Cognitive level of analysis

COGNITIVE PROCESSES

What is COGNITION?

• Comes from the Latin word cognoscere which

means „to know”

• Cognitive processes include perception,

thinking, problem solving, memory, language

and attention

• Cognition is based on one’s mental representations

od the world (images, words, concepts).

• People have different experiences – which lead to

different mental representations (for ex what is

right or wrong OR what girls or boys can or cannot

do) – it influence the way they think about the

world.

• Cognitive psychology – concerns structure

and functions of the mind, how human come

to know things and how they use this

knowledge

• Cognitive neuroscience – combines

knowledge about the brain with knowledge

about cognitive processes

PRINCIPLES OF THE COGNITIVE LEVEL OF ANALYSIS

1. Human beings are information processors and that mental

processes guide behaviour

• Goal of cognitive research is to discover principles underlying cognitive

processes

• The mind is a complex machine (an information processing machine) using

hardware (the brain) and software (mental images or reperesentations)

• Information input to the mind comes via bottom – up processing (from

the sensory system)

• Information is processed in the mind by top – down processing via

prestored information in the memory

• Output is the form of behavior

• There is a relationship between how people think about

themselves and how they behave (Carol Dweck’s Mindset)

• Fixed ideas about other people – Stereotyping

False memories

• People’s memories are not infallible because of the

reconstructive nature of memory

• People do not store exact copies of their experiences, rather

an outline which is filled out with information when it is

recalled

• We can’t distinguish between what they have experienced and

what they have heard after the event

• The brain is able to fabricate illusions which are so realistic

that we believe they are true

2. The mind can be studied scientifically by developing

theories and using a number of scientific research methods

• The experimental method is commonly used because

it is the most scientific method

• But there is a problem with artificiality,

• So psychologist use case studies of people with

extraordinary memory or people with brain damage

• Technology (fMRI) allows study brain processes - help

refute or confirm cognitive theories

3. Cognitive processes are influenced by social and cultural factors

• British psychologist Frederic Bartlett coined the term:

SCHEMA – mental representation of knowledge

• People often reconstruct a story to fit in with their own

cultural schemas (problems with remembering stories from

another culture)

• Memory is not like a tape recorder, people rather remember in

terms of meaning and what makes sense to them

• Memory is subject to distortions

A theory of a cognitive process: SCHEMA THEORY

• Schemas are cognitive structures

(mental templates or frames) that

represent a person’s knowledge

about objects, people or situations

• The concept of schema was first used

by Jean Piaget in 1926 and later

developed by Frederic Bartlett (1932)

Frederic Bartlett

Schemas

• are networks of knowledge, beliefs and expectations

• are used to organize our knowledge, to assist recall, to guide

our behavior, to predict likely happenings and to help us to

make sense of current experiences

• They come from prior experience and knowledge

• They simplify reality

• They allow us to take shortcuts in interpreting vast amounts of

information

What is schema theory ?

• As active processors of information, humans integrate new

information with existing, stored information.

• SCHEMA THEORY THEREFORE PREDICTS THAT WHAT WE

ALREADY KNOW WILL INFLUENCE THE OUTCOME OF

INFORMATION PROCESSING.

• In other words new information is processed in the light of

exisiting schema – schema can affect our cognitive processes.

• Schema processing can affect memory ay all stages

Schema theory explain memory processes

dividing it into 3 stages:

ENCODING

• TRANSFORMING

SENSORY

INFORMATION INTO

A MEANINGFUL

MEMORY

STORAGE

• CREATING A

BIOLOGICAL TRACE

OF THE ENCODED

INFORMATION IN

MEMORY, WHICH IS

EITHER

CONSOLIDATED OR

LOST

RETRIEVAL

• USING THE STORED

INFORMATION

Evaluation of Schema theory

• Theory explains memory distortions – „social schemas” are

helpful with explaining stereotyping and prejudice

• We don’t know how schemas are acquired in the first place

and how they actually influence cognitive processes

• Daniel Gilbert said „the brain is wonderful magician but a

lousy scientist – the brain searches for meaningful patterns

but does not check wether they are correct”

• Research in psychology• Anderson and Pichert (1978)• p. 72

Models of memory

The working memory model – Baddely and Hitch

The central executive

• and a soul of working memory model

• Link between senses and long term memory

• Controlling system –monitors and coordinates slave

systems

• has limited capacity and it is modality free

• His job is attentional control:

– The automatic level

– Supervisory attentional level

The episodic buffer

• It acts as a temporary and passive display store

The phonological loop

• Divided into two components:

– Articulatory control system (inner voice) – hold

information in a verbal form

– Phonological store (inner ear)

• Memory trace can last from 1.5 to 2 seconds if it is not

refreshed by articulatory control system

The visuospatial sketchpad

• Inner eye

Evidence of working memory

• Experiments using dual-task techniques (interference

tasks) – provide support for the model

• For example: participants carry out a cognitive tasks: telling

story to another person while at the same time performing

a second cognitive task, such as trying to learn a list of

numbers

Evaluation of the working memory model

• It explain why people are able to perform different

cognitive tasks at the same time without disruption

• It plays an important role in learning, especially during the

childhood years

Memory and the brain

• Kandel’s research shows that

learning, means formation of memory

– that is growing new

connections or strenghtening existing

connections between neurons to

form neural networks.

• Case studies – brain demage can

affect one type of memory but leave

others intact. ERIC KANDEL

Nobel Prize winner in 2000

Memory and the brain

• Animals’ study – how ares of the brain are related to memory.

• Animals learn to perform a specific task (running through a maze) and a

memory is formed.

• To find out which areas of the brain are involved in such a task researchers

cut away brain tissue and animal has to run through the maze again.

• This procedure (lesioning) is repeated a number of times until the animal

can no longer perform the task.

• This kind of research show that LTM must consist of several stores.

Demage to different parts of the brain affects diffrent kinds of memory.

Episodic memory

Semantic memory

Procedural memory

Role of hippocampus and amygdala

• Kandel has pointed the very important role of hippocampus

in the formation of explicit (declarative) memories.

• Case studies of people with hippocampal damage have

shown that they can no longer form new explicit memories,

but apparently they can still form new

implicit memories.

• Amygdala plays a role in the

storage of emotional memories

How brain damage affects memory

• Case study of Clive Wearing suffers from both:

anterograde amnesia and retrograde amnesia

• Anterograde amnesia is a loss of the ability to

create new memories after the event that

caused the amnesia,

• Retrograde amnesia is a loss of access to

events that occurred, or information that was

learned, before an injury or the onset of a

disease.

How brain damage affects memory

• Case study: HM suffered from anterograde amnesia.

• He suffered from epileptic seizures after head injury.

• Doctors removed tissue from his

temporal lobe, including hippocamus.

• After opperation he couldn’t form

new memories, but he still could

recall information acquired in

early life.

Helpful links:

• A Conversation With Eric Kandel - very interesting http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zuZjOwd7HLk

• Case study: Clive Wearing http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2007/09/24/070924fa_fact_sacks

• Case study: HM http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=fd0_1261475829

Cultural factors in cognition

• Development of cognitive abilities (memory, thinking, problem

solving) is influenced by the social and cultural context.

• Development of new techonology causes growing need for

people with specialized education (how many things you have to

learn comparing to your parents and grandparents)

• Jerome Bruner: Children af any culture learn the basics of culture

through schoolong and daily interaction with members of their

culture.

Cultural factors in cognition

• If cognitive processes follow universal laws then all humans

all over the world, regardless of culture, would perform the

same cognitive tasks with the same results

• When researchers from the West performed memory tests

with participants in non-western countries they found that

they did poorly on memory tests

• This could be misinterpreted as memory processes/strategies

being better in Western society

Cole & Scribner (1974) Memory Strategies in different cultures

• Argued that cognitive processes are universal but

not cognitive skills

• Cognitive skills are dependent on the environment

– education, social interaction, culture and

technologies which make up the environment

• Cole & Scribner investigated memory strate-

gies in different cultures – USA and Liberia

• They observed what effects on memory had

formal schooling / education (culture)

Cole & Scribner (1974) method

• Researchers compared recall (free-recall tasks) of a series of

words in the US and among the Kpelle people who live in Liberia

• They didn’t use the same list of words in the two different

countries so first they had started by observing everyday cognitive

activities in Liberia

• They devised list of words culturally specific

• The researchers asked liberian children to recall as many items as

possible from 4 categories – utensils, clothes, tools and

vegetables

Cole & Scribner (1974) results

• They found striking differences in memory between schooled and

non-schooled children in Liberia

• Kpelle children who attended to school learned the list just as

rapidly as children in US

• Illiterate children did not use strategies such as chunking – grouping

bits of information into larger units – to help them remember

• Kpelle children did not appear to apply rehearsal as the position of

the word in the list did not have an effect on the rate of recall

Cole & Scribner (1974) results

• In later trials the researchers varied the recall task so that the

objects were now presented in a meaningful way as part of a

story.

• This is called a narrative

• The illiterate children recalled

the objects easily and chunk

them according to the roles

they played in a story.

Cole & Scribner (1974)

• People learn to remember in ways that are relevant for

their everyday lives, and these do not always mirror the

activities that cognitive psychologists use to investigate

mental processes

Now, use your CRITICAL THINKING skills

and evaluate Cole & Scribner experiment

How reliable is our memory?

• The legal system uses eyewitness testimony which relies on

the accuracy of human memory to decide whether a person is

guilty or not.

• Do you think that we can rely on eyewitness testimony?

• SCHEMAS – RECONSTRUCTIVE NATURE OF MEMORY

How reliable is our memory?

• Do you remember FREUD and repression (defence mechanism)?

• Therapists who try to „help” to gain an access into our repression

memories, to our unconscious

• The False Memory Syndrome Foundation – US, 1992

• Elizabeth Loftus doesn’t deny that childhood abuse happens,

but she has argue that some of the recovered memories may

simply be created by post-event information during therapy

The War of the Ghosts (Bartlett, 1932)

• Bartlett argued that memory is reconstructive and that schemas

influence recall.

• Participants were given a 328 word Native American legend

“The War of the Ghosts”

to read twice and then

reproduce 15 minutes

later and a couple of

times more - repeated

reproduction.

Methodology

• Serial reproduction – participant reads and recalls the story,

second person reads and recalls the second

reproduction…….and so on

• Repeated reproduction – participants reads the story and

repeats it over various recall intervals

The War of the Ghosts (Bartlett, 1932)• One night two young men from Egulac went down to the river to hunt seals and while they were there it became

foggy and calm. Then they heard war-cries, and they thought: "Maybe this is a war-party". They escaped to the

shore, and hid behind a log. Now canoes came up, and they heard the noise of paddles, and saw one canoe

coming up to them. There were five men in the canoe, and they said: "What do you think? We wish to take you

along. We are going up the river to make war on the people." One of the young men said,"I have no arrows."

"Arrows are in the canoe," they said. "I will not go along. I might be killed. My relatives do not know where I

have gone. But you," he said, turning to the other, "may go with them." So one of the young men went, but the

other returned home. And the warriors went on up the river to a town on the other side of Kalama. The people

came down to the water and they began to fight, and many were killed. But presently the young man heard one

of the warriors say, "Quick, let us go home: that Indian has been hit." Now he thought: "Oh, they are ghosts." He

did not feel sick, but they said he had been shot. So the canoes went back to Egulac and the young man went

ashore to his house and made a fire. And he told everybody and said: "Behold I accompanied the ghosts, and we

went to fight. Many of our fellows were killed, and many of those who attacked us were killed. They said I was

hit, and I did not feel sick." He told it all, and then he became quiet. When the sun rose he fell down. Something

black came out of his mouth. His face became contorted. The people jumped up and cried. He was dead.

The War of the Ghosts (Bartlett, 1932)results

• Participants changed the legend, they made a lot of mistakes:

– Rationalisation errors—making the story read more like a

typical English story.

– Omissions — certain elements were left out

– Changes of order – events were sometimes re-ordered to

make the story more coherent

– Substitutions

– Shortening (reduced to 180 words)

Now, use your CRITICAL THINKING skills

and evaluate Bartlett’s experiment

Evaluation of Bartlett’s study

• The ecological validity has been questioned (lab)

• It wasn't a very well controlled study. Bartlett did not give very

specific instructions to his participants - Barlett, 1932 "I

thought it would be best, for the purposes of these experiments,

to try to influence the subject's procedure as little as possible"

• Gauld and Stephen ( 1967) found that the instructions stressing

the need for accurate recall eliminated almost half the errors

Another Bartlett’s study

Loftus and Palmer experiment (1974)

• Aim: To test hypothesis that the language

used in eyewitness testimony can alter

memory.

They aimed to show that leading questions

could distort eyewitness testimony.

• To test this Loftus and Palmer (1974) asked

people to estimate the speed of cars.

• The IV was the wording of the question and

the DV was the speed reported by the

participants.

Elizabeth Loftus

Loftus and Palmer (1974) - procedure

• 45 students (opportunity sample)

• a laboratory experiment with five conditions (only one of

which was experienced by each participant)

• Participants were shown slides of a car accident and asked to

describe what had happened as if they were eyewitnesses.

• They were then asked specific questions, including the

question: “About how fast were the cars going when they

hit /smashed /collided /bumped /contacted each other?”

Loftus and Palmer (1974) - findings

• The estimated speed was affected by the verb used.

• The verb implied information about the speed, which

systematically affected the participants’ memory of the accident.

Loftus and Palmer (1974) - conclusions

• the use of diffrent verbs activate diffrent schemas in memory

Second Loftus’s experiment

• 150 participants (students) - divided into three groups (two

experimental, one control group)

• All of them saw a film with car accident, including the

question on estimation of speed (only „hit” and „smashed”)

• A week after the participants were asked a lot of questions,

among them was: “Did you see any broken glass?”

• There was no broken glass shown in the film

Second Loftus’s experiment

Second Loftus’s experiment - conclusions

• It is possible to create false memory using post – event

information

Now, use your CRITICAL THINKING skills

and evaluate Loftus and Palmer’s experiments

Evaluation

• The research lacks realism (laboratory study), as the video

clip does not have the same emotional impact as

witnessing a real-life accident and so the research lacks

ecological validity.

• Using closed questions – people had to answear YES or NO

• Participants – US students – culture consideration and the

way they choose sample

Evaluation

• Yuille and Cutshall (1986) criticized Loftus’s research for lack

of ecological validity.

• They used Loftus’s technique in interviewing people who

hadwitnessed a real robbery and found that misleading

questions didn’t seem to distort people’s memory.

Use of modern technology to investigate

the relationship between

cognitive factors and behaviour

PET positron emission topography

• Scan monitors glucose metabolism in the brain

• The patient is injected with a harmless dose of radioactive glucose

• The radioactive particles emitted by the glucose are detected by

PET scanner

• Scan products coloured maps of brain activity

• Diagnose: abnormalities like tumours, changes in Alzhaimer’s,

compare brain differences in normal individuals and those with

psychological disorders (schizophrenia),

• PET (compared to MRI) can record ongoing activity in the brain,

such as thinking

PET

PET and Alzhaimer’s disease

• Researchers from NY Uinversity School of Medicine – brain –

scaned – based program that measures metabolic activity in

the hippocampus

• Longitudinal study - (9 to 24 yeras)

• 53 normal and healthy participants

• Using PET scans and this program – researchers showed that

in early stages of Alzhaimer’s disease, there is a reduction in

brain metabolism in the hippocampus

Evaluation of PET –

• Difficulty in interpreting the data. Requires experts or statistical analysis

• Invasive (use of radiation, even though it is mild)

• Expensive

• The injection of the tracer substance (radioactive glucose) can cause

allergy, some people are hypersensitive to radioactivity, it should not be

used on pregnant women

• It takes some time for the radioactive glucose to be taken up by the brain

– about 40 minutes (fMRI/MRI are quicker)

• Can be uncomfortable for the participant (problem with ecological

validity of the brain scan)

Evaluation of PET +

• Can see moving images of brain activity while the person is

doing a task

• Can be used to diagnose brain disease or damage (e.g.

Schizophrenia, Depression or Alzheimers disease - Mosconi)

MRI - magnetic resonance imaging

• Provides three dimensional pictures of the brain structures

• Work by detecting changes in the use of oxygen in the

blood

• When area in the brain is more active it uses more oxygen

• MRI is used to see which part of the brain are used when

people perform cognitive task

MRI

MRI - magnetic resonance imaging

• Maguire (2000): Scanned the brain of London cab drivers.

• Discovered that their hippocampus were larger than control

subjects.

• Corkin: Scanned HM’s brain.

• Found that the hippocampus was missing, along with the

amygdala. The brain size was small

Evaluation of MRI –

• May be time consuming

• Metal objects need to be removed

• Can be uncomfortable for the participant (problem with

ecological validity of the brain scan)

• Sensitive to motion

• Expensive

• Only shows still pictures and structure and not processes of

the brain

Evaluation of MRI +

• Can be used to discover structural differences, for instance to

spot brain damage

• Can be used to increase our knowledge of the brain

• Non invasive

• Can be used for therapy – e.g. neurofeedback