PSY510 - Cognitive Psychology. J.P. Toth.
Spring 2013
Key terms & ideas for Week 8 – Knowledge
Semantic Memory
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What are the main goals of research on semantic memory?
What are the primary tasks used to measure the organization of semantic memory?
What are the major cognitive theories of semantic memory?
Describe the Hierarchical Network model. How is this model hierarchical? How
does it exhibit "cognitive economy"? What data was this model designed to explain?
Give examples of Frequency & Typicality effects in sentence verification.
Describe the Spreading Activation model. How is it different from the Hierarchical
model? What are the main components and assumptions of this model?
What is Hebb's Law? What is LTP? What is a Hebbian circuit?
Describe the Connectionist (PDP) approach to semantic memory. What are the
main features and assumptions of connectionist networks? What interesting claim
do connectionists models make about the nature of knowledge?
What does the study of the brain & brain damage say about how semantic memory
(general knowledge) is organized?
According to our discussion in class, what two aspects of knowledge seem important
but unstudied? [understanding & (procedural) application].
Concepts & Categories
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What is a concept? What is a category? Give examples.
What does it mean to say that a person has or understands a concept or category?
What are the three major types of categories? Give examples.
What are the three major properties people use to categorize things?
Why is the process of categorization so important?
Theoretically, what are the three major ways by which people categorize things?
Why are some categories difficult to explain in terms of rules or defining features?
What theories assume a similarity- or resemblance-based categorization process?
What does it mean to say that some categories have fuzzy boundaries, a graded
structure, or a family-resemblance structure?
What is a typicality effect? What are some of the different tasks in which typicality
effects are shown. Give examples.
Describe the idea of a prototype. Be specific.
Describe the idea that prototypes are organized in a hierarchical structure?
What is the basic level of categorization, why is it unique, and what explains its'
uniqueness?
Describe the exemplar view of categorization.
Can the exemplar view explain typicality effects? If so, how? Can the exemplar
view explain findings that the prototype view cannot?
Describe the explanation view of categorization (called the *knowledge-based view
in the textbook). What findings support this view?
What is psychological essentialism?
In what way might all four theories of categorization be correct?