Chapter 2 - How To Study Cognition

Question 1

What is the mind-body problem?

Answer 1

The question/debate of how mental events such as thoughts, beliefs, sensations which are related to, caused by, physical mechanisms taking in the body such as cellular or molecular processes in the brain.

Question 2

What is dualism?

Answer 2

To view the mind and body as consisting of fundamentally different kinds of substances or properties.

Question 3

What is monism?

Answer 3

The view that there is only one kind of basic substance that makes up both the mind and body.

Question 4

What is physicalism/materialism?

Answer 4

The position that the only kind of reality is the physical reality. That cognition is a physical phenomenon such as digestion or breathing.

Question 5

What is idealism?

Answer 5

The view that the only kind of reality is mental and that all physical reality is a mental construct.

Question 6

What is neutral monism?

Answer 6

That there is only one kind of substance that is neither only physical or mental, that the mind and body are composed of the same element.

Question 7

Summarize idealism, physicalism, dualism, and neutral monism.

Answer 7

Idealism - Only the mind exists.
Physicalism - Only the body exists.
Dualism - Both the mind and body exist separately.
Neutral monism - The mind and body are made of the same thing.

Question 8

What is pragmatic materialism?

Answer 8

The idea that science operates based on physical measurements and explanatory mechanisms which cannot test non-physical theories.

Question 9

What is structuralism?

Answer 9

A school of psychology whose approach relies on introspecting on one’s own conscious mental states in order to understand the mind.

Question 10

What is introspection?

Answer 10

A structuralist technique which includes practitioners carefully considering and describing their own internal conscious experiences in terms of fundamental elements of consciousness.

Question 11

What is replication?

Answer 11

To copy a study using the same methods as the original.

Question 12

What is cortical blindness?

Answer 12

A condition where damage may have been inflicted to a part of the brain responsible for processing incoming visual information. However, while they report their blindness, they are still able to behaviourally respond to a visual stimulus. This is referred to as blindsight.

Question 13

What is behaviourism?

Answer 13

A school of thought emphasizing using observable stimuli and behaviours as the basis of scientific explanation. Watson was the founder of behaviourism. We must use stimulus and response.

Question 14

What is latent learning?

Answer 14

The process of learning without any type of conditioning. (Tolman’s rat maze!)

Question 15

What is an algorithm?

Answer 15

A method for producing the correct output from the input.

Question 16

What is a function?

Answer 16

A mechanism that takes an input and produces the respective output.

Question 17

What is the Stroop effect/Stroop interference?

Answer 17

When there is difficulty conflicting between the colour of the word, and the actual literate content.

Question 18

What are human factors?

Answer 18

A field concerned with how people interact with physical systems like car consoles or machinery.

Question 19

What is a stimulus?

Answer 19

Something that stimulates the senses of the experimental subject.

Question 20

What is a response?

Answer 20

The behaviour the experimental subject engages in after the stimulus is presented.

Question 21

What does behaviourism function on?

Answer 21

Expressed behaviour. The brain is thought of as a “black box” and the process is disregarded as the focus is on input of stimulus and output of response.

Question 22

What is classical conditioning?

Answer 22

A type of conditioning based on eliciting natural physiological reactions based on the antecedent.

Question 23

Did behaviourists believe the nature or nurture side of the argument?

Answer 23

Behaviourists believed the nurture part.

Question 24

What is operant conditioning? Who was it found by?

Answer 24

B.F. Skinner who found the system of conditioning a subject to engage in certain behaviours by reinforcing the behaviour, or punishing the behaviour.

Question 25

What is reinforcement learning?

Answer 25

When subjects were treated or rewarded for a certain action, that was known as reinforcement learning.

Question 26

What is the difference between negative reinforcement, and negative punishment?

Answer 26

Negative reinforcement is when a stimulus is removed from the environment which causes the subject’s behaviour to more likely and continue. Negative punishment is when a stimulus is removed from the environment which causes the subject’s behaviour to become less likely and cease.

Question 27

What is the difference between positive reinforcement and positive punishment?

Answer 27

Positive reinforcement is when a stimulus is added to the environment which causes the subject’s behaviour to more likely and continue. Positive punishment is when a stimulus is added to the environment which causes the subject’s behaviour to less likely and cease.

Question 28

What is cognitivism?

Answer 28

Based on the idea that we can measure observable behaviour in order to test theories of the underlying mental processes.

Question 29

What is Donder’s light bulb experiment?

Answer 29

Including reaction time as a means to measure participant response by including three conditions: 1. Detection (Press one button when one light turns on) 2. Discrimination (Press one button when the left light turns on) 3. Choice (Press the left when the left comes on, and vice versa.) Choice was the slowest.

Question 30

There are three measurements involved in signal detection theory:

Answer 30

- Correctness which measures whether or not a given response is accurate - Thresholds in which a stimulus may be manipulated along one or several dimensions - Reaction time (RTs) in which the time it takes a participant to produce a response is measured.

Question 31

What are some involuntary behaviours that can be measured?

Answer 31

Eye movements, pupil dilation, heart rate, galvanic skin response, facial and body gestures.

Question 32

What is cognitive neuroscience?

Answer 32

Combining behavioural experiments with methods for measuring brain activity.

Question 33

What is behavioural neuroscience?

Answer 33

Incorporating behavioural experiments alongside physiological measures of the brain, such as using animals to record the activity of their individual neurons or areas.

Question 34

What is optogenics?

Answer 34

Allowing researchers to experimentally manipulate activity of neurons using opsins activated by light.