Cognitive approach
Assumptions
- Internal mental processes can and should be studied scienti cally
- This approach has investigated those areas of human behaviour that we neglected by
behaviourist such as memory, perception and thinking
- Processes are private and cannot be observed so cognitive psychologists study them indirectly
by making inferences about what is going on inside peoples minds on the basis of their
behaviour
Theoretical and computer models
- Both theoretical and computer models are used to help understand internal mental processes
- In reality there are overlaps between these two models
- Theoretical models–> abstract
- Computer models-> concrete things
- Important theoretical model-> the information processing approach which suggests that
information ows through the cognitive system in a sequence of stages that include input,
storage and retrieval as in the multi store model
- This information processing approach is based on the way that computers function but a
computer model would involve actually programming a computer to see if such instructions
produce similar output to humans
- If they do then we can suggest that similar processes are going on in the human mind
- Such computational models of the mind have proved useful in the development of thinking
machines or arti cial intelligence
The role of schema
- Cognitive processing can often be a ected by a persons beliefs or expectations – schema
- Schema or packages of ideas and information developed through experience and they act as a
mental framework for the interpretation of incoming information received by the cognitive
system
- Babies are born with a simple motor schema for innate behaviours such as sucking and
grasping
- As we get older, our schema become more detailed and sophisticated. Adults have developed
mental representations for everything from the concept of psychology to schema for what
happens in a restaurant
- Schema enable us to process lots of info quickly and this is useful as a sort of mental shortcut
that prevents is from being overwhelmed by environmental stimuli
- However schema may also distort our interpretations of sensory info, leading to perceptual
errors
The emergence of cognitive neuroscience
- Cognitive neuroscience is the scienti c study of the in uence of brain structures on mental
processes.
- Mapping brain areas to speci c cognitive functions has a long history and psychology
- As early as the 1860s, Paul Broca had identi ed how damage to an area of the frontal lobe
could permanently impair speech production
- In the last 20 years with advances in brain imaging techniques such as fMRI and PET scans,
scientists have been able to systematically observe and describe the neurological basis of
mental processes
- Scanning techniques have also proved useful in establishing the neurological basis of some
mental disorders e.g. the link between the parahippocampal gyrus and OCD
- The focus of cognitive neuroscience has expanded to include the use of computer-generated
models that are designed to read the brain. This has led to the development of mind mapping
techniques known as brain ngerprinting
- One possible future application of this could be to analyse the brain wave patterns of
eyewitnesses to determine whether they are lying in court
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Assumptions
- Internal mental processes can and should be studied scienti cally
- This approach has investigated those areas of human behaviour that we neglected by
behaviourist such as memory, perception and thinking
- Processes are private and cannot be observed so cognitive psychologists study them indirectly
by making inferences about what is going on inside peoples minds on the basis of their
behaviour
Theoretical and computer models
- Both theoretical and computer models are used to help understand internal mental processes
- In reality there are overlaps between these two models
- Theoretical models–> abstract
- Computer models-> concrete things
- Important theoretical model-> the information processing approach which suggests that
information ows through the cognitive system in a sequence of stages that include input,
storage and retrieval as in the multi store model
- This information processing approach is based on the way that computers function but a
computer model would involve actually programming a computer to see if such instructions
produce similar output to humans
- If they do then we can suggest that similar processes are going on in the human mind
- Such computational models of the mind have proved useful in the development of thinking
machines or arti cial intelligence
The role of schema
- Cognitive processing can often be a ected by a persons beliefs or expectations – schema
- Schema or packages of ideas and information developed through experience and they act as a
mental framework for the interpretation of incoming information received by the cognitive
system
- Babies are born with a simple motor schema for innate behaviours such as sucking and
grasping
- As we get older, our schema become more detailed and sophisticated. Adults have developed
mental representations for everything from the concept of psychology to schema for what
happens in a restaurant
- Schema enable us to process lots of info quickly and this is useful as a sort of mental shortcut
that prevents is from being overwhelmed by environmental stimuli
- However schema may also distort our interpretations of sensory info, leading to perceptual
errors
The emergence of cognitive neuroscience
- Cognitive neuroscience is the scienti c study of the in uence of brain structures on mental
processes.
- Mapping brain areas to speci c cognitive functions has a long history and psychology
- As early as the 1860s, Paul Broca had identi ed how damage to an area of the frontal lobe
could permanently impair speech production
- In the last 20 years with advances in brain imaging techniques such as fMRI and PET scans,
scientists have been able to systematically observe and describe the neurological basis of
mental processes
- Scanning techniques have also proved useful in establishing the neurological basis of some
mental disorders e.g. the link between the parahippocampal gyrus and OCD
- The focus of cognitive neuroscience has expanded to include the use of computer-generated
models that are designed to read the brain. This has led to the development of mind mapping
techniques known as brain ngerprinting
- One possible future application of this could be to analyse the brain wave patterns of
eyewitnesses to determine whether they are lying in court
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