Cognition: History, Memory, and Pattern Recognition (Chapter 1)

Vocabulary flashcards covering key terms and concepts from the lecture notes on cognition, memory, sensory memory, and pattern recognition.

Diogenes of Apollonia

Ancient Greek philosopher (c. 500 BCE) who first shifted focus toward cognition and proposed air as the vehicle for cognition; credited with an early form of common sense.

common sense

Originating concept attributed to Diogenes; an early idea about cognitive reasoning dating back to 500 BCE.

wax tablets

Plato’s memory metaphor: memories are imprinted like wax tablets and recalled unchanged; memory viewed as static.

Plato

Ancient Greek philosopher who searched for universal principles and believed understanding required encountering many particular instances.

universal principles

Plato’s goal of identifying underlying qualities by examining many instances.

dog-example (Plato)

Plato’s method to understand dogness by attempting to encounter every dog in the world (or in his locale).

Aristotle

Ancient Greek philosopher who argued that sampling many instances suffices to understand concepts; introduced the doctrine of association.

doctrine of association

Aristotle’s claim that mental connections arise through contiguity, similarity, and contrast.

contiguity

Association by proximity in time and space.

similarity

Association by likeness or conceptual likeness.

contrast

Association by opposites (e.g., up vs. down) and related directional differences.

Saint Augustine memory stomach

Medieval claim that memory resides in the stomach; an example of early, incorrect memory localization.

Hobbes

17th-century philosopher who helped revive Aristotelian ideas about cognition in modern thought.

Locke

17th-century philosopher who rediscovered and discussed association ideas, contributing to cognitive thinking.

psychophysics

German tradition studying the thresholds at which stimuli are detectable; maps physical stimuli to perception.

Wilhelm Hunt

Early figure who established the first psychology laboratory and contributed to early cognitive discussion (note: the notes spell as Hunt).

behaviorism

Early 20th-century focus on observable behavior; downplayed internal mental processes; later seen as limited for understanding cognition.

William James

Functionalist psychologist who emphasized cognitive processes and influenced early cognitive approaches.

cognitive revolution

Late 1950s–early 1960s shift back to studying internal mental processes, spurred by limits of behaviorism and new theories.

information theory

Knowledge from communication/processing theory adopted by psychology to study cognitive processes.

BF Skinner

Leading behaviorist who proposed language theories based on behavior; challenged by Chomsky.

Noam Chomsky

Cognitive linguist who criticized Skinner’s behaviorist approach to language, contributing to the cognitive revolution.

computers as metaphor

Metaphor that the mind functions like a computer, with hardware (brain) and software (learned skills).

hardware vs software

In the information-processing view, brain/nervous system = hardware; knowledge/skills = software.

TOAD unit

TOAD: Test-Operate-Test-Exit unit; a simple model illustrating how people test ideas about how objects work and either exit with a successful understanding or discard failures.

Working memory

Also called short-term memory; the active, conscious part of memory where information is held temporarily for processing.

Long-term memory

Stores information over extended periods; retrieved back into working memory as needed.

Buffer model

A memory framework in which information moves from sensory memory to short-term/working memory (buffer) and then to long-term memory, with attention and rehearsal mediating the process.

Sensory memory

Brief, raw perceptual store of information immediately after it hits the senses; enables rapid attention selection (visual ~100–300 ms; auditory ~4 s).

Iconic memory

Visual sensory memory; extremely brief, lasting about 100–300 milliseconds; supports persistence of visual information across eye movements.