Psych GRE: Thinking

What type of thinking is used to figure out the solution to a math problem?

convergent thinking

Convergent thinking is used when there is one solution to a particular problem

What type of thinking is used when figuring out alternate sources of energy?

divergent thinking

Divergent thinking is used if there are multiple solutions to a problem or if there is a dissenter to a particular way of thinking

What is a term used for the understanding of how things generally go?

scripts

For a birthday party, a script might include decorations, guests, cake, etc.

Concepts

Concepts are the way we represent the connectedness of two or more items or ideas

ex: a coat is an item of clothing etc.

Why would psychologists be interested in algorigthms?

Algorithms are one way of solving problems, which is a way to study how the brain works.

Algorithms are an exhaustive problem solving search that go through every possible answer in order to find the correct one. The harder the problem, the more impractical it is for our brains to use algorithms.

What is heuristic? What are its benefits and drawbacks?

A heuristic is a way of solving a problem that uses common sense, rules of thumb, or educated guesses. It is not always accurate, but it is faster than an algorithm.

What is an availability heuristic?

When you use an availability heuristic, you judge the first things that come to mind as the most important because they are more salient.

How can a representativeness heuristic lead to stereotyping?

Representativeness heuristics take information we have already conceptualized with prototypes and apply them to all situations to make a judgment.

If your prototype of a specific group is negative because of one person in that group, it could lead to incorrectly stereotyping the whole group.

How might the idea of functional fixedness hinder innovation?

Functional fixedness is our tendency to see objects or concepts as they were learned.

This cements them in place in our minds so we may be unable to find alternative, innovative uses for these objects or concepts.

Describe the James-Lange theory of emotion.

This theory asserts that changes in physiological states occur before and result in emotion.

Which theory of emotion, as a response to the James-Lange theory asserts that the physiological response to emotion and the experience of emotion occur simultaneously in response to emotion-provoking stimuli?

the Cannon-Bard theory of emotion (or emergency theory)

What are the two factors of Schachter and Singer's two factor theory of emotion?

1. physiological arousal

2. how we cognitively label the experience of arousal

What is top-down processing?

Top-down processing uses information, particularly larger concepts, we already have in our brains to fill in gaps in the things we see. It can frequently overrule the more primitive areas of our brains.

Building perception of an object by mentally compiling all of its features is called what?

bottom-up processing or feature analysis

This is slower than top-down processing, but it more thorough and less prone to mistakes, and is data driven.

Why does it take longer to name the color of words when they are a different color than the text name than if the colors and the words were congruent?

The stroop effect causes a semantic interference between the color we see and the word we read, slowed response time.

What is "thinking about thinking" known as?

metacognition

What kind of thought is this: John was the only one in the room when the lamp got broken. Therefore, John must have broken the lamp.

This is an example of deductive reasoning. There is a specific conclusion to be gleaned from the information available.

How does deductive reasoning differ from inductive reasoning?

With deductive reasoning, information leads to a single conclusion.

With inductive reasoning, the specificity of information leads to larger, more general rules.

What are some logical reasoning errors?

-confirmation bias

-semantic effect

-atmosphere effect

If your mother accuses you of something and then uses every aspect of your arguments and body language to prove that you did it, what logical reasoning error is she using?

She is employing confirmation bias, which looks for any piece of evidence (even if it's wrong) to confirm a belief or solution to a problem.

How might the atmosphere effect prevent you from proper reasoning?

The atmosphere effect is a logical reasoning error in which the phrasing of information affects how a conclusion is made.

Ex: "how fast was the car going when it bumped into the pole?" vs "how fast was the car going when it slammed into the pole?"

In psychological terms, what is the "eureka!" moment called, when a new perspective comes from the information available?

insight

How is cognitive processing often measured?

It is measured by reaction time, which is also called latency

Who suggested that people can say two similar items or concepts are related more quickly than they can say two dissimilar items or concepts are unrelated?

Elizabeth Loftus and Allan Collins

They suggest that semantically similar items or concepts are grouped together in memory.

What is it that Allan Collins and Ross Quinlan suggest it takes longer to find a link between loosely associated stimuli than closely associated stimuli?

They believe that we have cognitive semantic hierarchies that we search when finding connections. The longer it takes to determine the relatedness of the stimuli, the farther apart they must be in the hierarchy.

What is the term for the search of cognitive semantic hierarchies?

parallel distributive processing or connectionism

How does semantic priming reduce latency in word-recognition tasks?

Semantic priming exposes a participant to a particular word without their awareness, and it more quickly recalled later because it has been activated in the semantic hierarchy.

What is the term for processing that is contained within a larger organizational process, thus happening without additional cognitive effort?

automatic processing

How can information processing be measured while a participant is reading?

eye movement and gaze durations

What are saccades?

movements of the eye between fixation points

Which of the following is most commonly associated with creative thinking?

divergent thinking

How do hypotheses inform our ideas of concepts?

Hypotheses allow us to test our existing ideas of relatedness, helping us to form new concepts or strengthen the concepts we already have.

How can a mental set help or hinder the attempt to solve a problem?

A mental set can be a good framework for solving future problems because it uses existing notions, but it can hinder problem solving by introducing rigidity and refusal to look at other possible ways to reach an outcome.

What is an organized pattern of ideas, framing the way we see the world called?

schema

Schemas (or schemata) are formed by existing understandings of how the world works. New information either fits into the existing schema or changes it.

Convergent and divergent thinking were first defined by

J.P. Guilford

Convergent thinking is necessary when there is a single solution to a problem.

Divergent thinking is helpful when there are multiple creative outcomes or solutions to a problem.

The process of interpreting new information in terms of an existing schema is termed

assimilation