objects and scenes better than computers?

our system is adapted to respond to the physical characteristics of our environment

semantic regularities

characteristics associated with the functions carried out in different types of scenes

scene schema

knowledge of what a scene typically contains, and the expectations created by scene schemas contribute to our ability to perceive objects and scenes

although people make use of regularities in the environment…

they are unaware of the specific information they are using

bayesian inference

the idea that our estimate of the probability of an outcome in determined by the prior probability (our initial belief) and the likelihood (the extent to which the available evidence is consistent with the outcome)

prior

a person’s initial belief about the probability of an outcome

likelihood

in Bayesian inference, the extent to which the available evidence is consistent with the outcome.

in terms of probabilities…

we perceive what is most likely to have created the stimulation we have received

gestalt psychologists

emphasized the idea that principles of organization are built-in; acknowledged that perception is affected by experience but argued that built-in principles can override experience (bottom-up processing is essential)

evolutionary processes

visual system may have been shaped to contain neurons that respond to things that are found frequently in the environment

experience-dependent plasticity

shaping of neural responding by experience (horizontals and verticals)

movement facilitates perception

movement can help us perceive objects in the environment more accurately (moving reveals aspects of objects that are not apparent from a single viewpoint); seeing an object from different viewpoints can provide added information that results in more accurate perception.

interaction of perception and action

movement is important because of the coordination that is continually occurring between perceiving stimuli and interacting with these stimuli

brain ablation

procedure in which a specific area is removed from an animal’s brain; usually done to determine the function of this area by assessing the effect on animal’s behavior

object discrimination problem

problem in which the task is to remember an object based on its shape and choose it when presented with another object after a delay; associated with research on the what processing stream

monkey experiment

presented monkeys with two tasks (brain ablation),

1) object discrimination problem

2) landmark discrimination problem

landmark discrimination problem

problem in which the task is to remember an object’s location and to choose that location after a delay; associated with research on the “where” stream

what pathway (ventral)

neural pathway, extending from occipital lobe to temporal lobe; associated with perceiving or recognizing objects (perception pathway)

where pathway (dorsal)

neural pathway, extending from occipital to parietal lobe; associated with perceiving or recognizing objects (perception pathway)

perception pathway

neural pathway, extending from occipital to temporal lobe; associated with perceiving/recognizing objects (what pathway)

action pathway

neural pathway, extending from occipital to parietal lobe, associated with neural processing that occurs when people take action (where pathway)

mirror neurons

neurons in the premotor cortex, originally discovered in monkeys, that respond both when a monkey observes someone else carrying out an action and when the monkey itself carries out the action (in humans as well)

mirror neuron system (MNS)

a network of neurons in the brain that have mirror neuron properties

knowledge, inference, and prediction

inference depends on knowledge; knowledge and inferences that follow are the basis of top-down processing

size-weight illusion

when a person is presented with two similar objects that are the same weight but different sizes, the larger one seems lighter when they are lifted together.

attention

the ability to focus on specific stimuli or locations

selective attention

attending to one thing while ignoring others

distraction

one stimulus interfering with the processing of another stimulus

divided attention

paying attention to more than one thing at a time

attentional capture

rapid shifting of attention usually caused by a stimulus (ie. loud noise)

visual scanning

movements of the eyes form one location or object to another

filter model of attention

model of attention that proposes a filter that lets attended stimuli through and blocks some/all of the unattended stimuli

dichotic listening

procedure of presenting one message to the left ear and a different message to the right ear

shadowing

procedure of repeating a message out loud as it is heard (commonly used with dichotic listening studies)

cocktail party effect

ability to focus on one stimuli while filtering out other stimuli.

filter

In Broadbent’s model of attention, the filter identifies the message that is being attended to based on its physical characteristics (tone, pitch, accent, etc.)—lets only this attended message pass through to the detector in the next stage.

detector

In Broadbent’s model, detector processes the information from the attended message to determine higher-level characteristics of the message, such as its meaning.

early selection model

model of attention that explains selective attention by early filtering out of the unattended message; filtering step occurs before the message is analyzed to determine its meaning.

attenuator

In Treisman’s model of selective attention, the attenuator analyzes the incoming message in terms of physical characteristics, language, and meaning. (Attended messages pass through at full strength, unattended messages pass through with reduced strength)

attenuation model of attention

Anne Treisman’s model of selective attention that proposes that selection occurs in 2 stages.

1) attenuator analyzes the incoming message and lets through the attended message

2) unattended message, at lower strength

dictionary unit

a component of Treisman’s attenuation model of attention; processing unit contains stored words and thresholds for activating the words (can explain why we can sometimes hear a familiar word in an unattended message).

priming

a change in response to a stimulus caused by the previous presentation of the same or a similar stimulus

repetition priming

when an initial presentation of a stimulus affects the person’s response to the same stimulus when it is presented later.

lexical priming

priming that involves the meaning of words

late selection model of attention

model of selective attention that proposes that selection of stimuli for final processing does not occur until after the information in the message has been analyzed for meaning

processing capacity

amount of information input that a person can handle; sets a limit on the person’s ability to process information

perceptual load

related to task difficulty; low-load tasks only use a small amount of a person’s processing capacity (high-load tasks use more of the processing capacity)

low-load task

a task that uses few resources, leaving some capacity to handle to handle other tasks

high-load task

a task that uses most or all of a person’s resources and so leaves little capacity to handle other tasks

load theory of attention

proposal that the ability to ignore task depends on the load of the task the person is carrying out; high-load tasks result in less distraction

endogenous attention

attention that is focused voluntarily on a stimulus in a sustained goal-driven matter

exogenous

attention that is involuntarily directed toward a stimulus in a transient fleeting manner

stroop effect

J.R. Stroop, using a task in which a person is instructed to respond to one aspect of a stimulus (ex. ink color) and ignore another aspect (ex. color that the word names). Red printed in blue ink

fixation

in perception and attention, a pausing of the eyes on places of interest while observing a scene

saccadic eye movement

eye movements from one fixation to another

overt attention

shifting of attention by moving the eyes

stimulus salience

bottom-up factors that determine attention to elements of a scene (ex. color, contrast) Meaningfulness of images does NOT contribute to stimulus salience

saliency map

map of a scene that indicates the stimulus salience of areas and objects in the scene

scene schema

a person’s knowledge about what is likely to be contained in a particular scene; can help guide attention to different areas of the scene.

covert attention

occurs when attention is shifted without moving the eyes (seeing “out the corner of one’s eye”)

pre-curing

a technique used in cognitive psychology where a cue directs attention to a specific location in the visual field before a target appears

same-object advantage

occurs when the enhancing effect of attention spreads throughout an object, so that attention to one place on an object results in a facilitation of processing at other places on the object.

attentional warping

occurs when the map of categories on the brain changes to make more space for categories that are being searched for as a person attends to a scene

task switching

A shifting of attention and cognitive resources from one task to another

multitasking

a phenomenon in which a person attempts to consciously divide attention between multiple tasks while also attempting to switch between those tasks

automatic processing

processing that occurs automatically, without the person’s intending to do it, and that also uses few cognitive resources (associated with easy/well practiced tasks)

(cognitive) choking

a decline in performance following increased conscious awareness or intended control of a task

productivity illusion

the false belief that multitasking makes a person more productive, while actual productivity tends to be slower and lower quality.

mind wandering

thoughts that come from within a person, often unintentionally (daydreaming)

inattentional blindness

a phenomenon in which people are unaware of clearly visible stimuli if they are not directing their attention to them.

visual search

occurs when a person is looking for one stimulus or object among a number of other stimulus or objects

inattentional deafness

occurs when inattention causes a person to miss an auditory stimulus (ex. it is more difficult to detect a tone when engaged in a difficult visual search task)

change detection

detecting differences between pictures of displays that are presented one after another

change blindness

difficulty in detecting changes in similar, but slightly different, scenes that are presented one after another; changes are often easy to see once attention is directed to them, but are usually undetected in the absence of appropriate attention

continuity errors

in film, changes that occur from one scene to another that do not match (ex. when a character reaches for a croissant in one shot, which turns into a pancake in the next shot).

binding

process by which features such as color, form, motion, and location are combined to create perception of a coherent object

binding object

the problem of explaining how an object’s individual features become bound together

feature integration theory

An approach to object perception (Anne Treisman), that proposes a sequence of stages in which features are first analyzed and then combined to result in perception of an object

pre-attentive stage

the first stage of Treisman’s feature integration theory, in which an object is analyzed into its features

focused attention stage

second stage of Treisman’s feature integration theory (attention causes the combination of features into perception of an object

illusory conjunction

a situation demonstrated in experiments (Anne Treisman), in which features from different objects are inappropriately combined.

Balint’s syndrome

a condition caused by brain damage in which a person has difficulty focusing attention on individual objects

conjunction search

searching among distractors for a target that involves 2+ features

ventral attention network

network that controls attention based on stimulus salience

dorsal attention network

network that controls attention based on top-down processing

effective connectivity

how easily activity can travel along a particular pathway between two structures

synchronization

occurs when neural responses become synchronized in time, so positive and negative responses occur at the same time with similar amplitudes

(synchronization may be responsible for enhanced effective connectivity and communication between two areas that accompany shifts of attention)

executive attention network

proposed neural network responsible for executive functions

executive function

number of processes that involve controlling attention and dealing with conflicting responses

cognitive control

a mechanism involved in dealing with conflicting stimuli; related to executive function, inhibitory control, and cognitive control

willpower

mechanism involved in dealing with conflicting stimuli; related to executive function, inhibitory control, and cognitive control

What is the commonality between the Helmholtz, regularities, and Bayesian approaches to perception?

These three approaches all have the idea that the environment plays an important role in our perception of objects.

The results of Gauthier’s “Greeble” experiment illustrate

an effect of experience-dependent plasticity.

Which of the following is true about Bayesian inference?

The probability of an outcome is determined by the prior probability and the likelihood of the outcome.

You are at a parade where there are a number of marching bands. You perceive the bands that are all in the same uniforms as being grouped together. The red uniforms are one band, the green uniforms another, and so forth. You have this perceptual experience because of the law of

similarity

Visualizing the following: an office, a department store clothing section, a lion, and a microscope, people tend to include more details in the scenes of the office and department store and less with the scenes of the lion and microscope. This is most likely because most individuals from modern society have less knowledge of

semantic regularities in those scenes.