🗓️ Unit 7
Thinking & Cognition

PSYC 181 – Intro to Psych

Emma Marshall – Instructor

University of Nebraska-Lincoln

July 29, 2024

What you will learn

Learning Objectives

• Describe cognition
• Describe how schemata are organized and constructed
• Explain the relationship between language and thinking
• Identify the difference between intelligence theories

COGNITIVE PSYCHOLOGY

Cognition is thinking

Perception

Knowledge

Problem-Solving

Judgement

Language

Memory

COGNITION

Sensations and information are received by our brains, filtered through emotions and memories, and processed to become thoughts.

How does the brain organize information?

Concepts categories of linguistic information, images, ideas or memories

Prototypes the best example or representation of a concept

• Prototype: The best example or representation of a concept.
  • E.g., Mahatma Gandhi could be a prototype for the category of civil disobedience.
• Concepts: Categories of linguistic information, images, ideas, or memories.
  • Used to see relationships among different elements of experience.
  • Can be complex and abstract (e.g., the idea of justice) or concrete (types of birds).

Concepts

Natural Created through either direct or indirect experience

Artificial defined by a specific set of characteristics

Natural concepts: - Created “naturally” through either direct or indirect experience. - E.g., our concept of snow. Artificial concepts: - Defined by a specific set of characteristics. - E.g., Properties of geometric shapes (squares, triangles etc).

Schemata

Schema A mental construct consisting of a collection of related concepts

Role schema Makes assumptions about how individuals in certain roles will behave

Event schema A set of routine or automatic behaviors or cognitive script

• When a schema is activated, we automatically make assumptions about the person/object/situation.
• Role schema: Makes assumptions about how individuals in certain roles will behave.
• Event schema (cognitive script): A set of routine or automatic behaviors.
  • Can vary widely among different cultures and countries.
  • Dictate behavior.
  • Make habits difficult to break.
  • E.g., when riding in an elevator, we automatically stand facing the door.

Event Schema

Example: Texting & Driving in Lincoln Difficult to change because event schema’s are automatic

When we receive a text, our event schema is to pick up our phone and reply. The problem is that this automatic reaction will arise even in situations when it is not safe to reply. Texting while driving is dangerous, but it is a difficult event schema for some people to resist.

Research suggests that just the event schema of regularly checking our phone makes it increasingly difficult to resist picking it up while driving.

Problem Solving STRATEGIES

Trial & error keep trying until solved

Algorithm step-by-step formula

Heuristic mental short-cut or “rule of thumb”

PUZZLE 1: SUDOKU

Problem solving abilities can improve with practice.

PUZZLE 2: Spatial Reasoning

Connect all nine dots with four connecting straight lines without lifting your pencil from the paper

Solutions

Solving Slide-Puzzles

Try it out!

Different strategies?

Problem Solving

Method	Description	Example
Trial and error	Continue trying different solutions until problem is solved	turning technology off and back on
Algorithm	Step-by-step problem-solving formula	Instruction manual for installing new software on your computer
Heuristic	General problem-solving framework	Working backwards; breaking a task into steps

When do people use heuristics?

• When faced with too much information.
• When time to make a decision is limited.
• When the decision viewed as unimportant.
• When limited access to other information to use in making the decision.
• When a particular heuristics are activated

Pitfalls to Problem Solving

“Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result” – Albert Einstein.

Functional fixedness inability to perceive an object being used for something other than what it was designed for

Mental sets a set way of looking at a problem

Decision-Making Biases

Anchoring Bias

Confirmation bias

Representative bias

Availability heuristic

Hindsight bias

Anchoring bias Tendency to focus on one piece of information and adjust

Confirmation bias Tendency to focus on information that confirms your existing beliefs

Confirmation bias on Social Media

Representative bias Tendency to unintentionally stereotype someone or something

Availability heuristic Tendency to make a decision based on readily available example, information, or recent experience

Hindsight biasKnowledge of an outcome makes that outcome appear more inevitable or foreseeable than it would have been beforehand

Language

Language a communication system that involves using words and systematic rules to transmit information from one individual to another

Components of Language:

Phoneme short, sound units (ah, eh)

Morphemes the smallest units that convey meaning

Lexicon the words of a given language

Grammar the set of rules that are used to convey meaning through the use of the lexicon.

How do we construct language?

Semanticsthe meaning we derive from morphemes and words

Syntax the way words are organized into sentences

Language Development

Critical period Proficiency at acquiring language is maximal early in life

• B.F. Skinner - language product of operant conditioning
• Noam Chomsky: believed acquisition is innate and proposed a universal system of grammar
• Critical period: Proficiency at acquiring language is maximal early in life.

Stages of Development

Stage	Age	Developmental Language & Communication
1	0-3 Months	Reflexive communication
2	3-8 Months	Reflexive communication; interest in others
3	8-13 Months	Intentional communication; sociability
4	12-18 Months	First words
5	18-24 Months	Simple sentences (two words)
6	2-3 Years	Sentences (three or more words)
7	3-5 Years	Complex sentences; conversations

Concept of Language (optional)

Intelligence

What is intelligence?

Psychologists have come up with many different ways to define intelligence.

Charles Spearman’s g-factor

Believed intelligence consisted of one general factor, called g.

Focused on commonalities amongst various intellectual abilities

Raymond Cattell: - Divided intelligence into two components: 1. Crystalized intelligence: Acquired knowledge and the ability to retrieve it. 2. Fluid intelligence**: The ability to see complex relationships and solve problems.

Robert Sternberg’s trio

Robert Sternberg’s theory identifies three types of intelligence: 1. Practical 2. Creative 3. Analytical

Howard Gardner’s multiple

Howard Gardner proposed that each person possesses at least 8 intelligences: 1. Linguistic 2. Logical-mathematical 3. Musical 4. Bodily kinesthetic 5. Spatial 6. Interpersonal 7. Intrapersonal 8. Naturalist

Emotional intelligence: The ability to understand the emotions of yourself and others, show empathy, understand social relationships and cues, and regulate your own emotions and respond in culturally appropriate ways.

Creativity

• Creative people usually:
  • Have specific expertise
  • Invest time & energy
  • Look at novel solutions
  • Seek out the advice & help of other experts
  • Take risks

Creativity the ability to generate, create, or discover new ideas, solutions, and possibilities

Divergent thinking thinking outside the box

Convergent thinking ability to provide a correct or well-established answer or solution to a problem

Used when more than one possibility exists in a situation

Measuring Intelligence

Intelligence Quotient (IQ) score earned on a test designed to measure intelligence

Flynn Effect each generation has a significantly higher IQ than the last

• Early 1900’s – Alfred Binet developed an intelligence test to use on children to determine which ones might have difficulty in school. Alfred Binet French psychologist Alfred Binet helped to develop intelligence testing. This page is from a 1908 version of the Binet-Simon Intelligence Scale. Children being tested were asked which face, of each pair, was prettier.
• Louis Terman (a Stanford psychologist) modified Binet’s work by standardizing the administration of the test and testing thousands of children to establish a norm. Standardization The manner of administration, scoring, and interpretation of results is consistent.

Norming: Giving a test to a large population so data can be collected comparing groups, such as age groups. - The resulting data provide norms/referential scores used to interpret future scores. - Standardization and norming ensure that new scores are reliable.

Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale

David Wechsler’s definition of intelligence: “the global capacity of a person to act purposefully, to think rationally, and to deal effectively with his environment.”

• In 1939, Wechsler developed a new IQ test by combining several subtests from other intelligence tests.
• Tapped into a variety of verbal and nonverbal skills.
• One of the most extensively used intelligence tests.
• Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children (WISC-V) tests:
  1. Verbal comprehension
  2. Visual spatial
  3. Fluid reasoning
  4. Working memory
  5. Processing Speed

The Normal Curve

Are you of below-average, average, or above-average height?

Results of intelligence tests follow the bell curve. - In psychological testing, this graph demonstrates a representative sample/normal distribution of a trait in the human population. - Representative sample: A subset of the population that accurately represents the general population. - Usually requires a large sample size.

Representative sample a subset of the population that accurately represents the general population

IQ Bell Curve

• Average IQ score is 100
• 82% of the population have an IQ score between 85 and 115

Standard deviations**: Describe how data are dispersed in a population. - One standard deviation in IQ testing is 15 points. - A score of 85 is one standard deviation below the mean (average). - Any score between one standard deviation above and below the mean is considered average.

The Source of Intelligence

Range of reaction theory that each person responds to the environment in a unique way based on genetic makeup

1. Nature perspective: Intelligence is inherited from a person’s parents.
   • The heritability of intelligence is often researched using twin studies.
   • Identical twins raised together and identical twins raised apart exhibit a higher correlation between IQ scores than siblings or fraternal twins raised together.
2. Nurture perspective: Intelligence is shaped by a child’s developmental environment.
   • If parents present children with intellectual stimuli it will be reflected in the child’s intelligence level.

Most now believe levels of intelligence are a combination of both.

Nature vs. Nurture

• Genetic makeup is a fixed quantity.
• Whether you reach your full intellectual potential is dependent upon environmental factors.

The Bell Curve (1994)

Learning Disabilities

Dysgraphia results in struggle to write legibly

Dyslexia an inability to correctly process letters

Learning disabilities are cognitive disorders that affect different areas of cognition, particularly language or reading. - Specific neurological impairments, not an intellectual/developmental problem. - Often affect children with average to above-average intelligence. - Exhibit comorbidity with other disorders.

• disgraphia Have difficulty putting their thoughts down on paper.

• Most common learning disability in children. - May mix up letters within words and sentences (letter reversals).