Cognition, Language, and Intelligence Study Notes

Cognition: High-level cognitive processes involving perception, knowledge, problem solving, judgment, language, and memory.
Cognitive Psychology: The field dedicated to examining how and why people think, including interactions among human thinking, emotion, creativity, and language.
Concepts: Mental categories or groupings of linguistic information, images, ideas, or memories.
- Natural Concepts: Developed naturally through direct or indirect experiences (e.g., understanding snow).
- Artificial Concepts: Defined by a specific set of characteristics or rules (e.g., geometric shapes like triangles or squares, where area formula equals $\text{length} \times \text{width}$ ).
Prototypes: The best example or representation of a specific concept.
Schemata: Mental constructs consisting of collections of related concepts that help organize information efficiently.
- Role Schema: Making automatic assumptions about how individuals in certain roles will behave.
- Event Schema (Cognitive Script): Automatic, routine sets of behaviors performed in specific situations (e.g., facing forward in an elevator or answering a ringing phone).

Components of Language:
- Lexicon: The words and vocabulary of a language.
- Grammar: Set of rules used to convey meaning through the lexicon.
- Phoneme: Basic sound unit of a language.
- Morpheme: Smallest unit of language that conveys meaning.
- Semantics: Process of deriving meaning from morphemes and words.
- Syntax: How words are organized into sentences.
Language Acquisition:
- B. F. Skinner proposed language is learned through reinforcement; Noam Chomsky argued language acquisition mechanisms are biologically innate.
- Children progress through predictable developmental stages: reflexive communication ( $0-8$ months), intentional communication ( $8-13$ months), first words ( $12-18$ months), two-word sentences ( $18-24$ months), multi-word sentences ( $2-3$ years), and complex sentences ( $3-5$ years).
- Overgeneralization: Applying a general rule of language to cases that are exceptions (e.g., saying "gooses" or "mouses").
Linguistic Determinism: The hypothesis that language influences or determines thought (associated with Edward Sapir and Benjamin Lee Whorf).

Problem-Solving Strategies:
- Trial and Error: Continuing different solutions sequentially until the problem is solved.
- Algorithm: Step-by-step problem-solving formula providing specific instructions to achieve a consistent result.
- Heuristic: General problem-solving framework or mental shortcut (e.g., working backwards, breaking tasks into smaller steps).
Obstacles to Problem Solving:
- Mental Set: Persisting in approaching a problem using a method that worked in the past but fails in the present.
- Functional Fixedness: A type of mental set where an object cannot be perceived as usable for anything other than its intended purpose (studied by Duncker).
Decision Biases:
- Anchoring Bias: Fixating on a single piece of information when making decisions.
- Confirmation Bias: Focusing on information that confirms existing beliefs.
- Hindsight Bias: Believing an experienced event was predictable all along.
- Representative Bias: Making judgments based on stereotypes or perceived similarities to prior beliefs.
- Availability Heuristic: Making decisions based on readily available precedents or recent experiences.

Major Intelligence Theories:
- General Factor ( $g$ ): Charles Spearman's construct of a single underlying factor of intelligence.
- Crystallized vs. Fluid Intelligence: Raymond Cattell divided intelligence into acquired knowledge retrieval (crystallized) and complex relationship/problem-solving ability (fluid).
- Triarchic Theory of Intelligence: Proposed by Robert Sternberg, comprising three parts:
- Practical Intelligence: Real-world application and street smarts.
- Analytical Intelligence: Academic problem solving and computations.
- Creative Intelligence: Inventing novel solutions or artistic expressions.
- Multiple Intelligences Theory: Howard Gardner's model containing eight distinct intelligences (linguistic, logical-mathematical, musical, bodily kinesthetic, spatial, interpersonal, intrapersonal, naturalistic).
- Emotional Intelligence: Ability to understand, manage, and empathize with emotions in oneself and others.
- Cattell-Horn-Carroll (CHC) Theory: Hierarchical model ranging from narrow to broad to general cognitive abilities.
Creativity:
- Divergent Thinking: Thinking "outside the box" to arrive at multiple unique solutions.
- Convergent Thinking: Ability to provide a single correct or established solution.

Historical Development:
- Sir Francis Galton created the first broad testing methods in the late 1800s.
- Alfred Binet developed early practical testing for French schoolchildren.
- Louis Terman standardized and normed Binet's test into the Stanford-Binet Intelligence Scale.
- David Wechsler created comprehensive tests tapping verbal and nonverbal skills: WAIS-IV, WISC-V, and WPPSI-IV.
Testing Concepts:
- Standardization: Uniformity in administration, scoring, and interpretation.
- Norming: Testing a large population to establish baseline scores for comparisons.
- Flynn Effect: Observation that each generation achieves significantly higher IQ scores than previous generations.
Bell Curve & IQ Distribution:
- Average (mean) IQ score is $100$ with a standard deviation of $15$ .
- $68\%$ of the population scores between $85$ and $115$
- Intellectual Disability: Diagnosed when an individual scores below $70$ (two standard deviations below the mean), has major adaptive deficits, and shows onset before age $18$ (subtypes: Mild $85\%$ , Moderate $10\%$ , Severe $5\%$ , Profound $<1\%$ ).
- Giftedness: IQ score of $130$ or higher (top $2\%$ of the population).

Genetics and Environment:
- Twin studies (e.g., Minnesota Study of Twins Reared Apart) demonstrate genetic heritability of intelligence.
- Range of Reaction: Theory that genes set boundaries for intellectual potential, while environment determines where an individual lands within that range.
- Poverty and daily stress negatively impact prefrontal brain functioning and IQ test results.
Learning Disabilities:
- Specific neurological impairments affecting cognitive processing, distinct from global intellectual disabilities (affecting individuals with average or above-average IQ).
- Dysgraphia: Neurological difficulty in writing legibly and transferring thoughts to paper.
- Dyslexia: Inability to process letters and phoneme-grapheme correspondences correctly.
- Dyscalculia: Difficulty learning or comprehending arithmetic and numerical symbols.

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