Thinking, Problem Solving,
Creativity and Language
E. Pardalis
What is “thinking”?
• Everything that has to do with thinking,
knowing, remembering and communicating
• Cognitive psychology
• The logical and illogical ways we form
concepts, solve problems, make decisions and
form judgments
Creating Concepts
• Mental groupings of similar objects, events,
ideas and people
• Prototype formation
• Piaget – schema formation
– Assimilate
– Accomodate
Introducing Prototypes
• Respond to the categories with the first examples that
come to mind:
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A bird
A color
A triangle
A motor vehicle
A sentence
A hero
A heroic action
A game
A philosopher
A writer
Introducing Prototypes
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Robin, sparrow or eagle
Red or blue
A picture of an equilateral triangle
A car
A short declarative statement
Superman, Batman or possibly a fireman/policeman
A single act by a male (i.e. rescue by a fireman)
Monopoly or some other board game
Socrates or Aristotle
Stephen King or some other white male author
Creativity
• How do you define creativity?
• Unusual Uses Test:
– You have two minutes to write down all the uses
you can think of for an ordinary paper clip.
• Remote Associates Test (30-35 minutes)
• Consequences Test
– What would happen if everyone in the world went
blind?
Remote Associates Test Answers
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
Phone
Book
Fire
Pin
Cheese
Chair
Slow
Foot
Party
Hard
Green
Floor
Stone
Bar
Fountain
16. ball
17. go
18. cover
19. type
20. chair
21. lead
22. top
23. tack
24. watch
25. cat
26. stop
27. mail
28. bubble
29. black
30. end
Problem Solving
• Answers to last night’s word problems.
• Strategies for problem solving:
– Trial and Error (Buddhist Monk)
– Algorithms (matrix, Fred, Ed, Ted)
– Heuristics (Hobbits-and-Orcs problem)
– Hypotheses (Truthteller)
Journal
• What are the top five things you fear?
– Is the fear related to evolutionary history?
– Is the fear not something you can control?
– Is the fear immediate?
Obstacles to Problem Solving
Imagine you serve on the jury of an only-child sole
custody case following a relatively messy divorce.
The facts of the case are complicated by ambiguous
economic, social and emotional considerations and
you decide to base your decision entirely on a few
observations. Parent A, who has an average
income, average health, average working hours, a
reasonable rapport with the child, and a relatively
stable social life or Parent B who has an above
average income, minor health problems, lots of
work related travel, a very close relationship with
the child and an extremely active social life.
Confirmation Bias and
Social Judgments
• Most people award sole custody to Parent B
• But when asked to which parent would they
deny custody another group also selected
Parent B.
• Award = look for positive
• Deny = look for negative
• Therapy: look for things to confirm original
diagnosis, ask questions based on personal
motives (Freudians: unconscious conflicts)
Availability Heuristic
• Base our opinions on how
mentally available information is.
• Go back to the fears… how many
of them are based on the
availability heuristic?
Overconfidence
• Overestimate accuracy of beliefs and
judgments
–Bush into Iraq
–LBJ into Vietnam
–Students studying
Belief Perseverance Phenomenon
• Clinging to one’s initial conceptions
after the bias has been discredited
–EX: Mess insisting on cramming
• Social conflict
–Death penalty
–Abortion
Effects of Framing
• The way we present an issue
–Affects decisions and
judgments
–EX: statistics, political and
sales decisions
Structure of Language
• Phonemes
• Morphemes
• Grammar
–Semantics
–Syntax
How do we learn Language?
•Receptive
•Productive
•Skinner vs. Chomsky
Langauge’s Influence on Thinking
• Linguistic determination – language
determines the way we think
• Language influences our thinking
– Forming categories
• Word count helps us conquer difficult images
(freedom, commitment, rhyming)
• Doublespeak
Doublespeak
• Alter perceptions of reality and corrupt our
thinking
– Sometimes used to make bad seem good and vice
versa
• Four forms
– Euphemism: inoffensive or positive word to avoid
harsh, unpleasant reality
– Jargon: specialized language of trade or profession
– Gobbledygook or bur