Mental imagery, concepts, problem solving/decision making

What is mental imagery?

Internal representation of things not currently being sensed - experiencing a sensory impression in the absence of sensory input.

What is Motoric Imagery?

Imagining performing a movement without actually performing the movement and without even tensing the muscles. It is a dynamic state during which the representation of a specific motor action is internally activated without any motor output. (ex - mentally rehearsing a dance)

What is Haptic Imagery?

Similar to motoric imagery, except it is imagining touching an object.

Types of mental imagery

Motoric, haptic, auditory? visual?

What is mental imagery like compared to real imagery?

Same areas of brain activated, same responses (like actions?), similar levels of brain activation (imagined less tho?)

Are there stronger/more distinct mental imagery categories?

Faces and places have strongest recognition I guess

What are mnemonics?

Memory aids - plans for retrieval that are well learned and stored in long-term memory. Often involve the use of visual imagery

What is the method of loci?

Mnemonic device. Takes advantage of our superior spatial memory - remembering info along a mental map.

- e.g. remembering by imagining the info moving through a familiar space.

The more disgusting or inappropriate the images, the more effective.

What is the peg-word method?

Mnemonic device. Associating/assigning items/images to a sequence of numbers. Memorize a fixed set of visual images that are easy to recall. Called pegs because new items are "hung" on them when you associate each item/thing you want to remember with one of your fixed set of mental visual objects

What are songs and rhymes?

Mnemonic that relies on wordplay, which may be a kind of auditory imagery (rhyming or creating jingles)

Are there individual differences in peoples mental imagery?

Yes there is varying degrees of image ability.

What is high image ability?

When people are asked to imagine a specific object and feel their image is "quite comprable to the real object. I feel as though I was dazzled when imagining the sun"

What is low image ability?

When people are asked to imagine a specific object and feel their image is "to my conscious there is almost no association of memory with objective visual impressions. I recollect the breakfast table, but do not see it."

If given a list of pictures or words and told to visualize words would you see a word or a picture?

Some would see the word and some would see a picture of what the word is. Vivid imagers would make more errors.

What is eidetic memory?

The ability to maintain a mental image with great clarity (aka photographic memory). Can recall and regurgitate tons of info but don't usually have much understanding of the memorized content they are regurgitating. Also, it is seen mostly in children

What is a concept?

A mental grouping of similar objects. ideas, or situations

What is a formal concept?

Formed by learning the rules that define it (rules are rigid, membership is clear)

What is the problem with forming concepts?

Some things are "better" category members then others - categories are not clear cut and not everything can be perfectly sorted. Ex) is a desk furniture? are bookends furniture? - see the issue?

What is a natural concept?

A mental category that is formed as a result of everyday experience

What is a prototype?

Idealized example of a concept/category. Used when sorting things basically. For ex, if you were looking at something deciding if its a bird or not maybe you'd think of an eagle or a robin or something (a prototype of bird) and compare. The problem is it could still be in the category even if it doesn't seem to match the prototype

What is trial and error?

A method of problem solving that involves randomly trying different combinations.

What is algorithm?

A method of problem solving that involves carefully checking every single possibility (in a formulaic one at a time very methodical fashion) - shortcoming is that there can be basically endless combinations to get through.

What are heuristics?

A method of problem solving that involves utilizing simplified principles used to make decisions (like rules of thumb/mental shortcuts)

Trial and error vs algorithm vs heuristics

Looking for grape juice while grocery shopping:

Trial and error - wander around supermarket randomly to find it

Algorithms - check every shelf of every single aisle in an order

Heuristics - Check only related aisles (go to juice aisle, drink aisle, soda area yk)

What is intuition?

Effortless, immediate, automatic feeling or thought

Pros and cons of heuristics and intuition?

They increase efficiency by a lot, but they can be wrong. They are usually very useful though

What is the availability heuristic?

Estimating likelihood based on ease of which examples are called to mind - affected by "vividness" (this is why when you win at the casino its like all the bells and whistles to the max so that you will remember winning so strongly and not remember losing as much)

What is the conjunction fallacy?

when people think that two events are more likely to occur together than either individual event when in reality in a statistics problem the option with two things can not be more likely than just one of the things

What is the representativeness heuristic?

Likelihood estimates based on representativeness or similarity - impacts conjunction fallacy

What is framing?

How problem solving is influenced by how the problem is contextualized or framed. (think of the treatments for the disease example)