Chapter 9: Language and Thought

  • Cognitive processes involve thinking, language, forming categories, problem solving, and reasoning

    • cognition: activities that underlie all forms 

  • Thinking: internal, goal-directed activity involving internal manipulation of knowledge

  • Linguistic relativity hypothesis: language shapes our perceptions of reality and influences our thoughts. 

  • To be considered a true language, the communication system must have rules that enable the communication or to combine symbols and create meaning (grammar)

    • Phonology: combo sounds to make words 

    • Syntax: combo words to make sentences.

    • Semantics: communicate meaning

  • The base of spoken language hierarchy are phonemes (smallest significant sound units in speech)

  • Morphemes: smallest units of language that carry meaning (small words or prefixes/suffixes)

  • Surface: outward, visible form of sentence

  • Deep: underlying meaning and grammatical relationships of a sentence.

  • Language comprehension: understanding what another person is trying to communicate 

    • relies on common knowledge.

  • Pragmatics: how practical knowledge can be used both to comprehend the intentions of speakers and to produce an effective response 

  • Many language researchers think babies are born prepared to use lang for communication

    • Most babies cry in similar ways and move quickly through vocalization milestones

  • Babies comprehend language faster than they can produce it

  • Children show telegraphic speech around 2 years old

    • Reflects rudimentary knowledge of syntax

  • Children in their preschool years show increased language complexity.

    • Show overgeneralization - applying grammar rules when they don't apply

  • Chimpanzee Gua and Kellogg family: baby chimp raised beside human baby, chimp originally more advanced than baby but the experiment ended when chimp stopped progressing and baby started imitating chimp

  • Kanzi the bonobo: Kanzi understood language 

  • Category: class of objects (people/places/things) that most people agree belong together

    • allows us to infer invisible properties about objects; once something is adequately categorized, predictions can be made about the future 

  • Defining features the set of features necessary to make objects acceptable members of a category 

    • Works well for mathematical categories but not for natural objects

    • Rosch and Mervis claim that category members have family resemblance

  • Prototype: the best or most representative member of a category

  • Psychologists debate how we determine category of a new object - compare prototype (general idea of something) vs. compare to all individual exemplar (specific examples of something)

  • We typically utilize basic level categories to describe objects in our world

    • The level in a category hierarchy that provides the most useful and predictive information usually resides at an intermediate level in the hierarchy

  • Problem solving is an adaptive skill

  • A problem results from having a goal and uncertainty on now to reach that goal

    • A well-defined problem is a prob w/ a well-stated goal, clear starting point, and relatively easy way to tell when solution is obtained

    • An ill-defined problem is a problem that has no well stated goal, no clear starting point, and no mechanism for evaluating progress

  • To solve a problem, we have to engage in problem representation 

  • Humans can engage in functional fixedness: the tendency to see objects and their functions in certain fixed and typical ways

    • People can become fixed in their views about the functions of objects.

  • Algorithms: step by step rules or procedures that, if applied correctly, guarantee a problem solution

    • Work for only certain kinds of well-defined problems and require long calculation time

  • Heuristics: the rules of thumb we use to solve problems

    • Can usually be applied quickly, but can't guarantee a solution will be found

    • Strategies

      • working backward: involves starting at the goal state and moving backward toward the starting point to see how the goal state can be reached 

      • searching for analogies: trying to find a connection between current problem and some previously solved problem

      • often people adopt mental sets to solve problems: continued use of a belief system and problem-solving strategy that worked in the past

  • Problem solving can result in reaching an "Aha!” moment

  • Insight: the moment when a problem’s solution seems to pop suddenly into one's mind 

    • not a slow and steady trial and error form of learning; it's spontaneous

    • may be correlated w/ activation of middle temporal cortex, hippocampus, and other limbic structures

    • actual process behind insight remains poorly understood

  • Decision making: how we evaluate and choose from among alternatives

    • closely related to problem solving

    • influenced by how you represent the alts in your mind, personal biases, and choice of decision-making strategies

  • Framing: the way alternatives are presented

    • can have dramatic influence on decision making 

    • how the problem/options are phrased influence how we make a decision

  • Confirmation bias: the tendency to seek out and use Info that supports and confirms a prior decision or belief

    • our memories play a role - we are more likely to remember things that support our argument 

  • Belief persistence: we tend to cling to our initial beliefs even when evidence suggests our belief may be wrong

    • examples: astrology and horoscopes, conspiracy theories

  • People making decisions also rely on heuristics. 

    • representative heuristic: we estimate the probability of an event based on how similar it is to a known situation

    • representative heuristic often occurs w/ Conjunction Error and the Gambler's Fallacy.

      • conjunction error: assuming multiple things are more likely to co-occur than a single thing on its own.

      • gambler's fallacy: when someone believes that the probability of an event is lower or higher after a series of outcomes than it would be for a single outcome

    • availability heuristic: using info that comes to mind most easily to make judgements 

      • People assume that info that is more easily recalled is more frequent/probable and info more difficult to recall is less frequent/probable

  • anchoring and adjustment

    • anchoring: influenced judgment by initial estimates given

  • Heuristics help us more than they hurt us; they are often surprisingly effective in leading us to make more accurate decisions

    • They are economical; logically thinking through every decision is very time consuming