Cognitive Psychology Fall 2015
Chapter One Eysenck – Intro and History
What is Cognitive Psychology, and what are the cognitive processes of interest to cognitive
psychologists?
History (Philosophical Roots)
Dualism and Interactive Dualism
Epistemology (Nativism and Empiricism) – relation to Nature Nurture Controversy
Aristotle - Tabla Rasa
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Associationism
four laws of association
common sense
Introspection
Wundt’s use of introspection
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Voluntarism
Apperception
Küple vs. Titchner - debate over Imageless thought.
Nisbett and Wilson (1977) – evidence that we are not always aware of our thought processes
and are prone to confabulate explanations to justify our decisions.
Pessiglione et al. (2007) Subliminal processes influence our thoughts and behaviors and are not
open to introspection.
Stroop Test - automatic and controlled processes
Texting
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McWilliam et al. (2009) study – what does it tell us about processing of textisms.
Overall, what is the relationship between frequency of texting and language skills?
Rosen et al. (2010) Study. Does this relationship apply equally to informal and
formal writing skills?
Early Influences on Cognitive Psychology
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William James – Functionalism
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Donders – Reaction Time
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Early Memory Research
Ebbinghaus
Munsterberg
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Applied Cognitive Research
Bryan and Noble (1899) – acquisition of skills
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Did Behaviorists approve of introspection?
What did Behaviorists believe the study of psychology should focus on?
What is the “law of Effect”?
Behaviorism
Cognitive Revolution
Makings of the Cognitive Revolution
Neo-Behaviorists e.g. Tolman (Dissatisfaction with Behaviorism)
Be able to describe Tolman’s cognitive map study.
What would behaviorists predict that the rats would if
rats who have been trained on this maze confronted a
blockage at the position of the dotted line?
What did the rats actually do?
How did Tolman interpret this?
Be able to explain Tolman’s Latent Learning Study.
What would behaviorist predict that the learning curve of rats would look like when they began
to be rewarded with food on the 11th day?
What did their actual learning curve look like?
How did Tolman interpret this finding?
Other Important Early Influences
WWII
Linguistics (e.g., Noam Chomsky).
Computer Technology - gave us a New Metaphor of mind
Information Processing Models
Parallel vs. Serial Processing’
Bottom-up vs Top-Down Processes
Contemporary Cognitive Psychology
Four Approaches
1. Experimental Cognitive Psychology
Study healthy individuals under laboratory conditions
Strength – internally valid (able to control for confounds)
Weaknesses – Ecological Validity (highly controlled laboratory results may not
generalize to real world settings).
2. Cognitive Neuroscience
Studies Brain Activity during Performance of Cognitive and Behavioral Tasks
Broadman’s Area Index – know that it is a system for identifying functional areas of the
cortex.
3. Cognitive neuropsychology
Study Patients with brain injury (lesion)
Modularity
Dissociations and double dissociations
Transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS)
4.
Computational Cognitive Science