This document summarizes chapters 1, 3 to 10, 12 & 13 of the book Cognition - Daniel Reisberg. It also contains the lecture notes for the school year 2021/2022. It has also some dutch words/phrases.
Cognitieve Psychologie Samenvatting + Aantekeningen Hoorcolleges
Cognition Exploring the Science of the Mind – Daniel Reisberg
H1. The Science of the Mind………………………………………………………………….……………….2
H3. Visual Perception…………………………………………………………………………….……………….3
H4. Recognizing Objects…………………………………………………………………………………….…..4
H5. Paying attention………………………………………………………………………………………….…..6
H6. The Acquisition of Memories and the Working-Memory System……………………..7
H7. Interconnections between Acquisition and Retrieval……………………………………….9
H8. Remembering Complex Events………………………………………………………………………..11
H9. Concepts and Generic Knowledge……………………………………………………………………13
H10. Language……………………………………………………………………………………………….………14
H12. Judgment and Reasoning……………………………………………………………………………...16
H13. Problem Solving…………………………………………………………………………………………….17
H1. The science of the mind
Cognitieve psychologie houdt zich bezig met hoe mensen onthouden, opletten en denken.
Het belang van al deze kwesties komt deels voort uit het feit dat het meeste van wat we
doen, zeggen en voelen wordt geleid door dingen die we al weten. Een voorbeeld is ons
begrip van een eenvoudig verhaal, dat sterk beïnvloed blijkt te zijn door de kennis die we al
hebben.
Rond 1950/1960 ontstond er een ‘cognitieve revolutie’. In deze revolutie ontstond een
nieuwe methode van onderzoek doen, gericht op vragen die al bekend waren: vragen over
het geheugen, keuzes maken etc. Er waren twee hoofdpunten in deze cognitieve revolutie:
de wetenschap van de psychologie kan de mentale wereld niet rechtstreeks bestuderen en
het tweede idee is dat de wetenschap van de psychologie de mentale wereld moet
bestuderen als we gedrag willen begrijpen.
Rond 1900 was het begrip introspection erg populair. Wilhem Wundt kwam met het idee dat
de enige manier om gedachtes te bestuderen is door middel van introspection, oftewel naar
binnen van jezelf kijken, om zelf je eigen mentale leven en ervaringen te observeren.
Psychologen raakten al snel teleurgesteld door deze beweging om verschillende redenen:
introspectie kan ons niet informeren over onbewuste mentale gebeurtenissen, en zelfs bij
bewuste gebeurtenissen zijn beweringen die geworteld zijn in introspectie vaak niet te
testen omdat er voor een onafhankelijke waarnemer geen manier is om de juistheid of
volledigheid van een introspectief verslag te controleren.
De behavioristische beweging verwierp introspectie als een methode, en drong er in plaats
daarvan op aan dat de psychologie alleen spreekt over mechanismen en processen die
objectief zijn en voor iedereen zichtbaar zijn. Er zijn echter aanwijzingen dat ons denken,
gedrag en onze gevoelens vaak worden gevormd door onze perceptie of ons begrip van de
gebeurtenissen die we meemaken. Dit is problematisch voor de behavioristen: perceptie en
begrip zijn precies de soorten mentale processen die het gedrag als subjectief beschouwt en
niet openstaat voor wetenschappelijk onderzoek.
De mentale wereld moest worden bestudeerd, maar dat bleek lastig. Kant kwam met de
transcendental methode; je begint met de observeerbare feiten maar vraagt dan welke
(onzichtbare) gebeurtenissen moeten hebben plaatsgevonden om deze (zichtbare) effecten
mogelijk te maken.
Vele factoren hebben bijgedragen aan de opkomst van de cognitieve psychologie. Tolmans
onderzoek toonde aan dat leren zelfs bij ratten het verwerven van nieuwe kennis inhield en
niet alleen een gedragsverandering. Chomsky betoogde krachtig dat een behavioristische
analyse ontoereikend was als verklaring voor het leren van talen en taalgebruik.
Gestaltpsychologen benadrukten de rol van de waarnemer bij het organiseren van zijn of
haar ervaring. Bartletts onderzoek toonde aan dat mensen hun ervaringen spontaan
inpassen in een mentaal kader of schema.
Cognitief psychologen vertrouwen op een diverse reeks methoden en verzamelen vele
soorten gegevens. Inbegrepen zijn metingen van de kwaliteit van iemands prestaties, maten
,3
van reactiesnelheid en in sommige gevallen methoden waarmee we de onderliggende
biologie kunnen onderzoeken.
H3. Visual Perception
The process of vision begins with light. In most cases, it’s this reflected light that launches
the processes of visual perception. Some of this light hits the front surface of eyeball, passes
through the cornea and the lens, and then hits the retina, the light-sensitive tissue that lines
the back of the eyeball. The cornea and the lens focus the incoming lights. On the retina,
there are two types of photoreceptors, specialized neural cells that respond directly to the
incoming light. One type, the rods, are sensitive to very low levels of light and so play an
essential role whenever you’re moving around in semidarkness or trying to view a fairly dim
stimulus. But the rods are also color-blind: they can distinguish different intensities of light,
but they provide no means of discriminating one hue from another. Cones are less sensitive
than rods and need more incoming light to operate at all. Cones are sensitive to color
differences. There are three different types of cones, each having its own pattern of
sensitivities to different wavelengths. Cones also enable you to discern fine detail. The ability
to see fine detail is referred to as acuity. When you want to see something in detail you are
positioning your eyes so that the image of the target falls onto the fovea, the very center of
the retina. Here, cones far outnumber rods, this is the region of the retina with the greatest
acuity.
Rods and cones do not report directly to the cortex. Instead, the photoreceptors stimulate
bipolar cells, which in turn excite ganglion cells. The ganglion cells are spread uniformly
across the entire retina, but all of their axons converge to from the bundle of nerve fibers
that we call the optic nerve. This is the never tract that leaves the eyeball and carries
information to various sites in the brain. The information is sent first to a way station in the
thalamus called the lateral geniculate nucleus (LGN), from there, information is transmitted
to the primary projection area for vision, in the occipital lobe.
Lateral inhibition is a pattern in which cells, when stimulated, inhibit the activity of
neighboring cells. In the visual system, lateral inhibition in the optic nerve creates edge
enhancement. This is a process in which the neurons in the visual system give exaggerated
responses to edges of surfaces.
Part of what we know about the visual system comes from a technique called single-cell
recording. This is a procedure through which investigators can record, the pattern of
electrical changes within in a single neuron. In the visual system, this recording has allowed
researchers to map the receptive fields of many cells. The receptive field is the size and
shape of the area in the visual world to which a cell respond. The mapping has provided
evidence for a high degree of specialization among various parts of the visual system, with
some parts specialized for the perception of motion, others for the perception of color, and
so on:
Area V1: axon from the LGN first reach the cortex. In this brain area some cells fire to
horizontals in this position in the visual world, others to horizontals in that position,
other to verticals in specific positions and so on. The full ensemble of cells in this area
provides a detector for every possible stimulus, making certain that no matter what
the input is or where it’s located, some cell will respond to it.
Area MT: most important for sensitive to direction and speed of movement
, 4
Area V4: cells in this area fire most strongly when the input is of a certain color and a
certain shape
The various areas function in parallel, and this parallel processing allows great speed. It also
allows mutual influence among multiple systems.
Within the optic nerve itself there are two types of cells, P cells and M cells. The P cells
provide the main input for the LGN’s parvocellular cells and appear to be specialized for
spatial analysis and the detailed analysis of form. M cells provide the input for the LGN’s
magnocellular cells and are specialized for the detection of motion and the perception of
depth.
Parallel processing begins in the optic nerve and continues throughout the visual system. For
example, the what system (in the temporal lobe) appears to be specialized for the
identification of visual objects. The where system (in the parietal lobe) seems to identify
where an object is located.
The reliance on parallel processing creates a problem of reuniting the various elements of a
scene so that these elements are perceived in an integrated way. This is the binding
problem. One solution to solve this problem is spatial position. Different brain systems are
organized in terms of maps, so that spatial position can be used as a framework for reuniting
the separately analyzed aspects of the visual scene.
Visual perception requires more than the ‘pick-up’ features. Those features must be
organized into wholes, a process apparently governed by the Gestalt principles. The visual
system also evident with reversible figures. Crucially these interpretive steps aren’t separate
themselves are shaped by the perceiver’s organization of the input.
The active nature of perception is also evident in perceptual constancy. We achieve
constancy through a process of unconscious inference, taking one aspect of the input into
account in interpreting another aspect. This process is usually quite accurate, but it can
produce illusions.
The perception of distance relies on many cues, some dependent on binocular vision, and
some on monocular vision. The diversity of cues lets us perceive distance in a wide range of
circumstances. One cue comes from the fact that you eyes look out on the world from
slightly different positions. As a result, each eye has a slightly different view. This difference
between two eyes’ views is called binocular disparity. We can also perceive depth with one
eye closed. Plainly then there are also depth cues that depend only on what each eye see by
itself. These are the monocular distance cues.
H4. Recognizing Objects
Objects recognition is powerfully influenced by the stimulus itself, by the features in that are
in view. Processes directly shaped by the stimulus are sometimes called ‘data driven’ but are
more commonly said to involve bottom-up processing. Influence relying on your knowledge
is sometimes called ‘concept-driven’. Processes shaped by knowledge are said to involve
top-down processing.
Recognition might begin with the identification of visual features in the input pattern. With
the features catalogued, you can start assembling the larger units. The importance of
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