Thinking and language

Question 1

How long ago did human language develop? Which mode of communication did early communication comprise of?

Answer 1

1-3 million years ago. This long ago, language was mostly comprised on hand signs.

Question 2

When was a written language first developed?

Answer 2

~6000 years ago.

Question 3

How many languages currently exist?

Answer 3

~7000 different ones. They are grouped into distinct families.

Question 4

What are phonemes?

Answer 4

The smallest, meaningful units of sound in a language.

Question 5

What are morphemes? Explain the different types and their sub-types.

Answer 5

The smallest meaningful units of language.

Free morphemes: can stand alone, unbound to another word.
- Content free morphemes: words that make up the sentence
- Functional free morphemes: morphemes that tie the sentence together (i.e. “a”, “and”)

Bound morphemes: morphemes that must be attached to another word to have meaning.
- Prefixes: attached to the start of the word (i.e. “un”)
- Suffixes: attached to the end of the word (i.e. “ing”)

Question 6

Define the difference between semantics and pragmatics.

Answer 6

Semantics is the literal meaning of words/phrases, independent of context.

Pragmatics is the intended meaning of a word/phrase, dependent on context.

Question 7

What is receptive language in relation to language acquisition?

Answer 7

The idea that language understanding develops before speaking does. This happens from 4-10 months of age.

Question 8

What is productive language in relation to language acquisition?

Answer 8

The development of consonants and vocabulary (i.e. babbling), improving grammatical rules and overregularization of words. This happens from the ages of 4 months - 5 years.

Question 9

What was Skinner’s approach to language learning?

Answer 9

Children learn language through imitating the adults in their environment, and will learn more if “good” language use is reinforced.

Question 10

What are the problems with Skinner’s language theory?

Answer 10

It is too simplistic, it does not explain how children develop novel words/sentences independent of exposure to adults.

Question 11

What is Chomsky’s nativist theory? Define “poverty of the stimulus”.

Answer 11

The idea that humans are predisposed to learn language.

Poverty of the Stimulus directly counteracts Skinner’s theory - children can pick up new parts of a language without imitating an adult.

Question 12

What are sensitive periods?

Answer 12

From infancy to ages 7/8. Language learning is much harder after puberty, and learning deficits have been seen in older children and children who live in isolation.

Question 13

What is the interactionist theory?

Answer 13

This theory emphasizes the importance of social interaction in language development, and that nature and nurture work together.

Language learning is bolstered with daily interactions/reading with parents, and children living in higher SES demonstrate larger vocabularies.

Question 14

Which hemisphere of the brain are the language centers located?

Answer 14

The left hemisphere.

Question 15

Where is Broca’s area located, and what is it responsible for?

Answer 15

The left frontal cortex. It is responsible for the production of language.

Question 16

Where is Wernicke’s area located, and what is it responsible for?

Answer 16

The left temporal cortex. It is responsible for the comprehension of language.

Question 17

What is the arcuate fasciculus, and what does it do?

Answer 17

A bundle of axons that connects Broca’s area and Wernicke’s area. Info is sent the Broca’s area to plan speech, and then to the PMC to mechanically produce the sound.

Question 18

What is the role of the auditory cortex in language processing?

Answer 18

It receives the auditory stimulus, and then projects to Wernicke’s area for processing/comprehension.

Question 19

What is Broca’s aphasia? What are the symptoms?

Answer 19

Damage to Broca’s area.

An inability to produce language - although well-rehearsed patterns can be preserved.

Question 20

What is Wernicke’s aphasia? What are the symptoms?

Answer 20

Damage to Wernicke’s area.

An inability to comprehend language - still able to talk and read social cues, but unable to tell what a speaker is saying.

Question 21

What is global aphasia? What are the symptoms?

Answer 21

Damage to both Broca’s area and Wernicke’s area.

Difficulty with both understanding and producing language, and cannot really respond to commands or answer questions.

Question 22

What is alexia?

Answer 22

An impairment with reading that involves damage to occipital and temporal areas.

Question 23

What is agraphia?

Answer 23

An impairment with writing that involves damage to memory and motor areas.

Question 24

What is the right brain responsible for in terms of language?

Answer 24

Understanding pragmatics. Someone with right brain damage will not understand sarcasm or irony.

Question 25

What is Whorf's linguistic relativity hypothesis?

Answer 25

A theory that language shapes our nature of thought. Although different languages can make people have different perceptions (i.e. color categories), it does not completely control our thinking.

Question 26

What is rational choice, and what is expected utility?

Answer 26

Rational choice: people make decisions based on maximizing the expected utility. Expected utility: the amount of something multiplied by the probability of getting that something.

Question 27

What is objective value?

Answer 27

The actual amount of something (i.e. $1000).

Question 28

What is subjective value?

Answer 28

How much something matters to you. This can be based on how immediately you will get it, the risk involved, or the effort it requires.

Question 29

How do more impulsive people tend to make decisions?

Answer 29

Impulsive people value smaller immediate rewards over larger, delayed rewards. The longer the delay, the less subjective value it has.

Question 30

What are framing effects?

Answer 30

The way a problem is framed will influence how we make a decision. i.e. 70% success rate vs. 30% failure rate

Question 31

What is the sunk cost fallacy?

Answer 31

We continue to do things that we have previously put energy into.

Question 32

What are the components of prospect theory?

Answer 32

Risk aversion: we avoid risks to keep our gains. Loss aversion: loss has a stronger emotional impact than gains, so we seek risks to avoid losses. The certainty effect: we tend to choose a small, guaranteed amount of money compared to a gamble for a lot of money.

Question 33

What are the 2 decision-making styles?

Answer 33

Maximizing: considering and comparing all options before making a decision. They make better large decisions, but have more decision regret, and do more social comparison. Satisficing: selecting the first option that meets a criteria. These people tend to be happier with their choices.

Question 34

Where does decision-making happen in the brain?

Answer 34

The prefrontal cortex: responsible for high executive functions, like self-control, planning, decision-making, and problem solving. It keeps emotions and habits under control so we can make good decisions. Limbic system: the hippocampus and the amygdala are involved in emotion processing, memory formation, and habits. *with PFC damage, people make riskier decisions and do not learn the differences between good and bad decisions.

Question 35

What affect to addictive drugs have on decision-making?

Answer 35

Addictive drugs weaken the PFC's ability to moderate habitual responses, so the person will make more risky decisions. The drugs overwhelm the nervous system with dopamine, so all decision-making is based on rewards. The balance of what guides decision-making (emotion vs. PFC) is changed.

Question 36

What is cognition?

Answer 36

Another way of saying "thinking". Cognition is involved with all mental processes.

Question 37

What are concepts?

Answer 37

Categories or groupings of information. i.e. the idea of happiness, a dog, nature, etc.

Question 38

What is a schema?

Answer 38

A cluster of related concepts. These develop over the lifespan, and become more sophisticated as we have more experiences.

Question 39

What are prototypes?

Answer 39

A mental "average" representation that is the basis of all schemas. If something is not exactly like the prototype but has similar features, we group it in the same category.

Question 40

What is rationality?

Answer 40

We think "rational" as making a good decision, and "irrational" as making a bad decision.

Question 41

What is logic?

Answer 41

A formal way of gathering information, a way of working through things systematically. A line of reasoning that draws conclusions from premises. Humans are not good at using logic to solve problems - we need to know the premises first.

Question 42

What is the conjunction fallacy?

Answer 42

If there are fewer things mentioned in a descriptive sentence, then they will be more probable. A very unnatural way of solving a problem in the real world.

Question 43

What are the requirements for a search problem in a problem space? Define each one.

Answer 43

1. Initial state 2. Goal state 3. Set of operators 4. Path constrictions

Question 44

What are algorithms? What are some issues with using algorithms to solve problems?

Answer 44

A method that searches through a space and is guaranteed to find the correct solution. Combinatorial explosion: The problems space can become so large that it is impossible to search through. We don't have enough information a lot of the time. We often don't know the initial state, the goal state, or the rules to follow. Path constrictions are also unexpected.

Question 45

What are heuristics?

Answer 45

Simple, rational strategies that are fast and usually correct (but they encounter errors) that we apply to solve our problems.

Question 46

What are the common types of heuristics that we use? Describe each one (10).

Answer 46

1. Affect 2. Anchoring 3. Authority 4. Availability 5. Effort 6. Familiarity 7. Fluency 8. Representativeness 9. Scarcity 10. Trial and error

Question 47

What is insight? What is the common problem with insight?

Answer 47

Rearranging problems in a completely different way than they are posed. Fixation and a mental set: we see the world in a certain way and have a mindset that is hard to shake when solving problems. i.e. the candle, radiation, and castle problems.

Question 48

What is intuition? What are some problems?

Answer 48

Belief perseverance: we still tend to cling to our beliefs, even if evidence against them is presented to us. (framing, sunk -cost fallacy)

Question 49

What is creative thinking?

Answer 49

The ability to create new and "valuable" ideas.

Question 50

What bolsters creativity (3)?

Answer 50

1. Aptitude/ability to learn 2. Intelligence 3. Working memory

Question 51

What is divergent thinking?

Answer 51

Opening up to a range of possibilities to solve a problem, and expanding the problem space.

Question 52

What is convergent thinking?

Answer 52

Working towards a certain "goal", which is usually not the case when creating art.

Question 53

What are Sternberg's 5 ingredients to creativity?

Answer 53

1. Expertise 2. Imaginative thinking skills 3. Venturesome personality 4. Intrinsic motivation 5. Creative environment

Question 54

Explain some examples of animals demonstrating human-like cognitive skills.

Answer 54

1. Alex the parrot being able to count objects and distinguish them by color. 2. Monkeys realizing they can use the researcher to climb and get the banana. 3. Crows solving a multi-step problem to get a reward, building cognitions on cognitions.

Question 55

How are humans different, cognitively, than other animals?

Answer 55

Language. Humans are the only species that have language with syntactical rules.