Chapter 8: Cognition, Language, and Creativity

cognition

dealing with knowledge

experiential processing

unconscious, effortless, automatic

• ex. knowing if someone’s expression is happy or sad

reflective processing

deliberate, construction required, engaged

mental images

visual depiction in ones mind that can aid in thinking and decision making (in STM or WM)

concept

idea that represents category of events/objects

prototype

an example of an idealized model to compare others things to and to help identify concepts

language

words and/or symbols that allow for communication

phonemes

basic sounds of speech that words are made out of

morphemes

sounds of speech collected into meaningful units

• ex. syllables

grammar

set of rules when constructing sounds into words and words into sentences

syntax

rules for the order of words (changing word order changes sentence meaning)

transformation rules

use basic sentence and apply rules to change it to fit the scenario (present tense, past tense, question, negative, etc)

semantics

study of what meanings are held by words and language

denotative meaning

exact/dictionary definition

connotative meaning

subjective/emotional/personal meaning

linguistic relativity hypothesis

words reflect our thoughts but also have a hand in shaping them

algorithmic solution

following a series of step by step rules

logical thought

making conclusions on info based on explicit rules

inductive thought

specific facts are gathered from general concepts

• ex. inferring laws of gravity by watching many items fall

deductive thought

applying general concepts to specific situations

• ex. rules of gravity to single falling object

understanding (in problem solving)

deeper comprehension of a problem

general solution

defines what is needed to be successful, but lacks detail

functional solutions

workable, detailed solutions

heuristic

short-cut or “rule of thumb” for finding solution

random search strategy

a few possible solutions tried at random

insight

organizing problems mentally to find clear solutions

fixation (in problem solving)

getting hung up on incorrect solutions/alternatives (happens when we restrict our thinking)

functional fixedness

we usually think of an object in the context of its typical use

• ex. to combat this, one can use a dime as a screwdriver

intuition

rapid impulses that don’t contain logic

behavioral economics

decision making integrating costs & benefits

framing

structure of a problem (framing a question changes the nature of the choices and how they’re viewed)

availability heuristic

when asked likelihood of event, we search our LTM for answer

(if we can think of many examples, we assume event is very likely, even if it isn’t)

representativeness heuristic

we tend to assign more importance to a choice if it lines up with what we already know (judging if something belongs in class based on similarity to others members)

base rate

underlying probability of an event

choice overload

hard time choosing because there’s so many options

convergent thinking

one specific answer that is found when lines of thought come together

creativity

combine different mental elements and thoughts in new ways (contrasts convergent thinking)

divergent thinking

consideration of various possibilities from starting point (intuitive and associative)

3 parts of divergent thinking

1. fluency

2. flexibility

3. originality

fluency

in tests of creativity, total # of suggestions you’re able to make

flexibility

in tests of creativity, # of different types of solutions made

originality

in tests of creativity, how unique/novel one’s solutions are

problem finding

going out of your way to find more problems to solve (if you are more creative, you are more likely to tackle problems)

mental set

tendency to think of problems in rigid ways that blinds us to other possible solutions