Perception-Cognition Exam #1

Behaviorism

people are environmentally driven and shared by nature, this view dominated USA from 1900s-1940s, only measure was behavior and relied on rigorous scientific methods with no concern for internal mechanisms

Pavlov

Classical Conditioning

Stimulus Response

conditioned the dogs

Watson

Behaviorist Manifesto

Little Albert experiment

humans can be classically conditioned

thinking is subvocating

Thorndike

Connectionism

Animals and puzzle boxes

Skinner

Radical Behaviorism

Positive reinforcement in education

operant conditioning

Turn away from Behaviorism

Came from how children learned words/phrases but used them incorrectly either in turns of grammar or creating their own sentence (I hate you mommy!)

Cognitive maps

how animals can remember a layout like a maze

Bandura

learning can be modeled or socialized by watching someone else do it (like watching an adult beat the shit out of a boba doll)

Confirmation Bias

Selectively seeing results/science to see what we want to see

Probabilistic Reasoning

complex and ever-changing problems that need reasoning

Availability Heuristics

What is more available to you will be more used (Sharks may be seen as more dangerous then horses when horses are indeed more dangerous)

Post-Mortem Analysis

studying the brain after a person dies, used to be the only way to see the brain

Patient Tan

person who could only speak in words like tan and through postmortem analysis a specific part of the brain was found to be affected

Brain Scan

can look at lesions, tumors, etc..

Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (TMS)

can disrupt brain functions for medicinal or research purposes

Electrical Recordings

record electrical brain activity

EEG

measures electrical brain activity

MRI

looks at structure of the brain with magnets

X-Rays

look at structure of body with radiation

Computer Tomography

3-D scan of brain and used functionally

Subtraction Method

Activation during task-Activation during control=Activation involved in a task

Positron Emission Tomography (PET)

injects radiation in body and then put under PET scanner to see where blood is going

Functional MRI (fMRI)

dissects magnetic property of blood and is similar to PET scan

MEG

measures the magnetic field coming off your brain

Parts of a Neuron

Soma-cell body and contains nucleus and all info

Dendrites-receive info from other sensory cell and can develop new dendrites

Axon-sends and transmits signal

Myelin Sheath-like white matter in brain

Terminal Button-where neuron stores neurotransmitters and then sends it via synaptic connection

Acetylcholine

is associated with arousal, sleep, memories, dsyregulation associated with memory loss and Alzheimers. Is the ONLY neurotransmitter to connect motor neuron to motor cells, nicotine can mimic acetylcholine

SSRI

Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitor, drug used for those with mental health issues

Dopamine

nuerotransmitter for behaviors, reinforces behaviors and associated with addiction because the reward circuit becomes conditioned to drink, gamble, etc.. and associated with movement and planning with lack of dopamine associated with parkinson (too little) and schizophrenia (too much)

Serotonin

Mood regulation and regulation of aggression and impulsivity, eating and driving behaviors

Midbrain

reticular activating system which monitors and regulates consciousness, heartbeat, breathing regulation (also includes the substantial nigra and colliculus)

Hindbrain

Includes Periaqueductal Grey Matter and Pons+Cerebellum, associated with fight or flight, defensiveness, startling, reflexes and coordination with body

Basil Ganglia

motor coordination and planning

Limbic System (Forebrain)

associated with emotions, reading people, memory/learning, fear reflexes, emotional stability

Hippocampus

involved in new and explicit memories

Thalamus

relay station between cortex and nest of brain, dysfunction linked to schizophrenia

Hypothalamus

controls fighting, fleeing, feeding, and fucking

Endocrine system

hormonal system in hypothalamus

Cerebral cortex

linked to speech

Parietal lobe

front area is a sensory strip, behind is involved with spatial relationships

Temporal Lobe

language comprehension, auditory processing, object recognition

Occipital Lobe

just processes visual things

Perception

how your brain processes sensory information

Top-Down Processing

Beliefs expectations impose structure on raw stimuli

Bottom-Up Processing

constructing a perceptual experience from parts of sensory

Linear Perspective

perceive depth with parallel lines

Relative size

comparative things look different depending on background

Proximity

if they look like they do go together then we group them together which is based on space

Similarity

how we group things together

Continuity

we will see connection even if there is none

Closure

our mind uses dead spaces and gaps and fills them in

Symmetry

pairing things together due to shape, size, and orientation

Size Constancy and Shape Constancy

Size Constancy: things look bigger when closer and smaller when further away

Shape Constancy: if you look at things from different angles we know its shape

Color Constancy

depending on background, colors can look different even if there the same (grey checkerboard thingy)

Sensory Adaption

our senses normalize common senses so it doesn’t alert you as much

Change Blindness

when focusing on busy scenes you may not notice other changes

Inattentional Blindness

you don’t recognize changes or even know it was there the whole time

Agnosia

problems with attention of..

Spatial Neglect

you perceive but can’t attend to certain things (like certain people with their left side of vision)

Target, Distraction, Hit

Target: what your looking for

Distraction: everything else in the environment/situation

Hit: when you find the target/s

Correct Rejection, False Alarm, Miss

Correct Rejection: looking but target was not there

False Alarm: when you think you’ve found the target but it was not the target

Miss: when you can’t find the target but it was there

Feature Search

distractors don’t matter because the target has a very specific feature (red X in a sea of blue T)

Conjunction

multiple features are needed to find a target (blue X that is sideways and has stripes, etc..)

Parallel and Serial Search

Parallel Search: searching a scene all at the same time

Serial Search: searching element by element to find a target

Feature Integration Theory

How we attend to our environment to find our targets

Step 1: Parallel Processing of Features or first seeing if the target pops out with a scan of environment

Step 2: Serial Processing of combination where if a scan does not work then you slow down and hunt for your target feature by feature

Filer Attention

Deciding which information we should or shouldn’t pay attention to

Broadbents Model of Selective Attention

Treismans Attenuation Model

Late-Filter Model

Spotlight Attention

solely focusing on a task, helps improve mental processing, being ‘in the zone’

Binding Attention

keeping our attention locked and putting our attention and memory together to complete a task 

Divided attention

trying to focus on multiple things at once, not always a bad thing like driving and reading signs on the road

Controlled Task

tasks that require/are accessible to conscious control (like when first learning something like tying your shoe)

Automaticity

ability to perform same task with little to no conscious attention

Automatic Processes

-concealed from consciousness

-unintentional

-use few attentional resources

Automatization

Process of a controlled process becoming automatic (reading)

The Stroop Effect

showing colors that match the word and then showing words with different colored ink to measure response times 

Dual Task

doing two tasks at once and seeing if they interfere while single task is doing one thing

Priming

seeing images or situations that prime your subconscious which influence how you act 

Tip of the Tongue Blindsight

its hard to bring something to our consciousness and we don’t have as much access to out subconscious as we think