Fundamentals of Cognition Test 1

structuralism

inspired by natural science, mental processes can be broken down and studied scientifically, William Wundt, studied using reaction time and introspection, brings standardized methods and repeated testing to modern psych

Gestalt Psychology

The mind is more than the sum of its parts, gestalt is german for whole, against reducing consciousness to elements

functionalism

comes from Darwin theory of evolution, how do dif aspects of human behavior help us survive and thrive (structuralism → functionalism) ID contents of mind to processes of the mind (what does the mind do and how does it help adapt to the environment) William James, also agiants reducing consciousness to elements, important to clinical psych- study where processes go wrong

Behaviorism

Movement to stop focusing on introspection and the internal mind, instead focuses on observable behavior rather than invisible internal events, John Watson (Little Albert) BF Skinner, Skinner Box

How does behavior change in response to stimuli?

Cons: limited to animal study, cannot explain complex cognition, overlooks complex human motivation

Classical Conditioning

Creates an association between 2 previously unconnected things in case of Pavlov’s dogs, unconditioned stimulus (food) with neutral stimulus (bell), over time, bell becomes associated with food, and the neutral stimulus (bell) creates same effect as unconditioned stimulus (food) like when TUPD feeds us

Operant Conditioning

forms association between behavior and good and bad outcomes

positive punishment: ADDING something bad, behavior decrease

negative punishment: TAKING something good, behavior decrease

positive reinforcement: ADDING something good (reward), behavior increase)

negative reinforcement: TAKING SOMETHING BAD, behavior increase

positive punishment

ADDING something bad (being tazed) decreases behavior

negative punishment

TAKING something good (no more phone), decreases behavior

Positive Reinforcement

ADDING something good (reward), increases behavior

negative reinforcement

TAKING AWAY something bad (tazer stops), decreases behavior

Skinner Box

Used for operant condition, reinforcement of behavior to shape it when animal press lever, reward, positive reinforcement

Cognitive Revolution

People realize that the mind is more complex than behaviorism would lead to believe- Ulric Neisser writes COgnitive Psychology, called father of cognitive psych

Tollman’s maze proves that behaviorism/ reward not the only explanation for learning

chomsky refutes skinner’s idea that language is solely a result of positive parental reinforcement, does not account for the creativity of language

Claude shannon pioneers info processing approach, looking at the mind as if a computer

Tollman’s maze

Rats in maze for 10 days, one group has a reward every day, one group has no reward, 3rd group had no reward until 10th day, navigated maze as fast as rats who had reward every day (learning isn’t solely facilitated by reward/ stim/resp pairing)

dualism

descartes-mind exists outside of the body (soul)

materialism

Mind is perfectly contained within the body

Hebb: “Behavior and neural function are perfectly correlated… one is completely caused by the other”

Marr’s Three levels of analysis

computational: What is the goal of the cognitive process being carried out?

algorithmic: What are the set of rules/ steps associated with the process?

implementation: How are the rules/ steps carried out in the brain?

Computational level of analysis

What is the goal of the cognitive process being carried out?

Algorithmic Level of Analysis

What are the set of rules/ steps associated with the process?

implementation Level of Analysis

How are the rules/ steps/ the whole process being carried out in the brain?

Functional Specialization

Specific areas of the brain have different functions

Hindbrain

houses stuff that is essential for basic life function keeps you legit alive

Midbrain

coordinates movement, pain regulation, relays auditory infor

Forebrain

high level cognition, motor control, sensory input and integration

Parts of the Forebrain

Cerebral cortex: wrinkly outer layer

2 hemipsheres, left and right

4 lobes- temporal, parietal, occipital, frontal (percepTion and memory, movement/motor control, vision, high level cognition)

Frontal Lobe

Thinking, planning, decision making

Parietal lobe

sensory integration, motor control

Temporal

Perception and memory

occipital lobe

vision

thalamus

sensory relay station, sleep, Lateral Geniculate Nucleus first stop for visual pathway

Hypothalamus

hormones, regulates behaviors related to essential biological needs

Limbic system

amygdala and hippocampus

Amygdala

emotional processing (emotions impact memory)

Hippocampus

Memory and learning (encoding)

Lateralization

certain aspects of cognition are more centralized on one side of brain than other left brain, languages, right brain, spatial reasoning) the two halves of the brain are connected by corpus callosum (commisure) and organized contralaterally

Primary Motor projection area

place where signals leave brain to tell muscles what to do ***departure points

posterior frontal lobe, more cortical coverage= more dexterity, our bodies are not evenly covered, some parts more dexterous than others

Primary Sensory Projection area

arrival point for sensory info to be processed

Somatosensory area: skin sensations

primary auditory cortex: audio sensation

Primary visual cortex: visual sensations \

organized spatially, contralaterally, and by function rather than anotomical proportion

association areas

take raw sensory data and put it into context so that we can understand it- damage may result in

APRAXIA: problems with voluntary motion

AGNOSIA: Problems IDing objects (like agriculture)

APHASIA: problems with language (broca’s= broken speech, wernicke’s= wack speech)

UNILATERAL NEGLECT SYNDROME: half of the visual world is ignored

APRAXIA

problems with voluntary motion due to damage of an association area

AGNOSIA

problems with identifying objects (like agriculture) due to damage of an association area

APHASIA

problems with language- BROCA’S- broken speech, WERNICKE”S- wack/ weird speech

Neurons

cell in the nervous system that relies on chemical and electrical signals to transmit information- comprimsed of soma, synapse, axon, axon terminal, send neurotransmitters, dendrites, cells made of myelin sheath

Glia

helper cells of neural system form myelin sheath

Name the lobes

A= parietal

B= frontal

C= temporal

D= occipital

synaptic plasticity

neurons that fire together wire together- connections can strengthen and weaken over time in response to activity

synaptic pruning

use it or lose it

Neuron coding

how the brain translates sensory info and thoughts into electrical impulses:

Temporal coding: speed of transmissions

Spatial coding: area of neurons that fire

certain neurons are specialzed only fire to express certain topics

Neuroimaging evaluation criteria

Spatial resolution: does its how where

Temporal resolution: does it show when

Invasive: does someone have to be hurt in the process

CT scan

Computed tomography- slices of x-ray taken at dif angles, good spatial, no temporal, slice of body/ brain

PET scan

positron emission tomography: radioactive glucose tracked in brain (goes towards areas that are at work) good spatial

MRI

Magnetic resonance imaging- uses magnetic properties of atom to create highly detailed images of the brain

fMRI

functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging- tracks flow of oxygen and blood in brain, good spatial, bad temporal

Single Cell Recording

implanted electrode tracks firing patterns of single neuron, awesome spatial and temporal resolution, buy on a unicellular level and very invasive

EEG

Electroencephalogram: electrodes placed all over skull, record changes in electric activity, good temporal, bad spatial (there is cheering in a stadium but we are outside and can’t see where or why)

HUMAN EYE

comprised of cornea, lens, iris, retina, fovea, optic nerve

VISUAL PATHWAY

LIGHT→ CORNEA AND LENS→ RETINA→ OPTIC NERVE→ LATERAL GENICULATE NUCLEUS (THALAMUS)→ PRIMARY VISUAL CORTEX (OCCIPITAL LOBE) ALSO, WHERE AND WHAT SYSTEMS (TEMP= WHAT, PARI=WHERE) LIKE WHERE’S PERRY\

from retina: photoreceptors→ bipolar cells → ganglion cells

CORNEA PLUS LENS

work like camera to focus image, muscles bulge the lens to zoom in like a camera, flatter for further away

iris

determines amount of light let in, dilates pupil etc

retina

where image is refracted onto, fovea in very center only has cones

photoreceptors

specialized neurons that respond to incoming light, 2 types, rods and conesro

rods

photoreceptor that picks up low light levels

cones

detect color, detail, do not work in low light situations

lateral inhibition

stimulated neurons will inhibit the neurons that are next to them, making the edges of these clusters of stimulated neurons the least inhibited, resulting in edge enhancement- brain’s version of a sharpening filter

receptive fields

region/ type of sensory input that a specific neuron can pick up on- many types, some pick up on vertical lines, some horizontal, some motion and direction, some corners

Center surround cells

fire strongest when stimulated in center and only center (if stimmed on center and outside, will fire at rate as if had not been simulated at all)

parallel processing in the visual system

Visual processing is divide and conquer, data begins being processed immediately from variety of different places, allows us to reinterpret what we see after gaining more info (think we see person, really just a shadow)

what system

temporal lobe- id’s what we are seeing- damage leads to visual agnosia, pathway connecting occipital lobe and inferotemporal cortex

where system

“where’s pari” parietal lobe, aids in perception of objects location (if damaged difficulties in reaching for things) occipital lobe and posterior parietal cortex

cognitively penetrable

what we sense can be influenced by our thoughts, beliefs, kmowledge, expectations

visual illusion

our brain makes compensations for size, brightness etc, sometimes unnecessarily, resulting in illusion

bottom up processing

data first, use raw sensory data to draw a conclusion

top down processing

driven by prior knowledge and experience to interpret new info

gestalt principles

assumptions we make about what we see- similarity, proximity, simplicity, good continuation, closure

similarity

WE group things that look similar together

proximity

we place objects that are close together in groups

good continuation

objects that are intersected by another and fall into the background are assumed to continue

closure

we prioritize seeing whole images over lines grouped together (our mins fill in the blank spaces to create the shape) simpl

simplicity

we would rather see two overlapping simple shapes than one weird one

object segmentation

how we separate an object form other objects/ foregound background

depth perception

guided by monocular and binocular cues

monocular depth cues

linear perspective (parallel lines appear to veer together) textual gradient (more detail plus texture close, less far away), interposition- objects in front closer, motion parallax- when moving head, closer objects will move more than ones that are further away

binocular depth cues

for things that are less than 20 feet away, brain can triangulate angles that both eyes see image at to figure out depth of objects

Color and wavelength

light is a form of electromagnetic energy that travels in waves, colors are determined by wavelength

perceptual constancy

our brain makes adjustment for brightness, size, and angle in order to perceive things consistently/ fairly

trichromatic theory of color

theory for how color is processed in the mind- 3 types of cones, red, green, blue, cones are activated by different frequencies, and activate in combinations that are interpreted as colors (for orange, red and green receptors would fire but not really blue) this theory is proved by color blindness (red-green color blind would make sense if you were missing red or green cones and therefore could not tell difference) di chromats plus monochromats

opponent process theory of color

we perceive colors in three opposing pairs: red vs. Green, blue vs. yellow, black vs. white, same neurons that activate when seeing blue will deactivate when seeing yellow, allowing the brain to figure out which color is being seen by look at activation and deactivation- proven by afterimage optical illusion- looking at one color for long time causes those neurons to fatigue, when shown a white screen (mix of all colors) the opposing pairs will send strong signals, in compared to their opposing pair’s weak ones

face inversion effect

we are significantly worse at recognizing faces when they are inverted because it messes with our ability to view them holistically

facial recognition

depends on orientation, inversion, ability to view them holistically, rather than how we can id an object based on a single part

object vs facial recognition

facial recognition relies on holistic processing, and is much more successful when not viewed at an angle, object recognition is far less holistic, objects can be recognized from their parts- more feature based. Facial recognition is more relationship based/ ratio based- how indiv features interact to make a whole