APPSYCH UNIT 2-COGNITION AND INTELLIGENCE

Perception

being able to interpret sensory information and make it meaningful

Bottom-Up Processing

Build - Up. When you can sense what is happening but can perceive it. (ex. People speaking in a language that you can hear but can’t understand)

Top-Down Processing

Think - Down. When you can sense and perceive information and make it meaningful (ex. People speaking in a language that you can hear and can understand)

Schemas

Category

Perceptual Set

mental predisposition to percieve on thing and not another; effects top down processing

Attention

the focus a persons brain can devote to one task

Selective Attention

awarness on a particular stimulus (why we can’t multitask)

Cocktail Party Effect

being able to distinctly hear and focus of one voice among many voices

Inattentional Blindness

failing to see visual changes when we are focused on one stimulus

Change Blindness

failure to notice changes in one’s environment

Gestalt Psychology

brain filters and constructs information into perception

Closure

filling in the gaps

Figure and Ground (figure-ground)

orgainization of the visual field into objects (figures) that stand out from their surroundings (ground)

Grouping

putting similar things together to make remembering easier

Proximity

making a group based on objects proximity to each other (II II II → three groups of two even though there is just six lines)

Similarity

grouping similar objects

Depth Perception

ability to see objects in three dimension

Visual Cliff

tested if a person is born with perception or if it is learned. They found that people are born with it because

Binocular Cues

depth cue that depends on both eyes

Convergence

binocular cues that combines images from both eyes

Retinal Disparity

compares retinal images from each eyes and the bigger the disparity, the closer the object

Monocular Cues

depth cues available to either eye on its own (for far objects)

Relative Clarity

far objects are hazy and blurry & near objects are clear and sharp

Relative Size

the depth cue in which we perceive distance based on the comparison of sizes between objects (assume smaller one is farther away)

Texture Gradient

from far away an object will look smooth even if it is rough when you touch it

Linear Perspective

parallel lines appear to meet in distance & a sharper convergence = increased perceived distance

Interposition

If one object blocks the view of another, the one that blocks is perceived as closer

Perceptual Constancies

top down processes that makes an object seem unchanging

Color Constancy

similar objects = same color, even if wavelengths (actual color) differs

Perceptual Adaptation

ability to adust to a changed sensory input

Apparent Motion

two individual shapes may be perceived as a moving object if they are presented one after the other within a short time span

Stroboscopic Movement

illusion of continuous movement experienced when viewing a rapidly moving series of slightly varying images

Phi Phenomenon

illusion when two or more adjacent objects blink in rapid succession

Autokinetic Effect

illusionary movement of still spotlight in dark room

Cognition

thinking

Metacognition

thinking about your thinking

Concept

stereotype of a topic

Prototype

what we think of when we think of an object (apples are supposed to be red)

Assimilation

interpretation based on existing schemas

Accommodation

adapting current schemas to fit new information

Executive Functions

thinking, remembering etc

Algorithm

long way of thinking. Methodical, not prone to mistakes

Heuristic

shortcut that is more prone to mistakes

Representativeness Heuristic

judging based on how well it matched prototypes

Availability Heuristic

thinging based on what is readily available in our head

Mental Set

tendency to approach a problem in a way that is familiar and has been successful in the past

Priming

warming up brain to do an action (after hearing salt, most people think of pepper because of salt & pepper)

Framing

how questions are framed to elicit a certain response

Nudge

choices that encourages beneficial decision making

Gambler’s Fallacy

unconscious representative heuristic

Sunk-Cost Fallacy

stick to original topic even if the other topic is easier

Functional Fixedness

fixed in the way one does things and there isn’t another way to do it

Insight

aha moment. After failing a bunch, looking at the problem differently

Confirmation Bias

looking for information that confirms your belief and ignoring information that challenges it.

Fixation

fixated that one’s belief is correct and no one else is

Intuition

gut feeling

Overconfidence

believing that you are so right (walking into a test think u know everything and then getting the results and you didn’t know everything)

Belief Perseverance

if you believe in something you won’t really look at the other side, even if the other side is better (politics)

Creativity

thinking of unorthodox ideas

Divergent Thinking

expanding the number of possible solutions; many interpretations (brainstorming)

Convergent Thinking

narrowing available problem solutions to determine best solution (aptitude tests)

Memory

brians storage of information/ events

Explicit Memory

thoughtful/ effortful is not automatic

Episodic Memory

experienced events

Semantic Memory

facts and general knowledge

Implicit Memory

automatic, doesn’t take conscious thought

Procedural Memory

routine (brushing your teeth)

Prospective Memory

remembering to do something

Neurogenesis

formation of new neural connections from sleep, exercise & non stressful stimulating enviorments

Long-Term Potentiation (LTP)

increase in a nerve cells firing potential after breif rapid stimulation; neural basis for learning and memory

Working Memory

memory while working, what you think about during a task (grocery shopping)

Visuospatial Sketchpad

hold an objects appearance and location (briefly)

Long-Term Memory

information that has been fully encoded and can be retrieved at a later time

Sensory Memory

brief memory is usually forgotten (smelling perfume in stores)

Central Executive

memory component that coordinates activities of phonological loop & visual sketchpad

Phonological Loop

holds auditory information (briefly)

Iconic Memory

the memory of visual information after looking at it, or being able to visualize writing on a paper when you think of it. VERY BRIEF

Echoic Memory

auditory memory, allows a person to remember words another person said after they said it. A little longer than iconic

Shallow Processing

processing based on surface characteristics

Deep Processing

making information stick through repetition and metacognition

Automatic Processing

implicit, doesn’t require conscious thought

Effortful Processing

explicit, requires conscious thought (comphreheding a book)

Encoding

processing information

Storing

storing info in short or long term memory

Retrieval

remembering information from long term memory

Structural Processing

when we remember only the physical quality of the word

Phonemic Processing

remembering the word by the way it sounds

Semantic Processing

remembering the words meaning

Mnemonic Devices

words or phrases that help one remember concepts that are difficult to remember

Method of Loci

associating physical places with information (people do when giving a speech)

Chunking

like grouping (chunking specific concepts together to make learning easier)

Categories

stereotypes, how you think of subjects

Hierarchies

a system or structure in which elements are ranked or organized in order of importance or level (how brain decides what was important)

The Spacing Effect

rehearsing intermittently, not all at once

Massed Practice

learning procedure in which practice periods for an activity are not separated by any rest periods or are separated by short rest periods only.

Distributed Practice

like spacing effect

Serial Position Effect

remembering things that came first and last but not in the middle

Primacy Effect

remembering stuff toward the beginning of a list (bun)

Recency Effect

remembering stuff toward the end of a list (carrot)

Short-Term Memory

memory that hold information