AP Psych Unit 4 Cognition

Flashcards based on lecture notes about Memory, Cognition, and Language.

Broca’sArea

Controls language expression – an area of the frontal lobe that directs the muscle movements involved in speech. Example: Difficulty forming words after a brain injury.

Wernicke’sArea

Controls language reception – a brain area involved in language comprehension and expression. Example: Trouble understanding spoken language after a stroke.

LinguisticDeterminism

Whorf's hypothesis that language determines the way we think. Example: The idea that if a language has more words for snow, its speakers will perceive snow differently.

Memory

The persistence of learning over time through the encoding, storage, and retrieval of information. Example: Remembering the plot of a movie you saw last year.

Encoding

The processing of information into the memory system, such as by extracting meaning. Example: Remembering new vocabulary by relating it to something you already know.

Storage

The process of retaining encoded information over time. Example: Keeping a phone number in your mind for a few minutes.

Retrieval

The process of getting information out of memory storage. Example: Recalling the name of your first-grade teacher.

Processing

The processing of many aspects of a problem simultaneously; the brain’s natural mode of information processing. Example: Recognizing a friend's face even when they're in a crowd.

SensoryMemory

The immediate, very brief recording of sensory information in the memory system. Example: The brief image of something you see just for a moment.

Short-TermMemory

Activated memory that holds a few items briefly before the information is stored or forgotten. Example: Remembering a phone number long enough to dial it.

Long-TermMemory

The relatively permanent and limitless storehouse of the memory system, including knowledge, skills, and experiences. Example: Remembering events from your childhood.

WorkingMemory

A newer understanding of short-term memory that focuses on conscious, active processing of incoming information and retrieved information. Example: Using mental math to solve a problem.

ExplicitMemory

Memory of facts and experiences that one can consciously know and declare (also called declarative memory). Example: Remembering the capital of France.

EffortfulProcessing

Encoding that requires attention and conscious effort. Example: Studying for an exam.

AutomaticProcessing

Unconscious encoding of incidental information, such as space, time, frequency, and well-learned information. Example: Knowing how many times you've seen a certain commercial.

ImplicitMemory

Retention independent of conscious recollection (also called nondeclarative memory). Example: Knowing how to ride a bike.

IconicMemory

A momentary sensory memory of visual stimuli; a photographic or picture-image memory. Example: Briefly seeing a flash of light and remembering its shape.

EchoicMemory

A momentary sensory memory of auditory stimuli. Example: Briefly remembering what someone just said, even if you weren't paying attention.

Chunking

Organizing items into familiar, manageable units; often occurs automatically. Example: Remembering a phone number as three chunks of numbers.

Mnemonics

Memory aids, especially techniques that use vivid imagery and organizational devices. Example: Using acronyms to remember a list of items.

SpacingEffect

The tendency for distributed study or practice to yield better long-term retention than massed study or practice. Example: Studying a little bit each day rather than cramming the night before.

TestingEffect

Enhanced memory after retrieving, rather than simply rereading information. Example: Taking practice tests instead of just rereading notes.

ShallowProcessing

Encoding on a basic level based on the structure or appearance of words. Example: Remembering if a word was in uppercase or lowercase.

DeepProcessing

Encoding semantically, based on the meaning of the words; tends to yield the best retention. Example: Understanding what a word means and relating it to your own experiences.

Hippocampus

Helps process explicit memories for storage. Example: Remembering where you parked your car.

FlashbulbMemory

A clear memory of an emotionally significant moment or event. Example: Remembering exactly where you were and what you were doing when you heard about a major news event.

Long-TermPotentiation

An increase in a cell’s firing potential after brief, rapid stimulation; believed to be a neural basis for learning and memory. Example: How neurons strengthen their connections after repeated stimulation.

Recall

A measure of memory in which the person must retrieve information learned earlier. Example: Answering an essay question on a test.

Recognition

A measure of memory in which the person need only identify items previously learned. Example: Answering a multiple-choice question on a test.

Relearning

A measure of memory that assesses the amount of time saved when learning material again. Example: Learning a song faster the second time around.

Priming

The activation, often unconsciously, of particular associations in memory. Example: Hearing the word 'doctor' and thinking of the word 'nurse'.

Mood-CongruentMemory

The tendency to recall experiences that are consistent with one's current mood. Example: Feeling sad and remembering other sad times in your life.

SerialPositionEffect

Our tendency to recall best the last (recency effect) and first items (primacy effect) in a list. Example: Remembering the first and last few items on a grocery list.

AnterogradeAmnesia

An inability to form new memories. Example: Not being able to remember events after an accident.

RetrogradeAmnesia

An inability to retrieve information from one's past. Example: Forgetting events that happened before an accident.

ProactiveInterference

The disruptive effect of prior learning on the recall of new information. Example: Having trouble learning a new phone number because you keep remembering your old one.

RetroactiveInterference

The disruptive effect of new learning on the recall of old information. Example: Forgetting your old password after learning a new one.

Repression

In psychoanalytic theory, the basic defense mechanism that banishes anxiety-arousing thoughts, feelings, and memories from consciousness. Example: Not remembering a traumatic event from childhood.

MisinformationEffect

Incorporating misleading information into one's memory of an event. Example: Remembering a car crash differently after hearing others describe it.

SourceAmnesia

Attributing to the wrong source an event we have experienced, heard about, read about, or imagined. Example: Thinking you remembered something from your childhood when it was actually something your sibling told you.

DéjàVu

The eerie sense that “I’ve experienced this before,” triggered by cues from the current situation. Example: Feeling like you've been in a specific place before, even if you haven't.

Cognition

The mental activities associated with thinking, knowing, remembering, and communicating. Example: Solving a crossword puzzle.

Concept

A mental grouping of similar objects, events, ideas, or people. Example: Thinking of all types of chairs when you hear the word 'chair'.

Prototype

A mental image or best example of a category. Example: Thinking of a robin when you think of a bird.

Creativity

The ability to produce novel and valuable ideas. Example: Inventing a new type of toy.

ConvergentThinking

Narrows the available problem solutions to determine the single best solution. Example: Taking a multiple-choice test.

DivergentThinking

Expands the number of possible problem solutions (creative thinking that diverges in different directions). Example: Brainstorming ideas for a project.

Algorithm

A methodical, logical rule or procedure that guarantees solving a particular problem. Example: Following a recipe to bake a cake.

Heuristic

A simple thinking strategy that often allows us to make judgments and solve problems efficiently but is more error-prone than algorithms. Example: Looking for the bread isle when you enter the grocery store.

Insight

A sudden realization of a problem's solution. Example: Suddenly understanding a joke.

ConfirmationBias

A tendency to search for information that supports our preconceptions and to ignore or distort contradictory evidence. Example: Only reading news sources that confirm your existing beliefs.

MentalSet

A tendency to approach a problem in one particular way, often a way that has been successful in the past. Example: Always using the same route to get to work, even if there's a faster way.

Intuition

An effortless, immediate, automatic feeling or thought, as contrasted with explicit, conscious reasoning. Example: Having a gut feeling about something.

RepresentativenessHeuristic

Judging the likelihood of things in terms of how well they seem to represent, or match, particular prototypes. Example: Assuming someone is a librarian because they are quiet and wear glasses.

AvailabilityHeuristic

Estimating the likelihood of events based on their availability in memory. Example: thinking that car accidents are more common than diabetes because you see them on the news more often.

Overconfidence

The tendency to be more confident than correct – to overestimate the accuracy of our beliefs and judgments. Example: Thinking you know more about a topic than you actually do.

BeliefPerseverance

Clinging to one's initial conceptions after the basis on which they are formed has been discredited. Example: Still believing something even after being presented with facts that disprove it.

Framing

The way an issue is posed; how an issue is framed can significantly affect decisions and judgments. Example: Being more likely to buy something that's '90% fat-free' than something that 'contains 10% fat'.

Language

Our spoken, written, or signed words and the ways we combine them to communicate meaning. Example: Writing a letter to a friend.

Phoneme

In language, the smallest distinctive sound unit. Example: The 'k' sound in 'cat'.

Morpheme

In a language, the smallest unit that carries meaning; may be a word or a part of a word. Example: The word 'unbreakable'.

Grammar

In a language, a system of rules that enables us to communicate with and understand others. Example: Knowing that adjectives usually come before nouns in English.

BabblingStage

Beginning at about 4 months, the stage of speech development in which the infant spontaneously utters various sounds. Example: A baby saying 'ah-goo'.

One-WordStage

The stage in speech development, from about age 1 to 2, during which a child speaks mostly in single words. Example: A child saying 'juice'.

Two-WordStage

Beginning about age 2, the stage in speech development during which a child speaks mostly two-word statements. Example: A child saying 'want juice'.

What is Wernicke’s area?

Early speech stage in which a child speaks like a telegram – using mostly nouns and verbs. Example: