Reemergence of the Mind in Psych
Edward Chace Tolman 1918 - 1954 at Berkeley - called himself a behaviourist as focus on measuring behaviour - but was actually early cognitive psychologist - because inferred mental processes.
rat in a maze- learned quickly to find the food, but when placed in different start place still found food, based on the cognitive map the rat developed in the initial runs of the maze - this placed him outside mainstream behaviourism
Others knew but resisted because of cognitive violated behaviourists idea that internal processes were acceptable to study. Wasn't until a decade later that Tolman intro idea of cognitive maps that led to resurgence of mind in psych
ironically Skinner's publication of a book Verbal Behaviour. He argued kids learn language through operant conditioning- children imitate speech that they hear, and repeat correct speech because it is rewarded.
This received scathing reviews, as some speech is not praised, the also go through a stage of incorrect grammar, which is not reinforced.
Chomsky saw language as being determined by inborn biological programs that hold across cultures. A language is a product of the way the mind is constructed, rather than a result of reinforcement - they began to realise that to understand complex behaviours, it is necessary to not only measure observable behaviours but also to consider what behaviour tells us about how the mind works.
Rebirth of Study of Mind
1950's beginning of *cognitive revolution - main thrust was to understand operation of the mind - start even before Chomsky's critique - new tech- digital computer helped this
Computer - 1954 - digital computer was avail to public. Used in Uni's to analyse data and suggest new ways of thinking about the mind.
:flow diagrams - input processor - then stored in memory then processed by 'arithmetic unit' - which create output. information-processing approach suggested to study the mind- traces sequences of mental operations involved in cognition. The operation of the mind can be described as occurring in a number of stages. The 1st experiment using this approach asked people how well they could concentrate on some information whilst other info is being presented at the same time.
Conferences on artificial Intelligence and information theory - 1956 Conference by John McCarthy at Darthmouth - defined IA - as "making a machine behave in ways that would be called intelligence if a human were so behaving"
10 weeks included psychologists, mathematicans, computer scientists, linguists, and experts in IT. Most important were Herb Simon and Alan Newell. They were busy trying to create IA machine that McCarthy envisioned - to provided proofs for problems in logic.
Success - called "logic theorist" - was able to create proofs of mathematical theorems that involve principle of logic. - was a real thinking machine - it did more than simply process numbers - with human like reasoning processes to solve problems.
Same year George Miller - 7 is the magic number of items humans can remember - there are limits to the human mind
Cognitive revolution took a while
These have represented shift from behaviourist to study of the mind - the cognitive revolution - occurred over a period of time - took 10 years to recognise the importance of events in 1956.
Nesser (1967) coined the term cognitive psychology
many changes since then - but has become a dominant approach in psychology
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Modern Research in Cognitive Psychology
2) How research progresses from one question to another
working memory - link to choking, holding info to solve a math problem
1)the role of models in cognitive psych
e.g. choking under pressure
Begins with what is known about a problem
then researchers ask Q's , design experiments , and obtain and interpret results.
pathway taken is determined by the results, the biggest challenge is therefore choosing the right question.
basketball/golf/exam stuffing up
more error occur when put pressure on, e.g. choking
This takes the research beyond what is choking to what is happening in the mind - working memory is being disrupted.
another Q is required to continue, looking for the characteristics of people most likely to fail, using previous research, of low working memory and high working memory, she then divided them into 2 categories, low-pressure and high pressure, then added now load conditions and high load conditions - HWM students choked under high pressure conditions
the next Q is why? She looked at how they solved problems, how they used their WM e.g. short cuts for LWM
Another Q vis how can choking be prevented, there are practical uses such as helping people cope with pressure, how to study more effectively
Models are representations of structures or processes that help us visualise or explain the structure or process
structural models - structures in the brain that are involved in specific functions
Process Models which illustrate how a process operates
Boxes usually represent specific processes and arrows, indicating connections between processes
e.g. Broadbents filter model, the box representing the 'filter' represents the process that separates the intended message from other messages. This process is not necessarily located in one particular part of the brain, it represents a process that could be carries out by a number of different structures working together.
Behaviour is what cognitive psychologists are trying to explain and physiological processes that underlie behaviour