Please enable JavaScript.
Coggle requires JavaScript to display documents.
The Cognitive Approach - Coggle Diagram
The Cognitive Approach
Assumptions
Thought processes can be , and should be , studied scientifically . They therefore feel that introspection is too unscientific and that well controlled laboratory studies can investigate what we are thinking
The mind works like a computer in that it has an input from our senses which it then processes and produces an output such as language or specific behaviours
Stimulus and response is appropriate but only if the thought processes that occur between stimulus and response are acknowledged ( direct criticism of behaviour )
-
Schema
-
-
-
There is a cultural effect in that people from the same cultures form similar schemas due to shared experience experience
Barletts 1932 'war of the ghosts' study illustrates how external influences can affect our memory of the event
-
-
Cognitive Neuroscience
Combines cognitive psychology , cognitive science and neuroscience
Main focus is to look for a biological basis to thought processes , specifically how neurons explain those processes
Emerged as technology has advanced , this has meant that as scanning machines have advanced
Cognitive science formed formally at a meeting in the massachusetts intitute of technology ( MIT ) in 1956 where many papers that were presented used rigorous scientific methods
-
George Miller and Michael Gazzaniga first used the label cognitive neuroscience about twenty years later following the recognition of neuroscience in in 1971
-
Evaluation
The focus of cognitive psychology is on the importance of thought processes , these are generally agreed to have an influence on behaviour and have importance for understanding human behaviour
The cognitive approach uses experimental methods to research , which means the research has scientific rigour
The approach has produced some good descriptions of what processes occur , and this informs treatment ( e.g the cognitive theory of depression and CBT )
The use of laboratory experiments means that the research lacks validity as the thought processes measured could be argued to be artificial due to the context and tasks performed
The use of models can be seen as over simplifying complex processes , for example the role of emotion is sometimes overlooked
The approach is criticised for its comparison of people to computers , seeing people as mechanistic and lacking free will
-
-
-