COGS 101B Final
Misinformation Effect Examples
Video example (subjs shown video of a car going through an intersection after a stop sign, followed by a picture of the same intersection with either a stop or yield sign--those shown the yield sign photo often identified the sign as what the car blew through) Photoshop Experiment (subjects shown photoshopped picture of themselves in a fake photo and were asked to recall event details--many came up with elaborate stories; same effect only with a completely real class photo and asked about a crazy stunt they (didn't) pull that year--many recalled the stunt the researchers suggested even though this memory was a plant)
Imprinting
Viewing another creature as your caretaker, happens during a very brief window after birth
Revised Model of Working Memory
Visuospatial Sketchpad, Phonological Loop, and Episodic Buffer are parts of STM, which are "slave"/subsidiary systems that feed into and are controlled by the Central Executive System, where active processing/manipulation takes place. This entire system is WM, and the STM components interact with visual semantics, language, and events (, etc.) in LTM.
Template Theory of Object Recognition
We have a template for every object that we see (e.g., the letter A), and detection of said object is based on whether it fits our template Issues: doesn't account for different fonts/styles/angles Modern Theory: Maybe mental templates are looser & DO account for angles
Extinction
Weakening/Eliminating a CR (often by no longer enforcing it)
Stroop Effect
Word spells (/is associated with) a different colour than the font colour--e.g. "green"
Forming Visual Images
Words (and word pairs) are better remembered when accompanied by an image
Linking Words to Self
Words on a list that people could relate to themselves were more accurately recalled
Attentional Residue Experiment
Workers given word puzzle game, followed by lexical decision task, then review resumes (followed by resume memory test) - Workers who didn't finish the word puzzle game did better at the lexical decision task with words related to the puzzle game but did worse on the resume/memory test portion
You are looking for a friend Sanjay at a crowded party but cannot find him. Unbeknowst to you, he is calling out your name amidst the many voices and music. You even brush by one another at one point without noticing. According to signal detection theory, this is an example of what? a. Miss b. False alarm c. Correct rejection d. Hit
a. Miss
Suppose that in a signal detection experiment, researchers pay participants $15 for each response that is a hit and $2 for each response that is a correct rejection. How might this affect a typical participant's response criterion? a. The participants' response criteria will be more liberal b. The participants' response criteria will be more conservative c. This will not affect response criteria
a. The participants' response criteria will be more liberal
Patients with lesions to their amygdalas participate in the experiment recalling normal v. horror movie pictures (then also being tested on the images' frame colours). As the research assistant, you predict that their memory of the colour of the picture frames would be a. Worse than what they claim to remember b. Better than what they claim to remember c. Worse than their healthy controls d. Nonexistent, because the amygdala is necessary to encode memories
b. Better than what they claim to remember
After studying a word list, before proceeding immediately to the free recall, you ask your experiment participants to perform some simple arithmetic calculations for 30 seconds. How do you expect the recall plot to differ from the one without the arithmetic task? a. The primacy effect will be smaller or eliminated b. The recency effect will be smaller or eliminated c. Both the primacy and recency effects will be smaller or eliminated d. No change, because remembering words and manipulating numbers don't interfere with each other
b. The recency effect will be smaller or eliminated
According to transfer-appropriate processing, which of the following strategies predicts the best performance on an exam? a. Imagining different models b. Using flashcards to memorise key terms c. Grouping theories of the same behavioural phenomemon d. Making a rhyming poem for all the experiments
b. Using flashcards to memorise key terms
Which of the following correctly ranks the memorisation methods from highest to lowest? a. Self-reference, semantic meaning, perceptual features, auditory features b. Mental imagery, self-reference, auditory features, perceptual features c. Self-reference, mental imagery, auditory features, perceptual features d. Perceptual features, auditory features, semantic meaning, self-reference
c. Self-reference, mental imagery, auditory features, perceptual features
Suppose a 2-month-old is invited to perform the following task--what would you predict her brain activity t look like when the square disappears?: Eyes focuses on centre cue, square flashes in a corner of the screen) a. Neurons that fired in response to the square continue to fire at the same rate b. Firing rate in general is slightly lower than when she saw the square on screen c. Some or all of the neurons stop firing d. Nothing, because infants don't have a prefrontal cortex
c. Some or all of the neurons stop firing
Bottom-Up Processing
processing data chronologically from the first stage of raw data to the final stage of the big picture (e.g., sensory stimuli -> transduction -> following specific pathway of parts of the brain (V1->V2->etc.) -> final picture
Which of these tasks is particularly supported by sensory memory? 1. Continuing to process a stimulus after it has disappeared 2. Remembering a phone number or shopping list for a few minutes 3. Recognising someone when you meet them for the second time 4. Spatial navigating using landmarks
1. Continuing to process a stimulus after it has disappeared
Biological Preparedness Examples
1. Human phobias 2. Rat experiment (using sweetness or clicker while rat was drinking water to associate with pain, sweet/nausea and clicker/pain caused associations, while other pairs did not) 3. Pigeon experiment (visual cues always took precedence over sound cues because pigeons possess/rely on much better vision)
Imagine you are at a big dinner party. Your ability to focus on one conversation while ignoring the other conversations happening around the dinner table is called 1. Divided attention 2. Exogenous attention 3. Endogenous attention 4. Selective attention
4. Selective attention
Which of the following is/are true about task automaticity? 1. Repetition is enough to achieve automaticity in simple tasks 2. It's possible to perform multiple tasks in parallel once automaticity is achieved 3. Automaticity happens without intentional effort 4. Some automaticity doesn't require attentional resources at all 5. All of the above
5. All of the above
Continuous Reinforcement
Behaviour always rewarded/punished
Supernormal Stimuli Examples
Candy/Sweeteners Gambling Exaggerated body features (hypersexualised art)
What are the three factors that aid encoding?
Creating connections, active creation, and organisation
Studying for an important exam while watching television is not very efficient because it is an example of...
Divided attention
What's the difference between echoic memory and iconic memory?
Echoic memory lasts longer than iconic memory (~4s)
Evolution of Modal Memory Model
Evolved from concept of primary memory (memory never lost from consciousness--STM) Has evolved to include different types of sensory memory/include a more sound definition of WM (v STM)
IP Approach
Information Processing Treated the mind like a computer
Operant Conditioning
Learning where behavior is strengthened if followed by a reinforcer or diminished if followed by a punisher
Frequency Effect
Letters more commonly used words are more easily remembered
Memory Span
Maximum number of items recalled in correct order
Short Term Memory
Memory currently stored that has not yet left our consciousness
How practice influences attentional abilities/performance
More practice generally decreases resources required to perform activity
Classical Conditioning
NS paired with an US that already causes a specific URAfter training, the NS becomes a CS that will cause the CR (usually the UR)
NS
Neutral Stimulus
Preparatory Response Theory
Purpose of CS/CR is to prepare the body for the US in the most adaptive way
Testing Effects
Reading a passage, then taking a practice test a few days later, leads to better final test results over reading a passage, then rereading it a few days later
Fixed Ratio
Reinforced every n times
Executive Functioning Components
Response Selector: required for selecting and imitating responses, both physical and mental
Implicit Memory
Retention via performance/non-conscious recollection
Constructive Memory Advantages
Schemas and relying on present information often enhance memory and expectations (e.g., knowing a class's typical structure helps you recall about what your last week's worth of classes looked like and gives you a general sense of what to bring/how to prepare for future classes) Breaking schemas/expectations can cause outliers to better stand out Generally help someone function in society/daily life
Introspection Method Shortcomings
Subjective analysis, doesn't account for sub/unconscious processes
Fixed Action Pattern Examples
Tailor bird weaving its nests, jewel beetle mating
What do change and inattentional blindness suggest about attention?
There is only so much information we take in that we're actually aware of (paying attention to), which is heavily influenced by our selective attention (Attention as a spotlight)
In the selective attention experiment (arrow that may or may not point to a red square that appears shortly after), why are participants usually slower to respond on invalid cue trials than on valid cue trials?
They shift their attention in the direction of the cue, which is the correct direction on valid cue trials, but is the incorrect direction on invalid cue trials
Which of the following best DOESN'T explain a lower working memory ability? a. It's the result of a smaller working memory capacity b. The central executive is less efficient c. The agent is more prone to distraction d. The agent has an impaired prefrontal cortex e. None of the above
a. It's the result of a smaller working memory capacity
Which of the following is most likely true about HM post-surgery? a. He didn't experience proactive interference b. He didn't experience retroactive interference c. He had considerable trouble with maintaining attention d. He should be able to perform the eye moving task where you focus on a cue in the centre of the screen and watch a square flash in one of the corners, often drawing your attention to it
d. He should be able to perform the eye moving task where you focus on a cue in the centre of the screen and watch a square flash in one of the corners, often drawing your attention to it
Which of the following is NOT expected to activate the hippocampus? a. Encoding of episodic memories b. Retrieval of episodic memories c. Consolidation of episodic memories d. Retrieval of semantic memories
d. Retrieval of semantic memories
Prefrontal Cortex Damage Leads to
- Preservation errors--tendency to produce the same response over and over for a task even though the task requires changing responses Patients can verbalise the recognition that their response should change, but they can't change it - Difficulty planning/Goal neglect
Sam Chase's 3 Basic Skills of Attention
1. Seek out new information 2. Sort between information streams 3. Keep track of important stuff
Marvin Chun's Tips to Increase Focus/Attention
1. Simplify (control how much information you have to pay attention to) 2. Relax (Stress decreases performance) 3. Unitask (performance increases when brain focuses on on one thing at a time)
Albina is in a hurry to a COGS 101B lecture and has to stop halfway through her MATH 10B assignment, which she usually finishes before the lecture. What would you predict about her attention in this particular lecture? 1. Worse than usual, due to the influence of the attentional residue 2. Worse than usual, due to failure to multitasking 3. Roughly the same as usual 4. Better than usual, since her WM contains less MATH10B material so she can focus on COGS101B
1. Worse than usual, due to the influence of the attentional residue
Duration of iconic memory
200-500ms
Digit Span
7 +/- 2 Maximum number of sequentially presented digits readily recalled in the correct order
Echoic Memroy
Brief auditory storage
Haptic memory
Brief somatosensory storage
Habituation
Decreased stimulus response strength over exposure time
Discriminative Stimulus
Elicits response after association with reinforcement (rather than stimuli not associated with reinforcement)
Cognitive Hypothesis of Reminiscence Bump
Encoding is best when after a period of change/craziness, there's a lull and stability where you don't really have to encode big events (thus the dip between 30-40yo) Supported by immigrants having a bump in memory recall between 30-40yo if they immigrated at 35
Supernormal Stimuli
Exaggerated, artificial, and stronger releaser
Stroop Task
Example of how reading words is an automatic process
Word Interference
In Stroop Task, colour/colour-associated words (e.g., grass) interfere with naming ink colour in incongruent trials
Sensitisation
Increased stimulus response strength over exposure time
Mental Representation
Internal depictions of information (e.g., being able to mentally represent shapes or conjure scenes, hearing a song in your head without it actually playing IRL)
Source Monitoring Errors
Misidentifying the origin of a memory
Word Superiority Effect
More used words will more readily come to mind (i.e., "stamp" will likely be thought of before "stump" because it's said/heard more)
Retroactive Interference
New learning interferes with old learning
Mindfulness
Paying attention to the present without judgement Practicing it leads to increased openness/compassion/sense of social connection, decreased implicit bias
Constructive Memory Disadvantages
Prone to misinformation effects (e.g., the car example) and assumptions of situations fitting schemas leads to stereotypes (knowing primarily male comedians shifts people to think men's humour is funnier than women's; office example where people brought into office briefly, and when asked to describe it many listed books as an object in the room despite there being no books)
Keppel & Underwood Findings
Reanalysed Peterson & Peterson, looking at the first time only for both experimental settings Noticed proactive interference
Culture Hypothesis of Reminiscence Bump
Society's "life scripts" often dictate important events that we automatically go to when asked to recall important events in our lives, and most of these "life script" events (graduations, first loves, marriage, etc.) often happen during 10-30yo
UR
Unconditioned Response
What does the data of the Stroop Effect show? 1. Difference in reaction times in which congruent trials are faster than incongruent trials 2. Difference in reaction times in which incongruent trials are faster than congruent trials 3. No difference in reaction times
1. Difference in reaction times in which congruent trials are faster than incongruent trials
Stimuli that are missed due to attentional blink: 1. Can capture endogenous attention 2. Can still be reported 3. Aren't perceived 4. Do not enter conscious awareness
4. Do not enter conscious awareness
Change Blindness
Being unaware of a change even while observing it (movie inconsistencies)
CR
Conditioned Response
Behaviourist Definition of Punishment
Decreasing the frequency of a behaviour
Modules
Faces and visual scenes especially, put together in large chunks Could explain paradelia (seeing faces in inanimate objects) and prosopagnosia (failure to recognise faces) Supported by the Thatcher Effect
What are the two main methods of active creation?
Generating information and testing
Evidence for Subdivision of Memory Systems
HM: No explicit memory, but implicit memory intact as evidenced by the mirror-and-maze-tracer setup Clive Wearing: 7-10s memory retention--another example of only explicit memory being affected
Organization of Information
If information is presented/encoded in an organized manner, it's much easier to retrieved than disorganized information
Unilateral Neglect
Ignoring objects in opposite (left) hemifield of damage after damage to right inferior parietal cortex
What are the two main ways to create connections?
Imagery and self-reference
Brain Area Associated with Executive Functioning
Prefrontal Cortex
Source Monitoring
Recalling (sometimes guessing) where we first learned something
Maintenence
Transferring STM to LTM by rehearsing something to yourself over a period of time Recollection often limited by digit span and word length
Working Memory
"Workspace" for information (in STM) to be manipulated
Types of Temporal Arrangements in Classical Conditioning
(Most to least effective) Delayed Conditioning (NS precedes US with some overlap) Trace Conditioning (NS precedes US with no overlap) Simultaneous Conditioning (NS and US directly overlap) Backward Conditioning (NS follows US)
When do people tend to make errors in eye-witness testimony?
- Media and police interference (accidental positive reinforcement) - Narrative rehearsal often leads to greater inaccuracy, especially when paired with other interference types
Tests Used to Diagnose Executive Function Issues
1. Copy a drawing comprised of shapes (goal neglect) Normal Executive Function: start with larger shapes and fill in using an organised method Abnormal Executive Function: no clear organisation/pattern to copying 2. Direction test: indicate direction of middle object in a lineup (preservation error) [ < < < ^ < < < ] Those with executive function issues will have trouble completing this task 3. Tower task (stack rings with largest on bottom to smallest on top) 4. Task to connect the dots without crossing lines 5. Stroop Task (name the ink colour a word is written in) 6. Dichotic Listening (attend to one channel, tune out the other)
Based on what you've learned about congruency, which of the following would be an example of an incongruency that might interfere with automaticity? 1. While giving your friend directions to the library, you point left but tell them to take a right 2. You point out a red car you like to your friend who's wearing a green shirt 3. You skip while chewing gum 4. You wave goodbye to your family and say "goodbye" at the same time
1. While giving your friend directions to the library, you point left but tell them to take a right
Dichotic Listening Experiments
2 channels going into people's ears--told to pay attention to one Strengths of attention: we can easily tune into one channel and shadow (repeat) it (good selective attention) Weaknesses: Only aware of low-level changes (pitch/non-speech sounds) in the unattuned channel, but not high-level ones (words/story, language, etc.) (change blindness) (What do they tell us about attention strengths and limits?)
Shifting attention to a specific location without moving your eyes to fixate that location is called... 1. Selective Attention 2. Covert Attention 3. Divided Attention 4. Trick question: spatial attention requires fixating the attended location
2. Covert Attention
Which of the following behavioural results best supports the hypothesis that there are task-general attentional resources? 1. Performing motor reasoning when driving slows down reaction time 2. Discussing philosophical ideas when driving slows down reaction time 3. Being able to judge road conditions while reading signs along the street 4. Practicing the Stroop Task leads to faster reaction time
2. Discussing philosophical ideas when driving slows down reaction time
You and your friends are playing the word mafia game, and you're the chosen mafia. One of your friends described the secret word as "something you're consciously aware of", while another said "you remember when it was". What would you guess the word is? 1. Implicit 2. Episodic 3. Procedural 4. Semantic
2. Episodic
When the primed response is different from the correct response, it constitutes... 1. Retroactive interference 2. Proactive interference 3. A late bottleneck 4. Chunking
2. Proactive interference
What does the Stroop effect demonstrate? 1. The difficulty in colour recognition 2. The automaticity of language 3. The automaticity of image recognition 4. The difficulty of language
2. The automaticity of language
The attention blink refers to not reporting a target stimulus that was presented...
200-500ms after a first target
Selective attention is our ability to... 1. Fill in the missing details in a noisy stimulus 2. Listen to our neighbour's conversation while pretending to do something else 3. Focus on one input or task while ignoring others 4. Do multiple things at the same time
3. Focus on one input or task while ignoring others
What description best characterizes the serial position curve for an experiment in which a distractor task comes between the presentation of a series and participants' recall of that series? 1. High recall for the first few items, low recall for the middle items, and high recall for the final items 2. High recall for the middle items and low recall for items at the beginning and end 3. High recall for the first few items and low recall for all other items
3. High recall for the first few items and low recall for all other items
The full v partial report experiments suggest that... (choose all that apply) 1. Human sensory memory is limited in capacity, typically holding 3-4 items at a time 2. LTM is different from WM 3. Unattended sensory information starts to decay after a short period of time 4. It's the STM system that's the bottleneck, not sensory memory
3. Unattended sensory information starts to decay after a short period of time 4. It's the STM system that's the bottleneck, not sensory memory
Shepard and Metzler
3D "Same Shape but different orientation" test (Asked if 2 3D objects were the same, included objects comprised of cubes rotated at different angles) Greater rotation angle correlated with longer reaction time Data supported the existence of mental imagery
According to the "Modal Model" of memory, if you were to time travel back to sabotage Pavlov's experiment, what manipulation could you do, assuming all of the following options are feasible? 1. Distract the dog every time the bell rings after it's learned the associations 2. Give the dog a brain lesion so it can't encode information into LTM 3. Use its favourite toy to distract it during training 4. All of the above
4. All of the above
Jill went out for dinner with 3 friends and they are working to split the bill. The restaurant gave them $10 off. Assuming each individual calculation takes the same amount of time, which of the following sequence of calculations would take the longest for them? 1. Add up the price of all the items, then subtract $10 2. Subtract $10 from the most expensive item, then add everything else together 3. Divide the total amount by 4, then multiply the tax rate 4. Multiply the tip rate, then divide the total amount by 4 5. All sequences take roughly the same amount of time
4. Multiply the tip rate, then divide the total amount by 4
According to the modal model of memory, which of the following statements is/are true? 1. Unattended sensory info may be implicitly encoded into LTM 2. If info retrieved from LTM is left unrehearsed, it becomes inaccessible 3. LTM isn't affected by forgetting 4. Not all WM info is transferred into LTM
4. Not all WM info is transferred into LTM
In class, a sequence of letters flashed on the screen and you were then asked to count down every third number from a given starting point. You ended up not remembering as well as when you had immediately recalled the letters after presentation. Which system is most affected by the additional countdown task? 1. Central executive 2. Visuospatial sketchpad 3. Episodic buffer 4. Phonological loop
4. Phonological loop
Neuroscience evidence shows that attention works by... 1. Filtering out unattended stimuli at early stages of processing 2. Selecting attended stimuli at late stages of processing 3. Maintaining eye fixation on the attended stimuli 4. Strengthening responses to attend stimuli at many levels of processing
4. Strengthening responses to attend stimuli at many levels of processing
Which observation suggests the existence of a phonological loop? 1. A list of long words is harder to memorise than a list of short words 2. After seeing the letter string "BPKMEL", some report seeing "VBKMEL" 3. Listening to lyrical music while trying to memorise your friend's phone number leads to poorer results 4. Some people are able to learn word associations but not foreign vocabularies 5. All of the above
5. All of the above (1. Word length effect 2. Phonological similarity effect 3. Articulatory suppression 4. Effect of stroke)
Episodic Buffer
A component of WM where information where STM components interact with LTM components
How do feature nets account for phenomena/errors in word recognition?
Account for priming & frequency effects Similar shapes or letter pairings, influenced by the stronger connections of more commonly-used bigrams/words, may activate the neurons to recognise the wrong word (e.g., recognising "truck" instead of "track" due to similarities in letter features and hearing "truck" more frequently)
Treisman's Attenuation Model
Accounts for cocktail party effect Attenuating filter "turns down" volume of unattended message, but it still enters working memory Inputs --> Sensory Store --> Attenuating Filter -Bottleneck-> Hierarchy of Analysis --> Working Memory Issue: unattenuated message can still impact the meaning taken from the attenuated message
Multitasking
Act of rapidly switching between tasks under the illusion of "performing them at the same time" Task switching performed by executive control
How attention helps solve the binding problem
Acts as a "spotlight" for our sensory cohesion--not everything is brought to conscious awareness (Concepts like change/inattentional blindness support this view)
Positive Punishment
Adding something that incentivises subject to decrease a behaviour
Positive Reinforcement
Adding something that incentivises subject to increase a behaviour
Late Selection Attention Theories
All input receives analysis Selection only occurs after analysis Inputs --> Sensory Analysis --> Full Analysis --> Filter --> WM
Using a cellphone while driving isn't safe because...
Attention is divided between the phone and the driving task
Compensatory-Response Model
Automatic CR in the opposite direction of the expected stimulus' effect (UR)
Simple Reflexes
Automatic response to a stimulus
Behaviorist Perspective
Backlash to the introspective methodInvolved Skinner & WatsonTreated the mind as a black box not to be studied--only focus on inputs and outputs (behaviour)
Episodic Memory Over Time
Becomes semantic memory, often through stronger inter-system connections and less reliance on the hippocampus for memory retrieval
Josh wonders why he can never recall the names of new acquaintances. In search of an answer, he analyses his own mental behaviours/feelings about meeting new people. Who would disagree with the validity of this approach?
Behaviourists and Cognitive Psychologists
How is expectancy theory inconsistent with a strict behaviourist perspective?
Behaviourists believe a reinforcement/training process can shape any behaviour, but the expectancy theory shows active punishment isn't always enough to diminish/encourage behaviours
How is learning-performance distinction inconsistent with a strict behaviourist perspective?
Behaviourists would argue that using a reinforcement system should always result in performing the learned behaviour, but this distinction shows that animals/people can learn behaviours and still not perform them, even with a strong reinforcement system
Similarities Between Facial and Object Recognition
Both involve holistic recognition based on a buildup of features and the object standing out against the background
Iconic Memory
Brief visual storage
Role of Complexity in Visual Stimuli on Working Memory Limit
Complexity generally decreases WM (e.g., easier to recall placement of more squares > English Characters > Chinese Characters > 3D Boxes)
CS
Conditioned Stimulus
Phonological Similarity Effect
Confusing letters that sound (NOT LOOK) similar e.g., F and S
Explicit Memory
Conscious memory of facts and experiences
Stimulus Discrimination
Contrasts stim generalisation, when stimuli are different enough to not evoke the same CR
Flashbulb Memories
Detailed recollections of the events surrounding how one heard about a big event (usually disaster)
Attentional Residue
Difficult to transition attention from an unfinished to new task
Miller Findings
Digit Span (7+/-2) Chunking
Digit Span v. Visual Working Memory Limit Differences
Digit span is more affected by chunking/the amount of numbers VWM is affected by both duration and capacity as well, but less info is often recalled & much greater scene complexity/variation
Task General Resources
Domain General Dissimilar tasks can use the same resources
Task Specific Resources
Domain Specific Similar tasks use more of the same resources--even harder to multitask because it takes up more attention
Broadbent's Filter Model
Early-selection model Message filtered based on low-level characteristics (e.g., pitch/accent/speaking rate) Inputs --> sensory store --> selective filter -bottleneck-> higher level processing --> working memory
Long Term Memory
Encoded memories sent from WM, whether they're truly ever "lost" v inaccessible over time is still a mystery
Thorndike Puzzle Box
Example of observational learning Cat that observes another cat perform a task will be faster at learning it
Pragmatic Inference Experiment
Example of unconscious inference People given list of sentences and asked to remember them When asked to fill in the blanks for these sentences, people would often use words that expanded upon the scenario they were initially presented (e.g., "the flimsy bookcase collapsed" v. the original "the flimsy bookcase bent"; "the baby cried all night" v. the original "the baby stayed up all night")
Expectancy Theory
Expectations can override actual training experience (e.g., if you're told that choosing high value cards in a task will lead to a big reward but keep losing money when you choose said cards, you will still choose the high value cards because you believe your expectation will eventually pay off)
How do top-down influences affect object recognition?
Expectations of an object are very likely to change what we perceive it as (and where we look for it)
Peterson & Peterson Findings
Experiment to read letter string, count down from #, then recall letters STM duration ~15s
Differences Between Facial and Object Recognition
Facial recognition is more orientation-dependent
Blocking
Failure to learn the stimulus-outcome association due to another stimulus already predicting said outcome (likely from being present at the same time as/before the NS)
Inattentional Blindness
Failure to see something one wouldn't expect to see (double-dutch example)
True or False: The primacy effect—better memory for the first few items in a series—takes place because the first few items are still present in your working memory upon recall.
False
True or False: Whether a person detects a stimulus depends only on their absolute threshold
False Also depends on response criteria/incentives
Reminiscence Bump
Finding that 40yos+ have greatest memory recall of adolescence/young adulthood (10-30yo)
Ebbinghaus
First attempted graph of human memory by studying the process of forgetting Memory can be quantified
Schedules of Reinforcement
Fixed or Variable, Ratio or Interval Examples of intermittent reinforcement
Kulik's Belief about Flashbulb Memories
Flashbulb memories are more vivid AND more accurate than normal memories
Pragmatic Inference
Going beyond what was initially stated (making inferences based on the circumstances)
Executive Function
Higher order mechanisms for goal-setting, prioritising, and cognitive processing
Binding Problem
How does the brain combine sensory stimuli to create a cohesive picture of the world?
Feature Net
How word recognition stems from a neural network that recognises basic shapes in letters, which connects to letters, then bigrams, then words This is a bidirectional feedback system
Object Recognition
Identifying an "object" and perceiving it as separate from its background
What was the difference between Sperling's Full Report and Partial Report tasks?
In the Full Report task, participants had to recall the full set of letters; in the Partial Report task, participants only had to recall one row of letters
Behaviourist Definition of Reinforcement
Increasing the frequency of a behaviour
Fixed Action Pattern
Innate skills/behaviour sequences an animal doesn't have to learn Initiated by RELEASER stimuli, even if stimuli is taken away the behaviour will continue
Biological Preparedness
Intrinsic tendencies that make certain associations come more readily associatable than others (i.e., bio history makes certain correlations/behaviours easier to learn)
Josh wonders why he can never recall the names of new acquaintances. In search of an answer, he analyses his own mental behaviours/feelings about meeting new people. How would you classify his attempt to understand the problem?
Introspection
Top-Down Processing
Knowledge, models/ideas, and expectations influence the interpretation of sensory information
Non-declarative Memory
LTM demonstrated through behaviour/nonverbal manners
Drug Overdose
Likely more frequent in hotel/non-home settings because at home, a compensatory response decreases the body's reaction to a drug and makes the person take more to experience a more extreme effect A novel environment doesn't trigger this response to prepare the body and the dose is lethal
Transfer-Appropriate Processing
Memory is most likely to transfer from one situation to another when the encoding and retrieval contexts of the situations match
The Standard Model of Consolidation
Memory retrieval depends on the hippocampus during consolidation, but not after
Perceptual Load Theory
Mind is like a bucket--can only take in so much information, and each task will take up a certain amount of resources/space in said bucket
Successive Task Procedure
Modified card sorting task, with low-complexity (sort cards by number) and high-complexity (sort cards by number AND colour) sets Mean reaction time for alternating task blocks (i.e., sort cards by number, then sort by colour) was longer than repetitive task blocks Mean reaction time for higher-complexity tasks was also slower than lower-complexity tasks
Critical Period
Most favourable/necessary time to develop a specific behaviour (e.g., langauge)
Patient PV
No phonological loop, could learn meaningful word associations but no foreign associations (e.g., while most people can learn to associate "gato" with a cat if it's shown next to a picture of a cat enough times, PV could never learn this association)--likely could not learn new words either
Learning-Performance Distinction
Not performing a behaviour doesn't mean an animal hasn't learned it
Recognition by Components Theory
Objects are mentally represented by a collection of "geons" (3D shapes that look different from each other at almost any angle and are stored in the mind)
Transcendentalism
Observe effects first, THEN look into the process bringing said effects about
Proactive Interference
Old learning interferes with new learning
Synaptic Consolidation
On a neuron-by-neuron level Short-term change (minutes/hours) Increase or decrease in specific receptors Lead to Long-Term Potentiation/More Widespread Changes
System Consolidation
On a systems-level Longer-term change (months/years) Structural change in neural connections Usually what's affected by brain-trauma-related amnesia (e.g., concussions/stroke)
DRM Word String Experiment
People given list of related words surrounding a "critical word" that didn't appear on the list (e.g., list with "sleep" synonyms but not "sleep" itself) When asked whether any of the following 3 words existed, many people would correctly remember the critical-word-adjacent on the list (e.g., "doze") and correctly not select the unrelated word (e.g., "cheese") but would INCORRECTLY recall the critical word (e.g., "sleep") \
How is the demonstration that we use hypotheses to guide rule learning inconsistent with a behaviorist perspective?
People love to hypothesise complex rules and will often learn them faster than simple rules This goes against the behaviourist theory that simple associations should be easy (easier) to make under a reinforcement system
Reality of Flashbulb Memories
People often make MORE errors in recalling where they were when they heard about a disaster than a mundane event, if not entirely fabricating it (yet they will feel more confident about their answer)
Bartlett's "War of the Ghosts" Experiment
People read a long passage about a subject, then are tested on it Found that people consolidate ideas (turn flowery prose into more straightforward factual sentences), forget information that they didn't think was important (not remembering the details of the scenery because they didn't think that was the passage's main focus), and are prone to schemas/bias by inserting things they're familiar with into a scene and dropping things they're not (e.g., how British people replaced the word "kayak" with "skiff")
Modal Memory Model
Perception/Sensory stimuli --> Sensory Memory -Attention-> Working Memory (interacts with Short Term Memory) -Encode-> Long Term Memory
Switching Costs
Performance takes more time and is less accurate due to phases of goal switching and rule-activation as one jumps from one task to another
Baddeley's Model of Working Memory
Phonological loop (audio) and Visuospatial Sketchpad are connected by the overlapping Central Executive System that serves as the controller of which information gets pulled
How did Sperling's Partial Report task reveal the duration of iconic memory?
Poorer recall when there was a longer delay between the presentation of the letters and the cue for recall
David Marr
Popularised belief that one needs to study the brain using more than just neurons--use background/environment as well
Task Novelty
Practice will often decrease the amount of resources required for a task (unless the task is too complex, like if a "does this appear in a set" task involves only letters, versus a numerical target and letter distractors)
Types of Implicit Memory
Priming/Statistical Learning, Procedures, and Conditioning
Well-Formedness
Probability of a string of letters occurring in a certain language Helps babies figure out basic speech patterns
Automaticity
Processing that occurs 1. Without intention 2. At a cost of few/no cognitive resources
Misinformation Effect
Putting misleading information of an event can cause a person to recall the information as if it were real Especially bolstered when the information is given good (v bogus) doctored evidence and happens shortly after the original event (though misinformation effect can be quite potent even years down the line)
Evidence for Blocking
Rat experiment where rats were trained under 3 conditions 1. Tone paired with shock, resulting in rats to react to tone with a fear response 2. Tone and light paired with shock, resulting in rats to react to both tone and light (separately) with a fear response 3. Tone paired with shock, then tone AND light paired with shock, which led to the rat reacting in fear to the tone and NOT the light
Spontaneous Recovery
Reappearance of a CR after extinction
What are the three main methods of organisation?
Recall by groups (e.g., the spontaneous grouping of fruits), presenting in an organised way, and meaningful framework (balloon experiment)
State-Dependent Memory
Recall is better if in the same internal conditions (emotionally, un/drugged, etc.) as encoding
Encoding Specificity
Recall is better if in the same physical context as the information encoding (e.g., the scuba experiment)
On the first day of your literature class, the instructor asks all 15 students to introduce themselves. Afterward, when you try to remember your classmates' names, you realize that you can only remember the last few people who introduced themselves. What is the name of this phenomenon?
Recency effect
Feature Detection
Recognising an object by building up certain components e.g., feature nets with neurons that take in base shapes of letters, which weigh in on neurons that take in the letters, which weigh in on neurons for letter pairs, which weigh in on neurons for full words
Semantic Memory
Recollection of "facts", independent of any attached personal scenarios (e.g., knowing your birthday but not via your personal experience on the day of birth)
Episodic Memory
Recollection of personal experiences (e.g., knowing your birthday because you have a memory of neither of your parents showing up for your birth)
Suppose a friend calls and tells you the seven-digit passcode to enter her home so that you can watch her cat while she's out of town. What can you do to maintain that information in working memory until you find a pen to write it down?
Rehearse it by repeating the passcode to yourself
Variable Interval
Reinforced after about n amount of time High response rate
Variable Ratio
Reinforced after about n times High response rate
Fixed Interval
Reinforced after exactly n time has passedWorst response rate
Process Models
Represent processes/neurons involved in cognitive mechanisms Use boxes to represent special processes and connect the relevant pathways with arrows
Tolman's Cognitive Maps
Representations of structures that help visualise/explain a structure or PROCESS Pro: falsifiable
Persistence of Vision
Retention of sensory stimulation for a brief period of time (<1s) Why we see a "trail of light" when we quickly move a glowstick
Confidence's Relation to Eye-witness Testimony Accuracy (When Uncontaminated)
Right after the event, witnesses confident in their statements are usually very accurate (This accuracy degrades over time with contamination, does not apply to unconfident eye-witnesses)
Wickens et al. Findings
STM and Proactive Interference Experiment See/Recall Word list Over time, trial performance for just fruits decreases If last trial is on veggie list, slight performance improvement If last trial is on professions, performance nearly same as first fruit trial Information is impeded by proactive interference and is semantically encoded
Self-Image Hypothesis of Reminiscence Bump
Self-identity is most formed between 10-30yo (e.g., often become a parent, or start a career/life path/start life-long hobbies and passions during this time of life)
The difference between short-term memory and working memory is that...
Short-term memory describes a temporary information store, while working memory also involves processing or manipulating information
Priming Effect
Showing a word in a test beforehand makes someone faster /more likely to choose the correct letter (FORK-------K/M v. K--------K/M K is better remembered in word context)
Latent Inhibition
Slower learning that occurs when NS is already familiar (e.g., hearing a bell all the time, then being trained to respond to it)
Relating Words to Survival Value
Some experiments show words are better recalled if person affirms that they can use them in a "surviving like our ancestors" scenario Issue: This experiment design could be flawed by not properly accounting for levels of processing/relation to self effect, as the comparative scenario (could you use this to defend yourself against an attacker) is a more realistic scenario with separate reasons for being worse recalled in general
Spacing
Spreading out studying time into smaller increments increases recall/performance
Simple Reflex Examples
Startle reflex, sucking reflex, flexation reflex, grabbing reflex, orientation(all found in newborns primarily)
Stimulus Generalisation
Stimuli similar to initial CS evoke similar response to CR
When Switching Is Most Detrimental to Performance
Switching between familiar to unfamiliar complex tasks (e.g., multiplying to dividing)
Negative Punishment
Taking something away that incentivises subject to decrease a behaviour
Negative Reinforcement
Taking something away that incentivises subject to increase a behaviour
What does the driving with phones experiment suggest we don't know?
Talking while driving hinders driving because it may use domain specific resources
Executive Resources on Multitasking
Task general Sets goals/priorities, chooses strategies, and controls sequences of cognitive processes
Evidence for Holistic recognition of Faces
Thatcher Effect Upside down faces look less natural than upside down faces with reversed smiles/eyes (we suck at upside down faces)
Why is working memory important for language comprehension?
The comprehender needs to hold the message in memory and update it with new words as they are heard or read
Levels of Processing
The deeper memory is processed/the more things you can link an item to in memory, the more accessible it will be
Recall of which items in a list would be most strongly affected by difficulty forming long-term memories, as in anterograde amnesia?
The first few items
Strict Behaviorist Assumptions
The mind is an unpackable black box not to be touched with a ten foot pole Some also believed given the right inputs, one could train a child into any career (Watson) or society into a complete utopia (Walden II)
In the selective attention experiment (arrow that may or may not point to a red square that appears shortly after), what was the difference between the invalid cue and valid cue?
The valid cue was an arrow pointing to the target location, and the invalid cue qas an arrow pointing away from the target location
Cryptoamnesia
Thinking you came up with an Original IdeaTM, when it was actually unconsciously influenced by something you'd previously come across (e.g., the author of Treasure Island confessing the first 3 chapters of his book was basically just the plot of a story he read as a kid, and he had no idea until years later)
Memory Consolidation
Time is needed to process/encode a list of items from STM to LTM
Elaborative Rehearsal
Transferring STM to LTM by linking the STM information with things already in LTM (e.g., an event/experience, telling a story with the information, etc.) More elaborate than maintenance
True or False: State-dependent memory depends on both the external and internal states at time of encoding
True
Declarative Memory
Type of explicit memory--able to be recited verbally/through language
US
Unconditioned Stimulus
Introspection Method
Using self-observation to make predictions and theories about the mindPopularised by Wilhelm Wundt