PSYC 3102: Exam 1 (Chapter 1-3) with correct answers

What are the 3 elements of psychology? -behavior -environment -organism Cognition involves... Perception Attention Remembering Distinguishing items in a category Visualizing Language Problem-solving Reasoning and decision-making Cognitive Psychology the branch of psychology concerned with the scientific study of the mind Cognition refers to what? the mental processes, such as perception, attention, attention, and memory, that are what the mind does Reaction-time (RT) experiment Measures interval between stimulus presentation and person's response to stimulus Simple RT Task (Donders) participant pushes a button quickly after a light appears Choice RT task (Donders) participant pushes one button if light is on right side, another if light is on left side Ebbinghaus (1885/1913) the savings method to measure forgetting Donders (1868) simple reaction time versus choice reaction time In Ebbinghaus experiment, most savings equals... time interval is short In Ebbinghaus experiment, less savings equals... time interval is longer What problems did John Watson see what the first cognitive psychologists ideas? -extremely variable results from person to person -results difficult to verify (invisible inner mental processes) John Watson proposed a new approach called what? behaviorism Watson and Rayner (1920) are known for what experiment? "Little Albert" experiment classical conditioning pairing one stimulus with another previously neutral stimulus causes changes in the response to the neutral stimulus B.F. Skinner developed operant conditioning operant conditioning -shape behaviors by rewards or punishments -behavior that is rewarded is more likely to be repeated, whereas behavior that is punished is less likely to be reapeated Tolman created... cognitive map (rat maze) Skinner argued that... children imitate speech they hear and correct speech is rewarded Chomsky argued that... children do not only learn language through imitation and reinforcement; language must be determined by inborn biological program How can you understand complex cognitive behaviors? -measure observable behavior -make inferences about underlying cognitive activity -consider what this behavior says about how the mind works information processing theory a way to study the mind created from insights associated with the digital computer Cherry (1953) "Dichotic" listening -Present message A in left ear -Present message B in right ear -To ensure attention, shadow one message -Participants were able to focus only on the message they were shadowing Broadbent (1958) -Flow diagram representing what happens as a person directs attention to one stimulus -Unattended information does not pass through the filter How research progresses from question to question -Start with what is known -Ask questions -Design experiments -Obtain and interpret results -Use results as the bases for new research questions and experiments Two models in psychology -structural models -process models structural models -Representations of a physical structure -Mimic the form or appearance of a given object -Example: different parts of the brain or a globe in a classroom Process models Represent the processes that are involved in cognitive mechanisms, with boxes usually representing specific processes and arrows indicating connections between processes cognitive neuroscience the study of the physiological basis of cognition-physical structures neurons cells specialized to create, receive, and transmit information in the nervous system 3 parts of a neuron cell body, dendrites, axon nerve net a netlike control system that sends signals to and from all parts of the body (like a highway system) Ramon y Cajal neuron doctrine; he found that individual nerve cells transmit signals, and are not continuous with other cells cell body contains mechanisms to keep cell alive dendrites multiple branches reaching from the cell body, which receives information from other neurons axon tube filled with fluid that transmits electrical signal to other neurons action potential neuron receives signal from environment; information travels down the axon of that neuron to the dendrites of another neuron How are action potentials measured? microelectrodes How long are action potentials active? about a second; they are very fast low intensities mean slow firing high intensities mean fast firing synapse space between axon of one neuron and dendrite or cell body of another Neurotransmitters chemicals that affect the electrical signal of the receiving neuron, cross the synapse and bind with the receiving dendrites specificity coding representation of a specific stimulus by firing of specifically tuned neurons specialized to just respond to a specific stimulus sparse coding when a particular object is represented by a pattern of firing of only a small group of neurons, with the majority of neurons remaining silent population coding representation of a particular object by the pattern of firing of a large number of neurons localization of function the idea of specific functions are served by specific areas of the brain cerebral cortex 3-mm thick layer that covers the brain; it contains mechanisms responsible for most of our cognitive functions Language production is impaired by... damage to the Broca's area; frontal lobe Language comprehension is impaired by... damage to the Wernicke's area; temporal lobe occipital lobe vision parietal lobe touch, temperature, pain temporal lobe hearing, taste, smell frontal lobe all senses double dissociation When damage to one part of the brain causes function A to be absent while function B is present, and damage to another area causes function B to be absent while function A is present double dissociation allows us to... identity functions that are controlled by different parts of the brain MRI stands for... magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) fMRI stands for... functional magnetic resonance imaging fusiform face area (FFA) responds specifically to what? faces parahippocampal place area (PPA) responds specifically to what? places extrastriate body area (EBA) responds specifically to what? pictures of bodies and parts of bodies Prosopagnosia damage to the temporal lobe that causes the inability to recognize faces neural networks -groups of neurons or structures that are connected together -can be examined using diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) Perception is... experience resulting from stimulation of the senses What are the basic concepts of perception? -perceptions can change based on added information -involves a process similar to reasoning or problem solving -perceptions occur in conjunction with actions Add or remove terms You can also click the terms or definitions to blur or reveal them Review with an activity