late 1940' s to 1950' s - dissatisfaction with behaviorism and verbal learning
Reemergence of Cognitive Psych
The failure of behaviorism Emergence of communication theory
The field draws off research, theory and expertise from at least 12 different areas Each of these areas are covered in dif chapters throughout the book
Theories exist at several levels of description:
putational theory - description of processing, input/output, purpose of computation (flowchart) 2.Algorithmic level -implementation of computational theory; exact nature of computation is described 3.Hardware level - physical realization of computational and algorithmic levels; i.e., the brain!
ִSpecialized forms of scientific concepts that have the same purposes ִused to describe the detection, storage and use of information within the “system”
What is cognitive psychology?
Cognitive psychology is the study of perception, attention, memory, language, and thinking in humans...how we know about the world. ...the scientific study of the human mind and information processing Related to other fields - linguistics, computer science, philosophy, development, etc.
Models vs. Theories
theory : comprehensive explanation of a
cognitive phenomenon based on a detailed description of the phenomenon that is derived from experimental evidence. a model is either a mathematical expression derived from a theory that can be used to summarize and predict empirical data, or a computer program derived from a theory that simulates and predicts empirical data.
ִInformation comes from the environment, is stored briefly, some is selected for additional processing, something is done to it, it may result in some additional behavior.
ִsignal detection , attention, cybernetics, and information theory experimented
Modern linguistics Memory Research Computer Science and tech advances Cognitive Development
Scientific Study of Info Processing...
Scientific study: Based on the
experimental method, empirical, scientific. Human information processing: People sometimes operate as information processors.
However, cognitive psychology also considers information acquired through modeling cognitive processes, analyzing impaired systems, and introspection.
Cognitive Psychology and Conceptual Science
Conceptual science - very general, consequences of observations, metaphorical Cognitive Models - abstract organizational ideas derived from inferences based on observations; part of conceptual science
Why do we study it?
Theoretical reasons - to
learn more about the processes that underlie our ability to represent information about the world in memory, how language works, and how we solve problems, how we learn things, etc
pre-20th century history of cognitive psychology
ִAristotle - How do we classify objects into groups? ִDescartes - What is the relationship between the mind and the body? ִLocke - How much do environmental and genetic influences affect perception? ִEbbinghaus - Can we quantify how information is retained and retrieved from memory? ִBryan & Harter - What happens as a task becomes well-learion
Current approaches to studying cognition The primary approach to cognitive psychology today is information processing. The information processing approach assumes that information from the environment undergoes a series of transformations as it is processed by different cognitive systems
early 20th century to late 1940' s
behaviorism - rely only on things that are observable; concept of 'mind' untenable
ִSR chaining - stimulus®response
verbal learning - SR chaining applied to language; word associations
Practical reasons to develop better human-machine interfaces, develop improved teaching methods, understand where things like stereotypes come from, etc.
Cognitive Revolution
The changes in American psychology have been so profound over the last 50 years that it has been called the cognitive revolution
Levels of description in cognitive psychology
Cognitive Models and Conceptual Science
In general, most hypotheses about the mind come from behavioral studies
ִi.e., seeing what people do in psychological experiments
2 Issues Result…
What are the stages through which information passes? In what form is the information represented in the human mind?