by Wikibooks contributors
Contents
CHAPTERS..............................................................................................................................4
01 Cognitive Psychology and the Brain................................................................................................ 4
02 Problem Solving from an Evolutionary Perspective........................................................................ 8
03 Evolutionary Perspective on Social Cognitions............................................................................. 25
04 Behavioral and Neuroscience Methods..........................................................................................33
05 Motivation and Emotion.................................................................................................................47
06 Memory.......................................................................................................................................... 57
07 Memory and Language...................................................................................................................66
08 Imagery....................................... ...............................................73
09 Comprehension.................... .....................................................81
10 Neuroscience of Comprehension........................................ ..............94
11 Situation Models and Inferencing...................................... .... 109
12 Knowledge............................... .......................................125
13 Decision Making and Reasoning........... ..............................146
14 Present and Future of Research.................. ...............................168
ABOUT THE BOOK............................... ............................... 177
History & Document Notes.... ....................... ...... ..........177
Authors & Image Credits........... ......... ................................. 178
GNU Free Documentation License............. .................. ..........
Introduction
magine a young man, Knut, sitting at his desk, with his tired eyes staring at a monitor, surfing around, trying to find some worthy articles for his psychology homework. A cigarette rests between the middle and index fingers of his left hand. Without looking, he stretches out his free hand and grabs a cup of coffee located on the right of his keyboard. While sipping some of the cheap discounter blend, he suddenly asks himself: "What is happening here?"I
Around the beginning of the 20th century, psychologists would have said, "Take a look into yourself, Knut, analyse what you're thinking and doing," as analytical introspection was the method of that time.
A few years later, J.B. Watson published his book Psychology from the Standpoint of a Behaviorist, from which began the era of behaviourism. Behaviourists claimed that it was impossible to study the inner life of people scientifically. Their approach to psychology, which they assumed to be more scientific, focussed only on the study and experimental analysis of behaviour. The right answer to Knut's question would have been: "You are sitting in front of your computer, reading and drinking coffee, because of your environment and how it influences you." Behaviorism was the primary means for American psychology for about the next 50 years. One of the primary critiques and downfalls of behaviorism was Noam Chomsky's 1959 critique of B.F. Skinner's "Verbal behaviour". Skinner, an influential behaviourist, attempted to explain language on the basis of behaviour alone. Chomsky showed that this was impossible, and by doing so, influenced enough psychologists to end the dominance of behaviorism in American psychology.
As more researchers were once again concerned with processes inside the head, cognitive psychology arose on the landscape of science. Their central claim was that cognition was information processing of the brain. Cognitive psychology did not dispose the methods of behaviourism, but rather widened their horizon by adding levels between input and output.
Modern technology and new methods enabled researchers to combine examinations of public actions (latencies in reaction time, number of recalls) with physiological measurements (EEG and event-related potentials, fMRI). Such methods, in addition to others, are used by cognitive science to collect evidence for certain features of mental activity. From this, references and correlations between action and cognition could be made.
These correlations were inspiration and thenceforwards the main challenge for cognitive psychologists. To answer Knut's question the cognitive psychologist would probably first examining Knut’s brain in that specific situation. So let's try this!
Knut has a problem, he really needs to do his homework. To solve this problem, he has to perform loads of cognition. The light is gleaming into his eyes, transducing it from his retina into nerve signals by sensory cells. The information is passed on through the optic nerve, crosses the brain at the lateral geniculate nucleus to arrive at the central visual cortex. On its journey, the signals get computed over complex nets of neurons; the contrast of the picture gets
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Contents
CHAPTERS..............................................................................................................................4
01 Cognitive Psychology and the Brain................................................................................................ 4
02 Problem Solving from an Evolutionary Perspective........................................................................ 8
03 Evolutionary Perspective on Social Cognitions............................................................................. 25
04 Behavioral and Neuroscience Methods..........................................................................................33
05 Motivation and Emotion.................................................................................................................47
06 Memory.......................................................................................................................................... 57
07 Memory and Language...................................................................................................................66
08 Imagery....................................... ...............................................73
09 Comprehension.................... .....................................................81
10 Neuroscience of Comprehension........................................ ..............94
11 Situation Models and Inferencing...................................... .... 109
12 Knowledge............................... .......................................125
13 Decision Making and Reasoning........... ..............................146
14 Present and Future of Research.................. ...............................168
ABOUT THE BOOK............................... ............................... 177
History & Document Notes.... ....................... ...... ..........177
Authors & Image Credits........... ......... ................................. 178
GNU Free Documentation License............. .................. ..........
Introduction
magine a young man, Knut, sitting at his desk, with his tired eyes staring at a monitor, surfing around, trying to find some worthy articles for his psychology homework. A cigarette rests between the middle and index fingers of his left hand. Without looking, he stretches out his free hand and grabs a cup of coffee located on the right of his keyboard. While sipping some of the cheap discounter blend, he suddenly asks himself: "What is happening here?"I
Around the beginning of the 20th century, psychologists would have said, "Take a look into yourself, Knut, analyse what you're thinking and doing," as analytical introspection was the method of that time.
A few years later, J.B. Watson published his book Psychology from the Standpoint of a Behaviorist, from which began the era of behaviourism. Behaviourists claimed that it was impossible to study the inner life of people scientifically. Their approach to psychology, which they assumed to be more scientific, focussed only on the study and experimental analysis of behaviour. The right answer to Knut's question would have been: "You are sitting in front of your computer, reading and drinking coffee, because of your environment and how it influences you." Behaviorism was the primary means for American psychology for about the next 50 years. One of the primary critiques and downfalls of behaviorism was Noam Chomsky's 1959 critique of B.F. Skinner's "Verbal behaviour". Skinner, an influential behaviourist, attempted to explain language on the basis of behaviour alone. Chomsky showed that this was impossible, and by doing so, influenced enough psychologists to end the dominance of behaviorism in American psychology.
As more researchers were once again concerned with processes inside the head, cognitive psychology arose on the landscape of science. Their central claim was that cognition was information processing of the brain. Cognitive psychology did not dispose the methods of behaviourism, but rather widened their horizon by adding levels between input and output.
Modern technology and new methods enabled researchers to combine examinations of public actions (latencies in reaction time, number of recalls) with physiological measurements (EEG and event-related potentials, fMRI). Such methods, in addition to others, are used by cognitive science to collect evidence for certain features of mental activity. From this, references and correlations between action and cognition could be made.
These correlations were inspiration and thenceforwards the main challenge for cognitive psychologists. To answer Knut's question the cognitive psychologist would probably first examining Knut’s brain in that specific situation. So let's try this!
Knut has a problem, he really needs to do his homework. To solve this problem, he has to perform loads of cognition. The light is gleaming into his eyes, transducing it from his retina into nerve signals by sensory cells. The information is passed on through the optic nerve, crosses the brain at the lateral geniculate nucleus to arrive at the central visual cortex. On its journey, the signals get computed over complex nets of neurons; the contrast of the picture gets
http://adf.ly/Po9Q3
او
http://adf.ly/Po9TM