cog exam 3

hemispheric asymmetry in imagery and perception

Imagery: left > right Perception: right > left

paired associate learning

In a paired-associate learning experiment, subjects are presented with pairs of words, like boat-hat or car-house , during a study period. They are then presented, during the test period, with the first word from each pair. Their task is to recall the word that was paired with it during the study period

research has shown that placing people in groups to share ideas results in fewer ideas than adding up the ideas generated by the same number of people asked to think of ideas individually - WHY

In groups, some people may dominate the discussion so others aren't able to participate. Also, despite the instructions to express any idea that comes to mind, being in a group can inhibit some people from expressing their ideas, possibly because they are afraid they will be judged. People also may be paying attention to others in the group, which keeps them from coming up with ideas of their own

visual object recognition

In ventral pathway, the complexity of object representations increases from posterior to anterior regions

who is always against imagery and perception comparisons

Pylyshyn

R.M.

R.M. was able to recognize objects and to draw accurate pictures of objects that were placed before him. However, he was unable to draw objects from memory, a task that requires imagery CAN PERCEIVE BUT NOT USE IMAGERY we can hypothesize that R.M.'s difficulty in creating mental images is caused by damage to higher-level areas, where mental images originate, but that he can perceive objects because areas earlier in the processing stream are still functioning

instrument inferences

Inferences about tools or methods when we read the sentence "William Shakespeare wrote Hamlet while he was sitting at his desk," we infer from what we know about the time Shakespeare lived that he was probably using a quill pen (not a laptop computer!) and that his desk was made of wood

anaphoric inferences

Inferences that connect an object or person in one sentence to an object or person in another sentence We usually have little trouble making anaphoric inferences because of the way info is presented in sentences and our ability to make use of knowledge we bring to the situation Riffifi, the famous poodle, won the dog show. SHE has now won the last three shows she has entered

causal inferences

Inferences that the events described in one clause or sentence were caused by events that occurred in a previous sentence Sharon took an aspirin. Her headache went away.

The Collins and Quillian model has been criticized for several reasons:

It can't explain the typicality effect, the idea of cognitive economy doesn't always hold, and it can't explain all results of sentence verification experiments

how do people use both exemplar and prototype methods when it comes to learning?

It has been proposed that as we initially learn about a category, we may average exemplars into a prototype; then, later in learning, some of the exemplar info becomes stronger Thus, early in learning, we would be poor at taking into account "exceptions" such as ostriches or penguins, but later, exemplars for these cases would be added to the category

illumination

Key insight or new idea emerges there's nothing magical about the "moment of illumination", nothing special about "Aha!"

semantic feature-statistics

Knowledge of both shared and distinctive feature information necessary for basic‐level recognition

size in the visual field

Kosslyn (1978) asked subjects to imagine two animals, such as an elephant and a rabbit, next to each other and to imagine that they were standing close enough to the larger animal that it filled most of their visual field When he repeated this procedure but told subjects to imagine a rabbit and a fly next to each other, subjects created larger images of the rabbit subjects answered questions about the rabbit more rapidly when it filled more of the visual field

evidence for the spatial nature of imagery in the mental scanning experiment

Kosslyn reasoned that if imagery, like perception, is spatial, then it should take longer for subjects to find parts that are located farther from the initial point of focus because they would be scanning across the image of the object --> this happened!

LH and RH compute information differently

LH fine-grain coding vs. RH coarse-grain coding

mapping

Mapping the correspondence between the source story and the target problem

language definition --> discourse

Meaningful units of language: Sentences and Paragraphs

final take on perception and imagery

Most psychologists, looking at the behavioral and physiological evidence, have concluded that imagery and perception are closely related and share some (but not all) mechanisms

N400

N stands for negative 400 stands for the time at which the response peaks, in milliseconds it is larger when words don't fit the sentence the sentence "The cats won't bake" results in a larger N400 response associated with structures in the temporal lobe

Tower of Hanoi problem

Newell and Simon's approach the initial state of the Tower of Hanoi problem as three discs stacked on the left peg, and the goal state as these discs stacked on the right peg For the Tower of Hanoi problem, the operators are moving the disc to another peg

noticing

Noticing that there is an analogous relationship between the source problem and the target problem. This step is obviously crucial in order for analogical problem solving to work most subjects need some prompting before they notice the connection between the source problem and the target problem

divergent thinking and creativity

Number of different ideas may not be the best measure of creativity • divergent production tests do not assess whether the solutions meet the two criteria for creativity: novelty and usefulness

syntax-first approach to parsing

One of the early proposals to explain parsing, and garden path sentences in particular states that as people read a sentence, their grouping of words into phrases is governed by a number of rules that are based on syntax. If, along the way, readers realize there is something wrong with their parsing, then they take other information into account in order to reinterpret the sentence

fixation

One of the major obstacles to problem solving, according to the Gestalt psychologists people's tendency to focus on a specific characteristic of the problem that keeps them from arriving at a solution

creativity and mental illness

One proposal is that highly creative people are more prone to mental illness. Some evidence supports this idea, especially with regard to bipolar disorder and psychotic conditions such as schizophrenia a recent study that used health and occupational data from more than a million Swedish citizens concluded that individuals in creative professions, such as researchers and artists, were not more likely than the general population to suffer from psychiatric disorders

readers looked at low-frequency words about 40 ms longer than highfrequency words --> WHY

One reason could be that the readers needed more time to access the meaning of the low-frequency words The word frequency effect, therefore, demonstrates how our past experience with words influences our ability to access their meaning

surface features

One thing that makes noticing difficult is that people often focus on surface features , specific elements of the problem such as the rays and the tumor Surface features of the source problem and the target problem can be very different

latent inhibition (LI)

One trait that seems to be related to both mental illness and creativity the capacity to screen out stimuli that are considered irrelevant Everyone has this property; it is one of the mechanisms that keep us from being overwhelmed by the huge number of stimuli that bombard us every day

functional fixedness

One type of fixation that can work against solving a problem, focusing on familiar functions or uses of an object

Analogical encoding

One way to help people notice structural similarities the process by which two problems are compared and similarities between them are determined

speech segmentation

Our ability to perceive individual words even though there are often no pauses between words in the sound signal

P600

P stands for positive 600 stands for the time at which the response peaks, in milliseconds the sentence "The cats won't eating" results in a larger P600 response this response is sensitive to the form of a sentence; it is larger when the form is incorrect associated with structures in the frontal lobe, more toward the front of the brain

C.K.

PERCEPTION IS IMPAIRED BUT IMAGERY IS RELATIVELY NORMAL C.K. suffered from visual agnosia, the inability to visually recognize objects C.K. could recognize parts of objects but couldn't integrate them into a meaningful whole C.K. was able to draw objects from memory, a task that depends on imagery we can hypothesize that C.K.'s difficulty in perceiving is caused by damage early in the processing stream, but that he can still create images because higher-level areas of his brain are intact

The following is true of high-prototypical objects:

(a) They have high family resemblance; (b) statements about them are verified rapidly; (c) they are named first; and (d) they are affected more by priming

Parallels between perception and imagery have been demonstrated physiologically by the following methods:

(a) recording from single neurons (imagery neurons); (b) brain imaging (demonstrating overlapping activation in the brain); (c) transcranial magnetic stimulation experiments (comparing the effect of brain inactivation on perception and imagery); and (d) neuropsychological case studies (removal of visual cortex affects image size; unilateral neglect)

The interactionist approach is supported by

(a) the way words with different meanings affect the interpretation of a sentence, (b) eye movement studies in the visual world paradigm, (c) predictions based on a person's knowledge of the environment, and (d) predictions based on a person's knowledge of language constructions

The use of imagery can improve memory in a number of ways:

(a) visualizing interacting images; (b) organization using the method of loci; and (c) associating items with nouns using the pegword technique

Characteristics of wise creative "investors"

- 1. Intelligence - 2. Knowledge (double-edged sword: it may produce functional fixedness) - 3. Motivation - 4. Encouraging environment (without external supports creativity withers) - 5. Appropriate thinking style - 6. Appropriate personality • To be creative, you need all 6 attributes (having 5 is not enough)

Rotation Heuristic

- A figure that is slightly tilted will be remembered as being either more vertical or more horizontal that it really is - Can occur even if you are familiar with the information

P600 may reflect

- Attempts to revise the structure - Syntactic integration difficulty in general

semantic category approach from notes

- Different brain regions for different categories - Justification --> evolutionary pressures resulted in dedicated brain mechanisms for processing specific classes of objects • E.g., living vs. nonliving

sensory functional hypothesis from notes

- Different brain regions for different sensory-motor features - Justification --> too many categories, to little brain.. - Underlies multiple-factor and embodied approaches no separate regions for categories, but they are all intermixed and depends on their functions and properties more supported by neuroimaging

spatial representation

- Different parts of mental image represent different parts of space (like a visual image) - Lot of work by Stephen Kosslyn A THEORY OF VISUAL IMAGERY

imagery activity

- Frontal, parietal, and cingulate - Same regions were not activated during perception - Independent of stimulus type Top-down control for generating and manipulating images

Effect of face exemplar similarity

- If one varies exemplar similarity continuously from almost identical to very different (=/ people) - Exemplar view --> prototype =~ unseen faces - Prototype view --> prototype =~ seen faces

Propositional Representation and Tacit Knowledge Explanation:

- Imagery is like language, abstractly represented - Tacit knowledge: "what should this look like?" - Zenon Pylyshyn is main proponent of this theory A THEORY OF VISUAL IMAGERY

different forms of motivation

- Intrinsic motivation • work because the task is interesting, exciting or personally challenging • intrinsic motivation is likely to enhance creativity - Extrinsic motivation • work to earn a promised reward or to win a competition • certain kinds of extrinsic motivation may undermine creativity people are likely to be more creative when they are working on a task they truly enjoy Creativity: Intrinsic motivation > Extrinsic motivation

RH vs LH and access to semantic representations

- LH small fields: activated by strong associates • Focuses on dominant, or contextually relevant meanings - RH large fields: activated also by weak associates --> GIST • Maintains weak, diffuse semantic activation • Disadvantage ambiguity (e.g., foot) • Advantage processing distant relationship

environmental and cultural blocks

- Lack of cooperation and trust among colleagues - Autocratic boss who values only his own ideas; does not reward others - Distractions—phone, easy intrusions - Lack of support to bring ideas into action - Fantasy and reflection are a waste of time, lazy, even crazy - Playfulness is for children only - Problem-solving is a serious business and humor is out of place - Reason, logic, numbers, utility, practicality are good; feeling, intuition, qualitative judgments, pleasure are bad - Any problem can be solved by scintific thinking and lots of money - Taboos

N400 from notes

- Negative wave largest over central-parietal sites peaking between 300-500 ms after the onset of a written, spoken, or signed word - Its amplitude can be modulated by a single word, sentence, or discourse context

vivid imagers vs non-imagers

- No relation between the vividness of someone's imagery— assessed via self-report—and performance on imagery tasks such as image scanning, mental rotation, or paper folding. - Individuals who insist they

individual differences in imagery

- People with vivid imagery ("vivid imagers") • images are picture-like color, details, viewing angle - People without vivid imagery ("non-imagers") • Images are not picture-like little color, detail, etc. • About 10% of the population • "have no visual images at all worthy of the name"

P600 from notes

- Posterior wave that peaks 500-800 ms after the onset of an eliciting word - aka syntactic positive shift (SPS)

different roles of language

- Receptive Language Processing • Reading and listening - Productive Language Processing • Writing and speaking

distributed + Hub theory from notes

- Sensory-functional plus an anterior temporal convergence zone - Justification --> we have abstract concepts that are difficult to explain in terms of sensory-functional properties

Mental Rotation in Musicians

- Training changes the brain • Musicians larger Broca's area - Broca's area is associated with • Language production (traditional view) • Associative sensorimotor learning • Sensory processing of visual stimuli - Sight reading • sensorimotor skill: translating visuospatial RESULTS --> NO DIFFERENCE IN SENTENCE VERIFICATION but FASTER MENTAL ROTATION IN MUSICIANS more accurate and faster in the 3D

N400 amplitude increases for

- Unexpected words - Semantic anomalies - Words that are difficult to integrate

P600 has increased amplitude for

- Ungrammatical continuations - Or grammatical but not preferred (garden path sentences)

N400 amplitude decreases with

- Word position in a sentence - Repetition - Relatedness the easier it is to put the word into context, the smaller the N400 is --> the more normal and expected

connectionist network vs hierarchical network

Representation in a connectionist network is far more complex, involving many more units for each concept, but it is also much more like what happens in the brain

depictive representations

Representations that are like realistic pictures of an object, so that parts of the representation correspond to parts of the object --> like spatial

family resemblance and who was it proposed by

-Ludwig Wittgenstein refers to the idea that things in a particular category resemble one another in a number of ways --> instead of setting definite criteria that every member of a category must meet, the family resemblance approach allows for some variation within a category was proposed to deal with the problem that definitions often do not include all members of a category When an item's characteristics have a large amount of overlap with the characteristics of many other items in a category, this means that the family resemblance of these items is high

Requirements for Understanding a Problem

-coherent representation -correspondence between internal representation and the material to be understood -relationship to background knowledge

language characteristics

-communicative -symbolic -structured -generative -dynamic

how are experts different than novices

-experts possess more knowledge about their fields -experts knowledge is organized differently than novices -experts spend more time analyzing problems

the creative personality

-importance of personal style -role of personal philosophy -importance of motivation, particularly intrinsic motivation

brocas aphasia

Patients with this problem—slow, labored, ungrammatical speech caused by damage to Broca's area patients with Broca's aphasia not only have difficulty forming complete sentences, they also have difficulty understanding some types of sentences have difficulty processing connecting words such as "was" and "by" damage to Broca's area in the frontal lobe causes problems in syntax—creating meaning based on word order

Methods for Representing a Problem

1. Symbols 2. Matrices 3. Diagrams 4. Images

radiation problem

A problem that has been widely used in research on analogical problem solving The solution is to bombard the tumor with a number of low-intensity rays from different directions, which destroys the tumor without damaging the tissue the rays are passing through the radiation problem and its solution fit with the Gestalt idea of representation and restructuring

Alignment heuristic

A series of geographic structures will be remembered as being more lined up that it really is.

basic principle of connectionism

A stimulus presented to the input units is represented by the pattern of activity that is distributed across the other units Incoming stimuli, indicated by the arrows, activate the input units, and signals travel through the network, activating the hidden and output units Connectionist networks learn the correct distributed pattern for a particular concept through a gradual learning process that involves adjusting the weights that determine how activation is transferred from one unit to another

the savant syndrome is often associated with damage to the

ATL (anterior temporal lobe)

ATL and living and nonliving things

ATL shows greater activity for living than non living because you need this region to distinguish and living things dont have more distinctive features

problem space

All possible intermediate states that could occur when solving a problem

inferences

An important part of the process of creating a coherent story determining what the text means by using our knowledge to go beyond the info provided by the text we often make inferences, often without realizing it, as we retrieve memories of what has happened in the past creates connections between parts of a story

coherence

An important property of any narrative the representation of the text in a person's mind so that information in one part of the text is related to information in another part of the text Coherence can be created by a number of different types of inference

applying

Applying the mapping to generate a parallel solution to the target problem

phonemes in different languages

Because different languages use different sounds, the number of phonemes varies in different languages

N400 and expected and non expected word levels

Because stage was the expected word, there is only a small N400 response to this word. The interesting result is the response to the other two words. Barn causes a large N400, because it isn't related to the passage. Guitar, which doesn't fit the passage either but is related to "concerts," generates a smaller N400 than barn We would expect stage to be activated, and to generate little or no N400 response, because it fits the meaning of the sentence. However, the fact that guitar generates a smaller N400 than barn means that this word is at least slightly activated by the concert scenario

language definition --> pragmatics

Practical information about language & language use

verification

Problem solver confirms that the new idea really does lead to a solution to the problem, and works out the details

whats the best way to brainstorm

Brainstorming in groups turns out not to be a good way to generate ideas. Individual brainstorming to generate ideas, however, can be effective

split brain patients

CC was damaged why was he able to name it when he saw the thing on the paper? he could recognize his drawing with the other hemi left hand can draw what was presented on the left side --> but cant name it right hemi is outside of consciousness right hemi is basically mute but he can draw it --> cant use words

patient C.K.

Cannot identify objects or letters • Can draw objects from memory • Can imagine letters àe.g., "What letter do you get when you take the letter L, flip it from top to bottom and add a horizontal line in the middle."

One of the central events in the cognitive revolution was

Chomsky's critique of Skinner's behavioristic analysis of language

intermediate state

Conditions after each step is made toward solving a problem

Let's summarize what we have said about conversations:

Conversations are dynamic and rapid, but a number of processes make them easier. On the semantic side, people take other people's knowledge into account and help establish common ground if necessary. On the syntactic side, people coordinate or align the syntactic form of their statements. This makes speaking easier and frees up resources to deal with the task of alternating between understanding and producing messages that is the hallmark of successful conversations

unilateral neglect

Damage to the parietal lobes can cause this condition the patient ignores objects in one half of the visual field, even to the extent of shaving just one side of his face or eating only the food on one side of her plate

history of imagery research

Early ideas about imagery included the imageless thought debate and Galton's work with visual images, but imagery research stopped during the behaviorist era. Imagery research began again in the 1960s with the advent of the cognitive revolution

one of the major findings of research on using analogies as an aid to problem solving:

Even when exposed to analogous source problems, most people do not make the connection between the source problem and the target problem

why do experts typically start off slow when analyzing a problem

Experts often get off to what appears to be a slow start on a problem, because they spend time trying to understand the problem rather than immediately trying to solve it Although this may slow them down at the beginning, this strategy usually pays off in a more effective approach to the problem

RAT (remote associates test)

Find a word that is associated with each word in a set higher you score usually means the more creative you are

Learning Foreign Words with the Linkword Method

Find an English word that sounds similar to the foreign word you want to learn Create a mental image linking the meaning of the foreign word and the meaning of the English linkword

experiments that demonstrated parallels between imagery and perception

Finke and Pinker's "flashed dot" experiment argued against the tacit knowledge explanation. (a) size in the visual field (visual walk task); (b) interaction between perception and imagery (Perky's 1910 experiment; Farah's experiment in which subjects imagined H or T); and (c) physiological experiments

expertise and which level is your "basic level"

Generally, people with more expertise and familiarity with a particular category tend to focus on more specific information

acquisition

How do people learn language? This includes not only how children learn language but also how people learn additional languages, either as children or later in life

speech production

How do people produce language? This includes the physical processes of speech production and the mental processes that occur as a person creates speech

comprehension

How do people understand spoken and written language? This includes how people process language sounds; how they understand words, sentences, and stories expressed in writing, speech, or sign language; and how people have conversations with one another

representation

How is language represented in the mind and in the brain? This includes how people group words together into phrases and make connections between different parts of a story, as well as how these processes are related to the activation of the brain

role of experience in language processing

However, by the second set of 10 trials, the ambiguity effect vanished the subjects adjusted their expectations about the RC sentences so that these structures eventually became easier to process

auditory imager

Imagery activated secondary auditory cortex more weakly than perception

garden path sentences

Sentences which begin appearing to mean one thing but then end up meaning something else Garden path sentences illustrate temporary ambiguity

savant skills and their accessibility

Snyder proposes that these savant skills reside within everyone but are not normally accessible to conscious awareness. Savants, he suggests, are open to information in the brain that is normally hidden from conscious awareness because of what he calls top-down inhibition

preconceptions and creativity

Sometimes preconceptions can inhibit creativity think functional fixedness

The Gestalt psychologists focused on

The Gestalt psychologists focused on how people represent a problem in their mind. They devised a number of problems to illustrate how solving a problem involves a restructuring of this representation and to demonstrate factors that pose obstacles to problem solving

how colors are processed in the left and right hemispheres of the brain

The basic idea behind this approach is that language is processed in the left hemisphere. Thus, if language does affect color perception, it would be more likely to do so when colors are viewed in the right visual field (which projects to the left hemisphere) than in the left visual field when the language hemisphere is activated, a category effect does occur, but when the nonlanguage hemisphere is activated, no category effect occurs

lexical ambiguity

The existence of multiple word meanings some meanings of a word are more likely than others in a particular language

meaning dominance

The fact that some meanings of words occur more frequently than others

word frequency

The frequency with which a word appears in a language

parsing

The grouping of words into phrases central process for determining the meaning of a sentence

interactionist approach to parsing

The idea that information provided by both syntax and semantics is taken into account simultaneously as we read or listen to a sentence

ambiguity effect

The longer time for the RC ambiguous sentences, compared to the unambiguous RC sentences

connectionist networks and brain damage

The operation of connectionist networks is not totally disrupted by damage Because information in the network is distributed across many units, damage to the system does not completely disrupt its operation

Edoardo Bisiach and Claudio Luzzatti (1978) tested the imagery of a patient with unilateral neglect by asking him to describe things he saw when imagining himself standing at one end of the Piazza del Duomo in Milan RESULTS

The patient's responses showed that he neglected the left side of his mental image, just as he neglected the left side of his perceptions

Wernicke's aphasia

The patients studied by Wernicke, who had damage to their temporal lobe, produced speech that was fluent and grammatically correct but tended to be incoherent not only produce meaningless speech but are unable to understand speech and writing Wernicke's area in the temporal lobe is thus involved in semantics—understanding meaning

syntactic coordination

The process by which people use similar grammatical constructions

group brainstorming

The purpose of this technique is to encourage people to freely express ideas that might be useful in solving a particular problem. Instructions given to participants in brainstorming groups emphasize that they should just say whatever ideas come into their mind, without being critical of their own ideas or of the ideas of others in the group. The basis of these instructions is to increase creativity by opening people to "think outside the box."

language --> symbolic

The symbols are arbitrary (except onomatopoetic words)

the weight of the evidence supports what (in reference to imagery and what it is served by)

The weight of the evidence supports the idea that imagery is served by a spatial mechanism and that it shares mechanisms with perception

how are all languages "unique but the same"

They are unique in that they use different words and sounds, and they may use different rules for combining these words (although many languages use similar rules). They are the same in that all languages have words that serve the functions of nouns and verbs, and all languages include a system to make things negative, to ask questions, and to refer to the past and present

back propagation

This adjustment of weights is achieved by a learning process. The learning process occurs when the erroneous responses in the property units cause an error signal to be sent back through the network, by a process called back propagation (since the signals are being sent backward in the network starting from the property units). The error signals that are sent back to the hidden units and the representation units provide information about how the connection weights should be adjusted so that the correct property units will be activated

imageless thought debate

This idea of a link between imagery and thinking gave rise to the imageless thought debate , with some psychologists taking up Aristotle's idea that "thought is impossible without an image" and others contending that thinking can occur without images The behaviorists branded the study of imagery as unproductive because visual images are invisible to everyone except the person experiencing them

analogical problem solving

This technique of using an analogy —that is, using the solution to a similar problem to guide solution of a new problem

BAIS (bilateral activation, integration, selection)

Three types of semantic processing LH and RH compute information differently LH and RH processes interact closely

input units

Units activated by stimuli from the environment (or stimuli presented by the experimenter)

balanced dominance

When a word has more than one meaning but the meanings have about the same dominance

biased dominance

When words have two or more meanings with different dominances

the analogical paradox

While it is difficult to apply analogies in laboratory research, people routinely use analogies in real-world settings

perceiving words challenge

You have your own ways of producing various words and phonemes, and other people have theirs When taken out of context and presented alone, words become much more difficult to understand, because of people's often sloppy pronunciation in conversational speech

prototype

a "typical" member of the category the "typical" prototype is based on an average of members of a category that are commonly experienced --> not an actual member of the category but is an "average" representation of the category

the imagery debate

a debate about whether imagery is based on spatial mechanisms, such as those involved in perception, or on mechanisms related to language

two-string problem

a demonstration of functional fixedness the subjects' task was to tie together two strings that were hanging from the ceiling. This was difficult because the strings were so far apart that it was impossible to reach one of them while holding the other Other objects available for solving this problem were a chair and a pair of pliers To solve this problem, subjects needed to tie the pliers to one of the strings to create a pendulum, which could then be swung to within the person's reach

physiological experiments and its take on the imagery/perception debate

a great deal of evidence points to a connection between imagery and perception, but the overlap is not perfect

method of loci

a method in which things to be remembered are placed at different locations in a mental image of a spatial layout --> helps you to retrieve memories later

contingency

a negotiation strategy used to represent analogical encoding a person gets what he or she wants if something else happens

the ERP consists of

a number of waves that occur at different delays after a stimulus is presented, and which can be linked to different functions

What exactly is "a mental representation of what a text is about"?

a person simulates the perceptual and motor (movement) characteristics of the objects and actions in a story

the link between action words and activation of action areas in the brain suggests

a physiological mechanism that may be related to creating situation models as a person reads a story

mental set

a preconceived notion about how to approach a problem, which is determined by a person's experience or what has worked in the past

spatial representation

a representation in which different parts of an image can be described as corresponding to specific locations in space mechanisms responsible for imagery involve this

corpus

a sample that indicates the frequency with which different words are used and the frequency of different meanings and grammatical constructions in that language a corpus reflects how people typically use their language

perceptual problems that come with brain damage are accompanied by

a similar problem in creating images

language

a system of communication using sounds or symbols that enables us to express our feelings, thoughts, ideas, and experiences provides a way of arranging a sequence of signals to transmit, from one person to another, things ranging from the simple and commonplace ("My car is over there") to messages that have perhaps never been previously written or uttered in the entire history of the world

in vivo research

a technique that studies the use of analogies in real-world settings involves observing people to determine how they solve problems in real-world situations The advantage of the in vivo approach is that it captures thinking in naturalistic settings. A disadvantage is that it is time-consuming, and, as with most observational research, it is difficult to isolate and control specific variables

prototype effect

a tendency to respond to the central value of a series of varying exemplars, even when this central value or prototype has not been experienced prototype had a huge tendency of people calling it old even though they hadnt seen it --> strong feeling youve seen someone even when you havent --> lots of typical features that give you false sense of familiarity

prototypicality

a term used to describe how well an object resembles the prototype of a particular category

that having people compare source stories is an effective way to

achieve analogical encoding because it forces them to pay attention to structural features that enhance their ability to solve other problems

operators

actions that take the problem from one state to another

spreading activation

activity that spreads out along any link that is connected to an activated node

Exemplars

actual members of the category that a person has encountered in the past

how can you fix the overgeneralization problem that occurs with cognitive economy

add exceptions at lower levels (ex. at the node for "ostrich" you would just indicate, "can't fly)

connectionism

an approach to creating computer models for representing cognitive processes it is based on how information is represented in the brain it can explain a number of findings, including how concepts are learned and how damage to the brain affects people's knowledge about concepts

brocas area

an area in the frontal lobe that he proposed was involved in language production important for language production SYNTAX

wernickes area

an area in the temporal lobe that he proposed was involved in language comprehension language reception SEMANTICS

candle problem

an example of functional fixedness he asked subjects to use various objects to complete a task You are given some candles, matches in a matchbox, and some tacks. Your task is to mount a candle on the corkboard so it will burn without dripping wax on the floor The solution to the problem occurs when the person realizes that the matchbox can be used as a support rather than as a container seeing the boxes as containers inhibited using them as supports is an example of functional fixedness

category specific memory impairment

an impairment in which they had lost the ability to identify one type of object but retained the ability to identify other types of objects

Many examples of how inventions were created involve

analogical thinking, in which observing a phenomenon has led to a new, novel, and useful solution to a practical problem

the effect of varying the structural features of the problem

analogical transfer is improved by making the structural features of the source and target problems more similar

common ground

another aspect of the sharing process the speakers' mutual knowledge, beliefs, and assumptions for a conversation to be successful, each person needs to understand the knowledge that the other person brings to the conversation

crowding

another factor that researchers have proposed to differentiate between animals and artifacts refers to the fact that animals tend to share many properties (like eyes, legs, and the ability to move) In contrast, artifacts like cars and boats share fewer properties, other than that they are both vehicles According to this idea, because animals tend to be more similar then artifacts, these patients find animals harder to recognize

source problem

another problem that shares some similarities with the target problem and that illustrates a way to solve the target problem

semantic integration

ant sup/med temporal gyri

what parts of the brain are associated with language

areas in the frontal and temporal lobes (Broca and Wernicke areas)

the hub and spoke model of semantic knowledge

areas of the brain that are associated with specific functions are connected to the ATL, which serves as a hub that integrates the information from these areas damage to one of the specialized brain areas (the spokes) can cause specific deficits, such as an inability to identify artifacts, but damage to the ATL (the hub) causes general deficits, as in semantic dementia

reading action words

areas of the cortex activated by the actual movements and by reading the action words The activation is more extensive for actual movements, but the activation caused by reading the words occurs in approximately the same areas of the brain

mutilated checkerboard problem

asks the following question: If we eliminate two corners of the checkerboard, can we now cover the remaining squares with 31 dominos? The key to solving the mutilated checkerboard problem is understanding the principle that each domino covers two squares and that these squares must be of different colors, so removing the two corner squares with the same color makes it impossible to solve the problem shows that solving a problem becomes easier when info is provided that helps point people toward the correct representation of the problem

why is the visual cortex crucial for perception

because it is here that objects begin being analyzed into components like edges and orientations This information is then sent to higher visual areas, where perception is "assembled," and top-down processing, which involves a person's prior knowledge, may also be involved

why is the need to communicate using language referred to as universal

because it occurs wherever there are people

why are readers capable of creating anaphoric inferences even under adverse conditions

because they add info from their knowledge of the world to the info provided in the text

why are there some people who are especially creative

because they are able to open their minds their ability can be traced to personal characteristics that make them less likely to get stuck in old ideas and more open to new ones

dissociation in imagery

between ventral and dorsal pathways

how is common ground determined

both by people's expertise and by the exchange of information during the conversation

moderate prototype view

both exemplars and the prototype are stored

visual perception necessarily involves what kind of processing

bottom-up starts when light enters the eye and an image is focused on the retina, then continues as signals are sent along the visual pathways to the visual cortex and then to higher visual centers

dissociations between imagery and perception

brain damage affects one of these but leaves the other in tact DOUBLE this conclusion contradicts the other evidence we have presented that shows that imagery and perception share mechanisms!!!!

superordinate (global) level of categories

broad and general (think furniture)

segmentation is aided by

by knowing the meanings of words and being aware of the context in which these words occur

semantic dementia

causes a general loss of knowledge for all concepts Patients with semantic dementia tend to be equally deficient in identifying living things and artifacts anterior temporal lobe is typically damaged • Impairs all kinds of knowledge, regardless of modality of reception and expression • E.g., if fail to understand "telephone" also tend to fail to recognize the picture or the sound of a telephone

things that flash on left should be better for

close and far (coordinate) because left correlates with RIGHT visual field

creativity, relatives, and mental illness

close relatives of people with mental disorders tend to be more creative than average. This has led to the idea that there may be a genetically determined characteristic that is associated with both creativity and mental illness

4 major concerns of psycholinguistics are

comprehension speech production representation acquisition

conceptual peg hypothesis

concrete nouns create images that other words can "hang onto." it was easier to remember concrete nouns, like truck or tree , that can be imaged, than it is to remember abstract nouns, like truth or justice , that are difficult to image

initial state

conditions at the beginning of the problem part of Newell and Simon's approach

situation model

consider the nature of the mental representation that people form as they read a story a mental representation of what a text is about This approach proposes that the mental representation people form as they read a story does not consist of information about phrases, sentences, or paragraphs; instead, it is a representation of the situation in terms of the people, objects, locations, and events being described in the story a story that involves movement will result in simulation of this movement as the person is comprehending the story

what two external factors are important when analyzing language

context and knowledge we bring to the situation

coordinate hypothesis

continuous differences CATEGORIZATION ____ is closer than ____ to ____ looks for subtle differences THINK RIGHT HEMI?

semantic somatotopy

correspondence between words related to specific parts of the body and the location of brain activity

the power of imagery to improve memory is tied to its ability to

create organized locations at which memories for specific items can be placed

Human language can be distinguished from animal communication by its

creativity, hierarchical structure, governing rules, and universality

results from experiments that determine whether there is overlap between brain areas activated by perceiving an object and those activated by creating a mental image of the object

demonstrated an overlap between areas activated by perception and by imagery but have also found differences there is almost complete overlap of the activation caused by perception and imagery in the front of the brain, but some difference near the back of the brain

connection weight

determines how signals sent from one unit either increase or decrease the activity of the next unit These weights correspond to what happens at a synapse that transmits signals from one neuron to another

categorical hypothesis

differences between seperate categories language is categorical --> you jump from one word to another with two different concepts CATEGORIZATION ___ is to the left of ____ THINK LEFT HEMI? sometimes you only care about categories and dont need a specific example --> why categorical can be good --> good for abstract thoughts where you dont need details

language --> structured

each language has grammar rules

ERP

event-related potential the rapid electrical response recorded with small disc electrodes placed on a person's scalp can distinguish syntax and semantics

language --> dynamic

ever evolving --> slang, technical terms, new usage

damage to the temporal lobe and the N400

example, damage to areas in the temporal lobes reduces the larger N400 response that occurs when meanings don't fit in a sentence

Environmental Blocks: Use of Examples

examples reduce creativity

do syntactic rules like late closure operate alone to determine parsing until it becomes obvious that a correction is needed

factors in addition to syntax may be influencing parsing right from the beginning, rather than waiting until halfway through the sentence

evidence that imagery can cause food cravings

female subjects rate their intensity of craving on a 100-point scale and then divided them into two groups --> food and holiday imagery groups the food imagery task caused a large increase in craving, but the holiday imagery task had no effect Interestingly, the effect of imagery was greater in women who were dieting, although the increase in craving occurred in nondieters as well there is evidence that nonfood imagery can decrease craving --> food craving is reduced following both visual and auditory imagery, but the effect is larger for the visual group

The starting point for much of the research on analogical problem solving has been to

first determine how well people can transfer their experience from solving one problem to solving another, similar problem

Creative problem solving has been described as a process that begins with

generation of the problem and ends with implementation of the solution, with ideas happening in between

patient A.A

had suffered a stroke that affected his ability to produce actions associated with various objects Thus, when A.A. was asked to use hand motions to indicate how he would use objects such as a hammer, scissors, and a feather duster, he was impaired compared to normal control subjects in producing these actions Garcea and coworkers concluded from this result that the ability to represent motor activity associated with actions is not necessary for recognizing objects, as the embodied approach would predict

syntactic priming

hearing a statement with a particular syntactic construction increases the chances that a sentence will be produced with the same construction can lead people to coordinate the grammatical form of their statements during a conversation speakers are sensitive to the linguistic behavior of other speakers and adjust their behaviors to match

output units

hidden units send signals to this

strengths of connections result in what

high connection weights result in a strong tendency to excite the next unit, lower weights cause less excitation, and negative weights can decrease excitation or inhibit activation of the receiving unit strong tendency to excite the next unit

Analogical problem solving is facilitated when

hints are given regarding the relevance of the source problem, when the source and target problems have similar surface features, and when structural features are made more obvious. Analogical encoding is a process that helps people discover similar structural features

the importance of how a problem is stated

how a problem is stated can affect its difficulty

the frequency of a word determines

how long it takes to process its meaning

sentence verification technique is used to determine

how rapidly people could answer questions about an object's category Subjects are presented with statements and are asked to answer "yes" if they think the statement is true and "no" if they think it isn't

the hub and spoke are what

hub and ATL --> (GENERAL and integrating) spoke and parietal cortex (SPECIFIC)

preventive forms

ideas that precede the creation of a finished creative product preinventive forms need to be developed further before becoming useful "inventions"

interactions of imagery and perception rationale

if imagery affects perception, or perception affects imagery, this means that imagery and perception both have access to the same mechanisms

imagery and processing

imagery originates as a top-down process, in higher brain areas that are responsible for memory

creativity

in addition to being original, a creative response to a problem must be useful "anything made by people that is in some way novel and has potential value or utility"

graceful degradation

in which disruption of performance occurs only gradually as parts of the system are damaged

semantic selection

inferior frontal gyrus

language --> generative

infinitely novel --> endless possibilities

This difference between biased and balanced dominance influences

influences the way people access the meanings of words as they read them

the connectionist network's learning process consists of

initially weak and undifferentiated activation of property units, with many errors (for example, the input "canary" causing activation of the property unit tall ). Error signals are then sent back through the network, which result in changes in connection weights so the next activation of "canary" results in a new activation pattern. Each learning experience causes only a small change in the connection weights, but after many repetitions, the network assigns the correct properties to "canary."

hidden units

input units send signals to this

units in a simple connectionist network

inspired by the neurons found in the brain concepts and their properties are represented in the network by the pattern of activity in these units

Newell and Simon described problem solving as

instead of just considering the initial structure of a problem and then the new structure achieved when the problem is solved, Newell and Simon described problem solving as a search that occurs between the posing of the problem and its solution

subgoals

intermediate states that are closer to the goal Small goals that help create intermediate states that are closer to the goal. Occasionally, a subgoal may appear to increase the distance to the goal state but in the long run can result in the shortest path to the goal

Gestalt psychologists and problem solving

introduced the study of problem solving to psychology in the 1920s Problem solving, for the Gestalt psychologists, was about (1) how people represent a problem in their mind and (2) how solving a problem involves a reorganization or restructuring of this representation

language as "a form of joint action"

involves considering both the content of a conversation, in terms of given and new information, and the process by which people share information

exemplar approach to categorization

involves determining whether an object is similar to other objects the standard for the exemplar approach involves many examples, each one called an exemplar

pegboard technique

involves imagery, as in the method of loci, but instead of visualizing items in different locations, you associate them with concrete words The first step is to create a list of nouns, like the following: one-bun; two-shoe; three-tree The next step is to pair each of the things to be remembered with a pegword by creating a vivid image of your item-to-be-remembered together with the object represented by the word The beauty of this system is that it makes it possible to immediately identify an item based on its order on the list. So if I want to identify the third thing I need to do today, I go straight to tree , which translates into my image of the letters N, C, I , and S dangling in a tree, and this reminds me to watch the program NCIS on TV

language development across cultures

is similar No matter what the culture or the particular language, children generally begin babbling at about 7 months, a few meaningful words appear by their first birthday, and the first multiword utterances occur at about age 2

language --> communicative

it conveys meaning

what happens when the visual cortex is removed

it decreases image size removing part of the visual cortex reduced the size of her field of view, so the horse filled up the field when she was farther away this result supports the idea that the visual cortex is important for imagery

does language affect perception?

it depends on which part of the brain is involved when the language hemisphere is activated, a category effect does occur, but when the nonlanguage hemisphere is activated, no category effect occurs

Language makes it possible to create new and unique sentences because

it has a structure that is (1) hierarchical and (2) governed by rules endow humans with the ability to go far beyond the fixed calls and signs of animals to communicate whatever we want to express

chomsky proposed what about human language

it is coded in the genes just as humans are genetically programmed to walk, they are programmed to acquire and use language POSSIBLE BECAUSE THE UNDERLYING BASIS OF ALL LANGUAGE IS SIMILAR One of Chomsky's most persuasive arguments was that as children learn language, they produce sentences that they have never heard and that have never been reinforced

how does the experience-based explanation of sentence understanding support the interactionist approach to parsing

it shows that a person's predictions about the structure of language can influence processing as the person is reading a sentence Less likely sentence construction creates more ambiguity, but effect decreases with experience

when is imagery easiest

it was easier to remember concrete nouns, like truck or tree , that can be imaged, than it is to remember abstract nouns, like truth or justice , that are difficult to image

one disadvantage to being an expert

knowing about the established facts and theories in a field may make experts less open to new ways of looking at problems being an expert may be a disadvantage when confronting a problem that requires flexible thinking—a problem whose solution may involve rejecting the usual procedures in favor of other procedures that might not normally be used This may be why younger and less experienced scientists in a field are often the ones responsible for revolutionary discoveries

conceptual knowledge

knowledge that enables us to recognize objects and events and to make inferences about their properties this knowledge exists in the form of concepts

how does the right semi contribute to language

language comprehension • RH plays a greater role as language gets more complex (texts, etc.) • Distinct pattern of sensitivity to semantic relationships • RH damage subtle comprehension deficits

left inferior frontal gyrus

language production/ selection encompases the brocas area

left posterior temporal cortex

language reception/ activation language reception/ activation

hierarchical organization

larger, more general categories are divided into smaller, more specific categories, creating a number of levels of categories when people use categories, they tend to focus on one of these levels

Word-by-word presentation of sentences with lateralized targets --> DIFFERENCE in LH and RH

left hemi is more specific and right is not as clear or specific Both hemispheres are sensitive to context but only the LH is sensitive to semantic similarity between an unexpected endingand the expected completion

The ability to understand words in a sentence is influenced by word frequency. This has been demonstrated using the

lexical decision task and by measuring eye movements

distinguishing living things vs artifacts

living things are distinguished by their sensory features artifacts are distinguished by their function

mirror neurons

located in the premotor cortex called mirror neurons because the neuron's response to watching the experimenter grasp an object is similar to the response that occurs when the monkey is performing the action itself Most mirror neurons are specialized to respond to only one type of action, such as grasping or placing an object somewhere

the corpus callosum

located midway between 2 hemis thick band of nerve fibers that divides the cerebral cortex lobes into left and right hemispheres. It connects the left and right sides of the brain allowing for communication between both hemispheres crosses from the hemi to another very quickly

divergent thinking

many examples of creativity focus on this thinking that is openended, involving a large number of potential "solutions" divergent production --> # of varied responses match to each test item - do not have a single best answer - allow the problem solver to explore in many different directions from the initial problem state - many items require that the test taker overcome functional fixedness

Experiments that measure the ERP response to passages show that

many things associated with the passage are activated as the passage is being read

high typicality

means that a category member closely resembles the category prototype it's like a "typical" member of the category

The role of accessing information in understanding stories has been studied by

measuring the event-related potential (ERP) as people are reading short passages (think N400)

mechanical devices and the S-F hypothesis

mechanical devices have a widely distributed semantic representation that includes regions important for the representation of both living things and artifacts. Mechanical devices such as machines, vehicles, and musical instruments overlapped with both artifacts (involving performed actions) and animals (involving sound and motion)

propositional mechanisms

mechanisms related to language

prototype approach to categorization

membership in a category is determined by comparing the object to a prototype that represents the category

mental set and influencing problems

mental set can influence problem solving both because of preconceptions about the functions of an object (candle and two-string problems) and because of preconceptions about the way to solve a problem (water jug problem)

mental time travel

mental time travel is a characteristic of episodic memory although mental time travel does not have to involve visual imagery, it often does

What do ERP results show us as we read

models of the situation are activated that include lots of details based on what we know about particular situations results like these also indicate that we access this knowledge rapidly, within fractions of a second after reading a particular word

Reduced LI is associated with being

more open to stimuli that would ordinarily be ignored and is often associated with higher levels of the personality trait "openness to experience" This ability to "open the mind," which we mentioned in connection with the techniques of brainstorming and creative cognition, could potentially enhance creativity reduced LI enhances creativity by increasing the unfiltered stimuli available to conscious awareness, which increases the possibility of creating useful and novel combinations of stimuli

basic level

more specific but not really any detail (think table) people are more likely to say this!! think about when you see a picture of a guitar --> you wouldn't initially describe it by saying musical instrument or rock guitar --> special because people tend to focus on it THIS LEVEL IS NOT THE SAME FOR EVERYONE

how many languages are there

more than 5,000 different languages and there isn't a single culture without language

about how many words can an adult understand

more than 50,000

the most effective source stories are those that are

most similar to the target problem

the MaGurk Effect

mouth says ga, sound says ba, but you hear da?!?

Trade-off

negotiation strategy used to represent analogical encoding refers to a negotiating strategy in which one person says to another, "I'll give you A, if you'll give me B"

imagery neurons

neurons that fire in the same way when person closes their eyes and imagines an image these neurons respond in the same way to perceiving an object and to imagining it, thereby supporting the idea of a close relation between perception and imagery

the process of analogical problem solving involves the following three steps:

noticing, mapping, and applying

how do novices and experts organize differently

novices categorized problems based on their surface features (what the objects looked like) and the experts categorized them based on their deep structure (the underlying principles involved)

visual world paradigm

observing particular objects in a scene can influence how we interpret a sentence involves determining how subjects process info as they are observing a visual scene acknowledges that we often use language as we interact with the environment --> statistics of the environment

phonemic restoration effect

occurs when phonemes are perceived in speech when the sound of the phoneme is covered up by an extraneous noise Warren replaced the first /s/ in "legislatures" with the sound of a cough and asked his subjects to indicate where in the sentence the cough occurred. No subject identified the correct position of the cough, and, even more significantly, none of them noticed that the /s/ in "legislatures" was missing the phonemic restoration effect can be influenced by the meaning of the words that follow the missing phoneme

priming

occurs when presentation of one stimulus facilitates the response to another stimulus that usually follows closely in time

problem

occurs when there is an obstacle between a present state and a goal and it is not immediately obvious how to get around the obstacle a problem is difficult, and the solution is not immediately obvious

category

one way we organize concepts includes all possible examples of a particular concept the category "cats" includes tabbies, Siamese cats, Persian cats, wildcats, leopards, and so on

deactivating the ATL might

open people to different ways of perceiving stimuli

what is associated with high creative output

openness to experience combined with intelligence

meaning of words in a sentence

our knowledge of the properties influences the way we interpret the relationships between the words in the sentence

semantic memory

our memory for facts and knowledge

saccadic eye movements

people move their eyes from one place to another when looking at a scene

savant syndrome

people with autism or other mental disorders are able to achieve extraordinary feats, such as being able to tell the day of the week for any randomly picked date, or exhibit great artistic talent or mathematical ability

visual cortex and overlap in imagery and perception

perception activates much more of this area of the brain than does imagery this greater activity for perception isn't surprising because the visual cortex is where signals from the retina first reach the cortex

perception vs imagery

perception occurs automatically when we look at something, but imagery needs to be generated with some effort perception is stable—it continues as long as you are observing a stimulus—but imagery is fragile—it can vanish without continued effort

what are the 2 smallest units of language

phonemes and morphemes

the brain activity in the visual cortex plays what role, according to KOSSLYN and his TMS experiment

plays a causal role in both perception and imagery NOT AN EPIPHENOMENON the brain part activated by imagery also causes imagery etc

categories are like

pointers to knowledge (Once you know something is in a category, you know a lot of general things about it and can focus your energy on specifying what is special about this particular object)

semantic activation

post sup/med temporal gyri

a lot of what goes on during language comprehension can be traced to

prediction

4 stages of creative thought

preparation incubation illumination (like insight) verification when the 4 stages occur, they are in a complex back-and-forth sequence

problem solving and the role of insight

problem solving is not simply about getting an idea in a flash of insight, although that may happen, but about having a base of knowledge that makes the idea possible

recurrent food craving has been associated with

problems such as overeating, sabotaging attempts at dieting, and binge eating associated with eating disorders, especially in women

analogy

process of noticing connections between similar problems and applying the solution for one problem to other problems

computer model of human memory

proposed by Quillian --> a semantic network The network consists of nodes that are connected by links. Each node represents a category or concept, and concepts are placed in the network so that related concepts are connected. In addition, a number of properties are indicated for each concept The links connecting the concepts indicate that they are related to each other in the mind it is a hierarchical model there probably isn't a connection between this network and ACTUAL physiology --> just concerned with concepts and how they work

3 basic elements of consciousness

proposed by Wundt images, sensations, and feelings

semantic network approach

proposes that concepts are arranged in networks in the mind the way concepts are organized in the mind

semantic category approach

proposes that there are specific neural circuits in the brain for some specific categories --> there are a limited number of categories that are innately determined because of their importance for survival it also emphasizes that the brain's response to items from a particular category is distributed over a number of different cortical areas emphasizes specialized areas of the brain and networks connecting these areas

priming and its effects on prototypes

prototypical members of a category are more affected by a priming stimulus than are nonprototypical members

damage to areas in the frontal lobe and the P600

reduces the larger P600 response that occurs when the form of a sentence is incorrect

morphemes

refers to meanings the smallest units of language that have a definable meaning or a grammatical function "bedroom" has two syllables and two morphemes, because each syllable, "bed" and "room," has a meaning Although endings such as "s" and "ed," have no meanings in themselves, they are considered morphemes because they change the meaning of a word

phonemes

refers to sounds (when you say words, you produce these) bat --> /b/ /a/ /t/ the shortest segment of speech that, if changed, changes the meaning of a word Note that because phonemes refer to sounds, they are not the same as letters, which can have a number of different sounds

word frequency effect

refers to the fact that we respond more rapidly to high-frequency words like home than to low-frequency words like hike

word superiority effect

refers to the finding that letters are easier to recognize when they are contained in a word than when they appear alone or are contained in a nonword shows that letters in words are not processed one by one but that each letter is affected by the context within which it appears

skinner believed that language is learned through

reinforcement children learn language by being rewarded for using correct language and punished (or not rewarded) for using incorrect language

propositional representation

relationships can be represented by abstract symbols, such as an equation, or a statement such as "The cat is under the table." possibly the mechanism underlying imagery

the right hemisphere and categorization

right hemi is much more detailed --> more coordinate

patient B.G.

right prefrontal lesion - Pathologically high false alarm rates - Over-reliance on gist information COORDINATE SYSTEM AFFECTED MORE gist categories, so more false alarms --> dont have details that are gained from right hemi willing to claim he is completely confident in his choices --> over reliance on gist info (left hemi) Right PFC monitors item-specific details and checks the operations of the left hemisphere

visual imagery

seeing in the absence of a visual stimulus

3 types of semantic processing

semantic activation, semantic integration, semantic selection

Left anterior temporal cortex

semantic dementia --> - Progressive atrophy of temporal cortex - Typically beginning with left anterior temporal cortex - Starts word finding difficulties (anomia) and progresses to object knowledge deficits - Episodic memory is generally intact

components of language

small components such as sounds and words , then combinations of words that form sentences , and finally "texts"— stories that are created by combining a number of sentences

the visual cortex responds to

small details, such as oriented lines, that would be more obvious when perceiving

looking at a small object causes activity in what part of the brain vs the front

small object --> the back of the visual cortex looking at larger objects causes activity to spread toward the front of the visual cortex ALSO THE SAME FOR WHEN YOU IMAGINE IT --> thus, both imagery and perception result in topographically organized brain activation

epiphenomenon

something that accompanies the real mechanism but is not actually part of the mechanism some argued that spatial experience of mental images is this indicates that something is happening in the mind, but doesn't tell us how it is happening

mental and perceptual images both involve

spatial representation of the stimulus --> the spatial experience for both imagery and perception matches the layout of the actual stimulus The idea that imagery and perception may share the same mechanisms is based on the observation that although mental images differ from perception in that they are not as vivid or long lasting, imagery shares many properties with perception

subordinate (specific) level

specific (think kitchen table)

how is the visual cortex organized as a topographic map

specific locations on a visual stimulus cause activity at specific locations in the visual cortex and that points next to each other on the stimulus cause activity at locations next to each other on the cortex

syntax

specifies the rules for combining words into sentences

language modalities

spoken language vs written language

RT and distance of nodes in the hierarchical model

statements that required further travel from "canary" resulted in longer reaction times

the given-new contract

states that a speaker should construct sentences so that they include two kinds of information: (1) given info —info that the listener already knows; and (2) new info —info that the listener is hearing for the first time captures the collaborative nature of conversations

sensory-functional (S-F) hypothesis

states that our ability to differentiate living things and artifacts depends on a semantic memory system that distinguishes sensory attributes and a system that distinguishes function MAY BE TOO SIMPLIFIED

embodied approach

states that our knowledge of concepts is based on reactivation of sensory and motor processes that occur when we interact with the object thinking about concepts causes activation of perceptual and motor areas associated with these concepts --> think mirror neurons emphasizes activity caused by the sensory and motor properties of objects

tacit knowledge explanation

states that subjects unconsciously use knowledge about the world in making their judgments One of Pylyshyn's arguments against the idea of a depictive representation an explanation for why spatial scanning might not be all it was cracked up to be --> but experiments were done where they could control for this and got the same results

late closure

states that when a person encounters a new word, the person's parsing mechanism assumes that this word is part of the current phrase, so each new word is added to the current phrase for as long as possible a rule the parsers use to group words

lexical decision task

subjects are asked to read stimuli and decide whether they are words or nonwords you are faster when the list contains high-frequency words

the think-aloud protocol

subjects are asked to say out loud what they are thinking while solving a problem. They are instructed not to describe what they are doing, but to verbalize new thoughts as they occur One goal of a think-aloud protocol is to determine what information the person is attending to while solving a problem

mental scanning

subjects create mental images and then scan them in their minds supports the idea that there is a spatial correspondence between imagery and perception

lexical decision task

subjects read stimuli, some of which are words and some of which are not words their task is to indicate as quickly as possible whether each entry is a word or a nonword

response time and prototypicality

subjects responded faster for objects that are high in prototypicality (like apple for the category "fruit") than they did for objects that are low in prototypicality (like pomegranate)

water jug problem

subjects were told that their task was to figure out on paper how to obtain a required volume of water, given three empty jars for measures

3 levels of categories

superordinate (global) basic level subordinate (specific)

TMS (transcranial magnetic stimulation)

temporarily disrupt the functioning of a particular area of the human brain by applying a pulsating magnetic field using a stimulating coil placed over the person's skull If a particular behavior is disrupted by the pulses, researchers conclude that the disrupted area of the brain is involved in that behavior

Narrative

texts in which there is a story that progresses from one event to another, although stories can also include flashbacks of events that happened earlier

advantages of the exemplar approach

that by using real examples, it can more easily take into account atypical cases such as flightless birds --> rather than comparing a penguin to an "average" bird, we remember that there are some birds that don't fly This ability to take into account individual cases means that the exemplar approach doesn't discard information that might be useful later may work best for small categories

the hierarchical nature of language means

that it consists of a series of small components that can be combined to form larger units For example, words can be combined to create phrases, which in turn can create sentences, which themselves can become components of a story

One of the main contributions of Newell and Simon's approach to problem solving is

that it provided a way to specify the possible pathways from the initial to goal states

The correspondence between the physiology of mental imagery and the physiology of perception supports what idea

that mental imagery and perception share physiological mechanisms

The link between LI and creativity is

that reduced LI is associated both with mental illness and with enhanced creativity

typicality effect

the ability to judge highly prototypical objects more rapidly explained by the exemplar approach by proposing that objects that are like more of the exemplars are classified faster

mental imagery

the ability to recreate the sensory world in the absence of physical stimuli experiencing a sensory impression in the absence of sensory input also occurs in senses other than vision --> people have the ability to imagine tastes, smells, and tactile experiences

what is the result of spreading activation

the additional concepts that receive this activation become "primed" and so can be retrieved more easily from memory

suggestions for when each method (exemplar and prototype) work best

the exemplar approach may work better for small categories, such as "U.S. presidents" and the prototype approach may work better for larger categories, such as "birds" or "automobiles."

psycholinguistics and its goal

the field concerned with the psychological study of language The goal of psycholinguistics is to discover the psychological processes by which humans acquire and process language

multiple factor approach

the idea of distributed representation is a central frame of this this approach focuses not on brain areas or networks that are specialized for specific concepts but on searching for more factors that determine how concepts are divided up within a category emphasizes the role of many different features and properties

temporary ambiguity

the initial words of the sentence are ambiguous—they can lead to more than one meaning—but the meaning is made clear by the end of the sentence can be caused by expectations and can be changed by experience

which brain does the false alarm

the left coordinate system

semantics

the meanings of words and sentences

how can you explain the paradox between perception and imagery (double dissociation but share mechanisms)

the mechanisms of perception and imagery overlap only partially, with the mechanism for perception being located at both lower and higher visual centers and the mechanism for imagery being located mainly in higher visual centers

concepts

the mental representation of a class or individual the meaning of objects, events, and abstract ideas concepts provide rules for sorting objects into categories

Sapir-Whorf hypothesis

the nature of a culture's language can affect the way people think

food craving is reduced following both visual and auditory imagery, but the effect is larger for the visual group ---> WHY

the nonfood visual imagery uses some of the capacity of the visuospatial sketch pad, so food-related imagery is reduced The smaller effect of the auditory imagery occurs because auditory images would affect the phonological loop but not the visuospatial sketch pad. It is possible that the small effect observed for the auditory imagery group could be due to unintended visual imagery, as would occur if a person imagines what a telephone looks like as they imagine the telephone's sound

neural net model

the one with nodes, connections, and back propagation

fixations

the places where the eye briefly stops to look at a particular place in a scene

target problem

the problem the subject is trying to solve

categorization

the process by which things are placed in categories

restructuring

the process of changing the problem's representation associated with insight

Four approaches to explaining how concepts are represented in the brain are

the sensory-functional hypothesis, the semantic category approach, the multiple-factor approach, and the embodied approach

activation of units in a network depends on what 2 things

the signal that originates in the input units and the connection weights throughout the network

goal state

the solution of the problem part of Newell and Simon's approach

typicality effect and the hierarchical model

the statement "A canary is a bird" is verified more quickly than "An ostrich is a bird," but the model predicts equally fast reaction times because "canary" and "ostrich" are both one node away from "bird."

neuropsychology

the study of patients with brain damage

insight

the sudden realization of a problem's solution suddenly discovering a crucial element that leads to the solution debate about this

the presence of a double dissociation usually means that

the two functions (perception and imagery, in this case) are served by different mechanisms

Structural features

the underlying principle that governs the solution In the radiation and lightbulb problem, the structural features are strong ray destroys tissue for the radiation problem, and strong laser breaks lightbulb for the lightbulb problem

both perception and imagery activate what part of the brain

the visual cortex

the Russians' faster response when stimuli were from different categories occurred because

their language distinguishes between goluboy and siniy . One way of looking at this is that learning the different labels makes it more likely that the colors will be perceived as different, and this makes it easier to quickly determine which square matches the one on the top This effect does not occur for English-speakers because all of the colors are simply called blue supports the Sapir-Whorf idea that language can affect cognition

resemblance and prototype relationship

there is a strong relationship between family resemblance and prototypicality Thus, good examples of the category "furniture," such as chair and sofa, share many attributes with other members of this category; poor examples, like mirror and telephone, do not

prototype effect in face recognition

there is a tendency to falsely recognize an unseen stimuli

insight vs non insight problems

there should be a difference in how subjects feel they are progressing toward a solution in insight problems versus noninsight problems subjects working on an insight problem, in which the answer appears suddenly, should not be very good at predicting how near they are to a solution. Subjects working on a noninsight problem, which involves a more methodical process, would be more likely to know when they are getting closer to the solution

The rule-based nature of language means

these components can be arranged in certain ways "What is my cat saying?" is permissible in English, but not in other ways "Cat my saying is what?" is not

mental walk task

they were to imagine that they were walking toward their mental image of an animal Their task was to estimate how far away they were from the animal when they began to experience "overflow"—when the image filled the visual field or when its edges started becoming fuzzy --> The result was that subjects had to move closer for small animals this is a study looking at the effects of size in the visual field --> showed that images are spatial, just like perception

phonemic restoration effect has what kind of processing

this "filling in" of the missing phoneme based on the context produced by the sentence and the word containing the phoneme is an example of top-down processing

effect of making surface features more similar

this excellent analogical transfer from the radiation problem to the lightbulb problem occurred because of the high surface similarity between rays (radiation problem) and lasers (lightbulb problem) similar surface features enhanced analogical transfer

means-end analysis

this is achieved by creating subgoals A way of solving a problem in which the goal is to reduce the difference between the initial and goal states

eye movements and language and reading

tracking a person's eye movements provides a way to track the mental processes that are occurring as the person is reading for example, if a person pauses for a long time on a particular word, we can infer that he or she is taking longer to perceive that word or to process its meaning

creative cognition

trains people to think creatively

analogical transfer

transfer from one problem to another

the lines in a simple connectionist network

transfer information between units, and are roughly equivalent to axons in the brain

vivid imagers should do better than non-imagers in tasks that depend on

visual imagery confirmed

cognitive economy

way of storing shared properties just once at a higher-level node like giving birds the property "can fly" instead of placing it on every single individual bird type makes the network more efficient BUT does have the problem of generalizing (ex. not all birds fly) Properties that hold for most members of a concept are stored at higher-level nodes

mental chronometry

way to infer cognitive processes determining the amount of time needed to carry out various cognitive tasks block revolving task thingy thats super hard --> this experiment showed that the time it took to decide that two views were of the same object was directly related to how different the angles were between the two views -->(subjects were mentally rotating one of the views to see whether it matched the other one)

definitional approach to categorization and its flaw

we can decide whether something is a member of a category by determining whether a particular object meets the definition of the category The problem is that not all of the members of everyday categories have the same features. So, although the dictionary definition of a chair as "a piece of furniture consisting of a seat, legs, back, and often arms, designed to accommodate one person" may sound reasonable, there are objects we call "chairs" that don't meet that definition

prediction and language

we often predict what words, sentences, or passages mean based on what we know about the properties of our language

statistics of the environment

we take the "statistics" of the environment—our knowledge of what is most likely to occur—into account to determine meaning

parallel distributed processing

what connectionist models are also known as --> designed to represent concepts they propose that concepts are represented by activity that is distributed across a network proposes that concepts are represented in networks that consist of input units, hidden units, and output units, and that information about concepts is represented in these networks by a distributed activation of these units

differences between brain activation for perception and for imagery

when subjects were using visual imagery, some areas associated with nonvisual stimuli, such as hearing and touch, were deactivated --> during imagery their activation was decreased when subjects were using visual imagery, some areas associated with nonvisual stimuli, such as hearing and touch, were deactivated

lexicon

where our knowledge about words is stored a person's knowledge of what words mean, how they sound, and how they are used in relation to other words

the context of the sentence determines

which meaning we access, if a word has more than one meaning

higher visual areas respond more to

whole objects --> more obvious when using imagery

words in sentences and spaces

words spoken in a sentence are usually not separated by spaces

do were really solve the problem unconsciously

work for 5 min rest 1 hour work 5 more min SOLUTION! - Did the rest help? Or did the problem require 10 min of work? - No! --> the interruption could allow gathering additional information • Clues in the environment, and owns memories - No! the interruption could allow a fresh start • Frustration or fatigue tend to dissipate during a break • The break could allow a new mental set that can solve the problem

Development of Categorical Speech Perception

• At birth infants can discern all phonemic distinctions. • By 1 year babies respond only to language relevant sound categories. • Does this mean they can't hear the other distinctions or that they simply ignore them?

pictures vs percepts

• Pictures - Neutral depictions • Percepts - Organized depictions IMAGES ARE LIKE PERCEPTS

preparation

• Problem-solver gathers information about the problem • Effortful work on the problem, generally with little success

incubation

• Problem-solver sets the problem aside and seems not to be working on it • According to Wallas, thought on the problem continues unconsciously

In the world of ideas, creative people buy low and sell high

• Produce creative ideas when no one else is interested in the "investment" • Later, when the idea has become popular, they move on to a new creative project

Visuo-semantic sensitivity Semantic feature overlap and subsequent memory

• Visual representations predicted memory only in the perceptual test, whereas semantic representations predicted memory in both concep. and percep. tests - Possibillity: distractors had small semantic differences with targets