219 - Ch.10: Visual Imagery

Method of Loci

a method in which things to be remembered are placed at different locations in a mental image of a spatial layout.

Transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS)

a simulating coil that temporarily disrupts the functioning of a particular area of the brain by applying a pulsating magnetic field.

Rule-Based Approach

applying a rule of previous knowledge

Pegword Technique

associating imagery with concrete words. (ex: one-bun, two-shoe, three-tree)

Mental chronometry

determining the amount of time needed to carry out various cognitive tasks.

Imagery Neurons

neurons that not only fire for a physical stimulus, but a mental image of it too. In other words, these neurons respond to both perceiving an object and to imagining it.

Tacit Knowledge Explanation

states that participants unconsciously use knowledge about the world in making their judgments.

Mental Simulation

when solving a problem involves a mental representation in the mind.

Imagery Debate

a debate about whether imagery is based on spatial mechanisms or on mechanisms related to language (called propositional mechanisms.

Spatial Representation

a representation in which different parts of an image can be described as corresponding to specific locations in space.

Propositional Representation

a representation in which relationships can be represented by abstract symbols (such as an equation) or a statement.

Conceptual Peg Hypothesis

according to this hypothesis, concrete nouns create images that other words can "hang onto".

Depictive Representations

representations that are like realistic pictures that resemble an object, so that part of the representation corresponds to parts of the objects.

Visual Imagery

seeing in the absence of a visual simulus.

Epiphenomenon

something that accompanies the real mechanism but is not actually part of the mechanism. -Mental images indicate that something is happening in the mind but don;t tell us how it is happening.

Mental Imagery

the ability to recreate the sensory world in the absence of physical stimuli.

Unilateral Neglect

when a patient ignores objects in one half of the visual field, even to the extent of shaving just one side of his face or even eating off of only one side of a plate.

Mental Scanning

when participants create mental images and then scan them in their minds.

Paired-Associate Learning

when participants were presented with pairs of words and then given one of the words and asked to recall the other one that was paired with it. Paivio found memory for pairs of concrete nouns are much better than for pairs of abstract nouns.

Mental Walk Task

where participants (in Kosslyn's "size in the visual field" study) were to imagine that they were walking toward their mental image of an animal.