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Chapter 9 cognition: a focus on the mental activities associated with thinking, knowing, remembering, and communicating information concepts:mental groupings of similar objects, events, ideas, and people o You are using cognition when you form concepts o One concepts could include many thingsthe concept chair includes many things, like a high chair, dining chair, reclining chair, etc. Analogical representation: use this type of representation when we are remembering the physical characteristics of an object o Ex: our yellow and black Giants jersey Symbolic representation: an abstract mental representation that doesn’t correspond to the physical features of an object or idea o Thing of the wordsymbolic-you should think of how an object may be symbolic of something else, but they’re similar in terms of just the physical appearance Defining attribute model: the idea that a concept is characterized by a list of features that are necessary to determine if an object is a member of the category o Ex: Dogs have a certain set of features that define them as a “dog”we use that list when we are looking at another animal to see if we would characterize it as a dog Prototype model: When we think of the best example of a category o Ex: When you think of colors, you think of the primary rainbow colors (red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple), not lime green, even though that’s also a color o Ex: When you think cute dog, you may think golden retriever puppy not a Great Dane Prototype: a mental image or best example of a category; basically the same thing as a prototype model o Ex: More people think that a “robin is a bird” rather than “a penguin is a bird” even though they are both considered birds o Ex: Most people think that “an apple is fruit” rather than “a tomato is a fruit” Exemplar Model: When we compare something we see to other “examples” of it o Ex: When we see a dog, we compare it to all the other dogs we see o Ex: When you guys made the brain for your last project, you probably compared it to other brain projects you had seen Prototypes and memory effects: Once we place an item in a category, our memory of it later is shifted to resemble that category prototype o Ex: did an experiment in which they showed Belgian faces that were 70% Caucasian and 30% Asianthe subjects classified the face as Caucausian Later when they were recalling(remembering the faces), they were more likely to remember an 80% Caucasian face rather than a 70% Caucasian face Inductive Reasoning: using examples or instances to determine if a conclusion is likely to be true o Ex: I met 3 different people from the Key Club on campus on different occasions and they all acted entitledmy conclusion is that all people in the Key Club act entitled Deductive reasoning: reasoning based on principles of logic and math; using a belief or rule to determine if a conclusion is valid o Ex: There are 3 study rooms at the HPC. 5 of my friends are studying in one of the study rooms, but I don’t know which one. There is a meeting in study room #1 and study room #3 only fits 3 people. Therefore, I think my friends are in study room #2. Algorithm: a step-by-step procedure that guarantees a solution. o Issue with algorithms: they take a really long time You’re basically trying every possible option to find a solutionEx: to find a word using the 10 letters in SPLOYOCHYG, we would have to try 907,200 possibilitieswe could do it, but think of how much time it would take! Heuristics: simpler thinking strategies; something we can use to quickly solve a problem o Issue with heuristics: they don’t take as much time, but they’re not always right HEURISTICS ARE QUICKER, BUT THEY’RE NOT ALWAYS RIGHT; ALGORITHMS JUST TAKE A LOT OF TIME Insight: an abrupt, true-seeming, and often satisfying solution; strikes suddenly; “sudden burst of genius”; the answer just pops into your mind unexpectedly Confirmation bias: the fact that we are always looking for evidence verifying our ideas rather than refuting them o Ex: just think of how you are always trying to prove your ideas are rightwe don’t normally try to prove we’re wrong Belief perseverance: maintaining a belief even after the evidence used to form that belief has been contradicted o Ex: you argue that a Jetta is an unsafe car based on the safety tests of 20122 weeks later, the test is redone and Jetta receives a much higher safety ratingbelief perseverance would be if you still argued that Jetta was an unsafe car even AFTER the new safety ratings o Wason said “ordinary people evade (ignore) facts, become inconsistent, or systematically defend themselves against the threat of new information relevant to the issue.” Wason Card Problem: Mental set: our tendency to approach a problem with the mind-set of what has worked for us previously; can lead you the wrong way sometimes; not really thinking “out of the box” because you’re doing the same thing that worked for you before Functional fixedness: a bias that limits a person to using an object only in the way it is traditionally used o The candle problem: you have to use only a candle, matches, and a box of tacks to attach the candle to the board so that the candle can be lit but not drip on the table-we’re so used to using those things for specific purposes that this problem might confuse or stump us Intuition: our fast, automatic, unreasoned feelings and thoughts; NOT a problem-solving approach Availability heuristic: when we estimate the likelihood of events based on how mentally available they are. o Ex: You see a guy making a fool of himself outside and it looks like he has a can in his hand (you don’t know what kind of can it is-whether it is an alcoholic can or non-alcoholic can). Alcoholism runs in your family, so you automatically assume he is an alcoholic. That guy may just be drinking a Coke and be a weird person; but based on what’s most salient, or readily available in your life, you may be more inclined to think he’s an alcoholic just based on your experiences o Ex: You may think that volunteering is a really important and good thing to do. But if someone asked you to give 20 reasons why volunteering is good and you could only give them 6 or 7, you may change your answer and say volunteering isn’t the best. Representativeness heuristic: Base rates and probability Anchoring and adjustment heuristic: according to this heuristic, people start with a implicity suggested reference point and then later make adjustments to reach their estimate o You first approximation is your “anchor” and then as you get additional information, you may make small, increments adjustments o Ex: guess the answer to 1 x 2 x 3 x 4 x 5 x 6 x 7 x 8. You would probably guess a random number, but then change it after you find out that 1 x 2 x 3 x 4 x 5=120 and 1 x 2 x 3 x 4 x 5 x 6=720 Overconfidence: the tendency to overestimate the accuracy of our knowledge and judgments o Ex: It’s overconfidence that drives stockbrokers and investment managers to market their ability to outperform stock market averages, despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary Framing: Based on the way we present an issue, we can sway (change) decisions and judgments o Ex: a surgeon is explaining the risks of a surgery to a patient. He can present it 1 of 2 ways: 10% of people die during this surgery OR 90% of patients will surviveWhich would make you want to do the s5urgery more? Loss aversion: our tendency to strongly prefer avoiding losses to acquiring gains; losses emotionally hurt us a lot more; try to avoid fair game bets as well o Ex: You would probably pick an game with a high reward and possibly a big loss over a fair bet game because in a fair bet game, your games don’t outweigh your losses Language: transmits knowledge-can be spoken, written, or signed; the original wireless communication that allows us to transfer information from mind to mind and with it, the transmission of accumulated knowledge across generations Phoneme: the smallest distinctive sound units in a language; not the same as letters; can just be any intelligible sound o English uses 40 phonemes-remember it’s not the same as the letters of the alphabet! Morpheme: the smallest units that carry meaning in a given language o Ex:bat, pre- from preview Difference between morpheme and phoneme with the word “bat” o The word “bat” has the following phonemes: b, a, and t. o But the word “bat” is also a morpheme Grammar: the system of rules that enable us to communicate with one another Babbling stage: babbling begins with babies at around 4 months old; may contain sounds from various languages o Most of it is jus from consonant-vowel pairs formed by simply bunching the tongue in the front of the mouth (da-da, na-na, ta-ta) or by opening and closing the lips (ma-ma) o NOT an imitation of adult speech One-word stage: occurs when the baby is 1 year old o They have already learned that sounds carry meanings Two-word stage: the stage in speech development during which a child speaks mostly in 2-word statements o Beginning at about age 2 Telegraphic speech: an early speech stage in which a child speaks like a telegram-“go car”-using mostly nouns and verbs o Your book and your teach disagree on this-teacher says this happens at 18 months, but the book says both the 2-word stage and telegraphic speech occur at around 2 years of age Critical period for language: this idea that it’s easiest to learn language when you’re very young or else you may never be able to learn language; as you get older, harder to learn a language o If you are first exposed to language when you are 2-3 years old, you will be able to catch up in your lifetime o If you are first exposed to a language at age 7, unlikely to ever master any language o Equally as important for deaf children: without exposure to signing starting from infancy, natively deaf children are unlikely to learn English Aphasia: an impairment of language Broca’s aphasia: occurs after damage to Broca’s area, which is in the left frontal lobe; a person would struggle to speak words, but they can still sing familiar songs and comprehend speech o Expressive aphasia because the impairment or issue is in expressing yourself through speech Wernicke’s aphasia: occurs after damage to Wernicke’s area, an area of the left temporal lobe; people can only speak meaningless words o Their speech loses complete meaning, but still has regular rhythm when talking o Cannot read and can only understand songs sometimes Linguistic determinism: Whorf’s hypothesis that language defines how we think o Said we can’t even think about things unless we have words for those concepts and ideas o Ex: English has more self-focused words (like happy), while Japanese has more other-focused emotion words (like sympathy)consequently, the US is a more independent culture while Japan is an interdependent culture Sapir-Whorf hypothesis: language determines the way we think and experience the world; used the concept of linguistic determinism Language and perception: by expanding language, we are also expanding thinking o Ex: If we had more words for different shades of yellow, we would be able to better perceive and remember different shades of yellow Bilingualism and the self: based on what language one is using, that person may have a different sense of self o Ex: did an experiment in which bilingual Chinese Americans were asked to describe themselves When they described themselves in Chinese, they used more role-based self attributes and more agreement with Chinese values, equally positive and negative self statements When they described themselves in English, they had more independent self attributes and mostly positive self-statements Bilingualism and social perception: One is more likely to make more positive associations with the language they are speaking o Tested bilingual Israeli Arabs who spoke both Arabic and Hebrew When they were speaking Hebrew, they were more likely to make positive association with Jewish names and negative associations with Arabic names When they were speaking in Arabic, they were more likely to make positive associations with Arabic names and negative associations with Jewish names Bilingualism and cognition: Bilingual people are skilled at inhibiting one language while using the other (have to learn how to switch from language to language) o Bilingual people have better executive control (see below) Executive control: a term for cognitive processes that regulate, control, and manage other cognitive processes, such as problem solving, working memory, multi-tasking, planning, attention control Stroop effect: a demonstration of the reaction time of a task; when the name of a color(blue, green, or red) is printed in a color other than that word(ex: the word red printed in blue ink), naming the color of the word takes longer and is more error prone (you’re likely to make more mistakes) Bilingual advantage: as seen by the Stroop Effect, bilingual people are better at inhibiting attention to irrelevant information Bilingual education: shown to be positive o Children educated in a French language immersion program have maintained English fluency while increasing aptitude test scores, creativity, and an overall appreciation for the French-Canadian culture Chapter 4: Behavior genetics: the study of the relative power and limits of genetic and environmental influences on behavior Environment: the physical and biological factors along with their chemical interactions that affect an orgasm Chromosome: threadlike structures made up of DNA molecules that contain the genes; each chromosome contains 2 strands of DNA connected in a double helix (look to the very right of the picture) Gene: small segment of the giant DNA molecules, all the genes form the chromosomes o You have 20,000-25,000 genes o Genes can be either active (expressed) or inactive The way your professor explains this is that “our genotype may or may not be fully expressed in our phenotype (observable characteristics) Ex: If you have really tall parents, you would have a tall genotype. But if you never ate anything nutritious, you would be tall (phenotype) o When a gene is active or “on”, they provide the code for creating protein molecules-our body’s building blocks Genome: the complete instructions for making an organism, consisting of all the genetic material in that organism’s chromosomes Twin studies: provide information about the influence of genetics vs. the environment o To find the effect of the environment: compare identical twins raised together vs. identical twins raised apart If identical twins raised together are more similar and identical twins raised apart are less similar, we can infer that the similarity would be due to the common home environment (with the identical twins raised together) o To find the effect of genes: keep the environment constant; compared identical twins raised together vs. fraternal twins raised together If identical twins are more similar to each other, we can infer this greater similarity is due to greater genetic overlap Identical twins: develops from a single (monozygotic) fertilized egg that splits in 2; they are genetically identical o Identical twins are always the same sex Fraternal twins: develop form separate (dizygotic) fertilized eggs; share a fetal environment, but they are genetically no more similar than ordinary brothers and sisters o Only share 50% of the genes o Don’t have to be of the same sex; can have one guy and one girl Influence of genetic vs. adoptive relatives: the question we want to ask if whether adoptive children will be more like their biological parents or their adoptive parents o They are more like their biological parents in terms of extraversion and agreeableness o However, their values, attitudes, manners, faith, and politics resemble their adoptive parents o Adopted children often end up happier, more stable, and more intelligent than their biological parents Temperament: the basic, genetic component of personality o Become observable in the first few weeks of life If a baby has a difficult temperament, they are characterized as irritable, intense, unpredictable, fidgety, and emotionally upset easily If a baby has an easy temperament, they are cheerful, quiet, easy going, relaxed, predicable Studies have shown that this temperament that is shown when one is a baby persists when they are older Ex: if one had a difficult temperament as a child, they are more physiologically aroused in new situations in adolescence, etc. Molecular genetics: seeks to identify the specific genes that are influencing our behavior Heritability: the extent to which variation among people concerning a given trait can be attributed to their differing genes o The way your professor describes it is that you are just one data point; heritability looks at the whole spread of variance (change) in phenotype and compares it to the variance in genotype o If everyone in a group had exactly the same environment, but still had a range of intelligence, we could not contribute it to the environmentit must be genes o If everyone in a group had exactly the same genes, but still had a range of heights, we couldn’t attribute it to heredityit would have to be the environment Interaction: the interplay that occurs when the effect of one factor (such as environment) depends on another factor (such as heredity) Gene-environment interaction: our genetics are NOT our destiny; our genes and our experiences could interact in a number of ways, which could change us Epigenetics: the study of the molecular mechanisms by which environments trigger genetic expression o Basically even though genes have the potential to influence development, environmental triggers can switch those genes on or off o Whether a gene is on or off is affected by environmental factors, such as diet, drugs, and stress o Ex: methyl molecules can attach to part of a DNA strand, interfering with the replication of genes in that stretch of DNA Epigenetics and stress o More stress leads to more flee-floating stress hormones and the result is that you are more stressed out It’s an example of genes reacting to the environment Impoverished vs. enriched early environments o A study was done in which rats were raised in either an impoverished environment (solitary confinement) or an enriched, social environment (other rats, playthings) o Later the researchers looked at the brain cortex size-the rats that were raised in an enriched environment had a thicker and heavier cortex-also had more synapses o In human babies: premature babies who were given massage therapy developed faster neurologically, gained weight faster, and went home sooner Influence of parents vs. peers o Parenting- outside of really, really good parenting or really, really bad parenting-doesn’t do much to change a child’s personality o Peers are super influential in a child’s development Difference in cultures o Individualism: priority to own goals, defining identity as unique and internally derived, about your individual attributes o Collectivism: priority to goals of group over the individual, defining identity as being part of the social fabric/network, about your roles and relationships Evolutionary psychology: uses the principles of natural selection to study the evolutionary roots of behavior and the mind; focuses on what makes us so much alike as humans Natural selection: comprised of the following thing: o We compete for survival o Some people have certain biological or behavioral qualities that make them more likely to survive and reproduce Some of these traits give us an advantage in certain environments and help us with survival Some of these traits come from random genetic mutation Paternity uncertainty Parental investment Mate preferences Mutation Gender Gender differences Culture Norm Aggression X chromosome Y chromosome