Cognition and Language

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Chapter 10

• Cognition and Language

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What is Cognition?

• Cognition all mental activities that are
  associated with processing, knowing, remembering,
  
• understanding,
• communicating
• Metacognition
• thinking about
• ones thinking

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CONCEPTS

• Concepts mental groupings of similar objects,
  events, ideas, people
• Ex. Shoe (Shoe String, Tennis Shoe, Shoe
  Store, Horseshoe, Shoe polish)
• Concepts give us much information without a lot
  cognitive effort
• Concepts are organized into more broad
  hierarchies
• Concepts allow us to avoid relearning

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Forming Concepts

• Ways to form concepts
• By Prototypes a mental image or best example of
  a category
• Ex. A Rose is a prototype flower
• Ex. A Robin is a prototype bird
• Ex. A lab is a prototype dog
• Prototypes give mental pictures of average
  features that make it easier and quicker to
  determine if another object fits into that
  category.

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PROBLEM SOLVING

• Algorithm a step-by-step procedure or logical
  rule that guarantees solving a particular problem
• Algorithms oftentimes consume large amounts of
  time
• Ex. Unscrambling the word SPLOYOCHYG you place
  each
• letter in every possible position.
• Ex. Solving 10 x 2 can be determined by adding
• 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2
• Ex. Computer chess may use algorithms to
  determine its
• next move
• How could you use an algorithm to find toothpicks
  at Harris Teeter?

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PROBLEM SOLVING

• Heuristic a simple thinking strategy (rule of
  thumb, shortcut) that often allows us to make
  judgments and solve problems efficiently.
  Heuristics are speedier but also more error prone
  than algorithms
• Ex. Unscramble the word SPLOYOCHYG but
  eliminating
• various possibilities like placing the two
  Ys Together
• Ex. Work backwards hypothesize an answer and
  see
• what you find
• How could you use a heuristic to find toothpicks
  at Harris Teeter?

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PROBLEM SOLVING

• During problem solving we often experience
  insight
• Insight a sudden realization of the solutions
  to a problem (Aha..)
• Insight contrasts with strategy based solutions.
  The answer just comes to us!

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Obstacles to Problem Solving

• sometimes we are mislead as we search for
  solutions to problems.
• Solve Divorce Problem
• Confirmation Bias tendency to search for
  information that confirms our preconceptions
• Peter Watsons Confirmation Bias experiment
• Pg. 388 Can you guess the rule? 2 4 6
• Give more examples that confirm your hypothesis
• The actual rule. Any three ascending numbers

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Obstacles to Problem Solving

• Fixation the inability to see a problem from a
  new perspective
• Using a box of matches, thumbtacks, and a candle
  think of how to mount the candle on a bulletin
  board. The candle must be able to be lit in a
  certain way without falling over

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Obstacles to Problem Solving

• Mental Set continuing to use problem solving
  strategies that have worked in the past rather
  than trying new ones.
• O-T-T-F. what are the next 3 letters? F (Five),
  S(Six), S(Seven)
• Try this one J-F-M-A. what are the next 3
  letters? (M, J, J)

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Obstacles to Problem Solving

• Functional Fixedness the tendency to think of
  things only in terms of their usual functions
• Use a paper towel when you ran out of coffee
  filters
• Not recognizing that the box of matches could be
  used in assembling a candleholder.

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Using/Misusing Heuristics

• Heuristics could cause us to make quick / poor
  decisions.
• Representativeness heuristic judging the
  likelihood of things in terms of how well they
  seem to match particular prototypes.
• A person is short, slim and likes poetry? Would
  you guess that this person is an ivy league
  professor or a truck driver? (pg. 390)

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Using/Misusing Heuristics

• Availability heuristic we base our judgments on
  the availability of information in our memories.
  We assume information and experiences that are
  readily available in our minds are common.
• Do more words in the English alphabet begin with
  k or have k as their third letter? (page 402)
• Availability heuristics can affect our social
  judgments. Re p 392-3

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We have the tendency to be overconfident

• Overconfidence our tendency to overestimate the
  accuracy of our knowledge and judgments

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Framing

• Framing the way an issue is posed
• Framing can greatly affect our decisions and
  judgments.
• Ex. Which ground beef would you most likely buy
  75 lean or 25 fat?
• Bush Tax Cuts 25 of our deficit comes from
  these cuts which almost exclusively were given to
  those in top 1 of wealth. Tax Cuts expired 2
  weeks ago. Obama extended them backed by 100
  Republicans. extend the tax cuts OR 800
  Billion dollar spending package.

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Belief Bias

• Belief Bias the tendency for our beliefs to
  distort logical reasoning sometimes this
  affects our conclusions. Valid conclusions seem
  invalid and invalid conclusions seem valid.
• Example
• Some Professors wear ties.
• Some men wear ties.
• Some professors are men.
• (true statement but this flow of thinking is not
  always correct)
• Some Prof. wear ties. Some scarecrows wear ties.
  Some prof. are scarecrows.
• Belief bias is related to Confirmation Bias
  seek to confirm our beliefs.

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Belief Perseverance

• Belief perseverance clinging to ones initial
  conceptions after the basis on which they were
  formed has been discredited.
• Belief perseverance may fuel social conflict.
• Ex. Belief about yourself you may stick to it
  even though others have tried to discredit your
  belief
• Ex. Belief that you should invest in a stock or
  that a child is academically gifted

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Language

• Language our spoken, written, or signed words
  and the way we combine them to communicate meaning

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Components of Language

• Phonemes the smallest distinctive sound unit in
  spoken language
• English language has about 40
• See phoneme handout
• Changes in phonemes changes in meaning
• Ex. Wall, Well, Will
• But in and of themselves, phonemes do not mean
  anything

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English Phonemes

• A/a/b/k/d/E/e/f/g/h/I/i/j/l/m/n/O/o/p/kw/r//s/t/U/
  u/v/w/ks/gz/y/z/OO/oo/oi/ou/aw/
• ar/sh/hw/ch/th/ng/zh/ 

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Components of Language

• Morpheme the smallest unit in language that
  carries meaning may be a word or part of a word
• In English, there are only a few phonemes that
  are also morphemes
• Ex. A or I
• A morpheme could be a complete word or part of a
  word (Prefix/Suffix)
• Ex. hat or pre

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Grammar rules that enable communication

• Semantics set of rules by which we derive
  meaning from morphemes, words, and sentences
• Add ed for the past tense
• Limb arm? Or a tree branch?
• Context can affect meaning
• Syntax the rules for combining words into
  grammatically sensible sentences.
• Ex. Adjectives before nouns
• Ex. I am happy instead of Happy am I

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Language Development

• Childrens language development moves from simple
  to complex
• By age 4 months
• Babbling stage infants spontaneously utter
  sounds at age 3-4 months
• At first, these sounds are unlike household
  language
• Cannot distinguish between Chinese babies
  babbling and English babies babbling
• Nature vs. Nurture
• Nature allows us to create consonant-vowel pairs
  (ma, da, goo, ba)
• Nurture eventually molds our language
• Eventually, babbling begins to resemble the
  household language

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Some words Charlie knows at 24 mo.

• Mama/Dada Mother/father
• Nana/TA Deanna/TJ
• me yummy food
• Hello - phone
• Doe doe sleep
• Meenu cat (Cajun)
• Poowoo I pooped
• Bobo - dog
• Ball
• Juice
• Noonee pacifier
• Meimei Maddie made a mess
• Bye bye lets go
• Eye
• Nose
• Bo elbow
• Back
• Knees
• Hello yellow

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Language Development

• 10 months phoneme sounds outside the infants
  household language begin to disappear
• One year old child enters the one-word stage
• juice I am thirsty
• Two years old child enters the two-word stage
  (combination of a verb and noun)
• want sleep I am ready to go to bed
• Telegraphic speech two word sentences that
  contain the most necessary words
• Older than two years old begin to form complete
  sentences

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Explaining language development

• BF Skinner operant learning
• Children learn to speak through imitation,
  association, and reinforcement
• Imitation saying words as mom and dad say them
• Association associating sound with pictures
• Reinforcement hugs, smiles, high fives

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Explaining language development

• Noam Chomsky language is almost entirely
  inborn, children are prewired to learn language
• Children acquire untaught words and grammar rules
  quickly
• Video Scientific American Frontier Born to
  Talk 21
• Ex. incorrectly adding ed (Cindy hitted me)
• Overgeneralization the misapplication of
  grammar rules
• Children have a Language Acquisition Device (LAD)
  that allows them to extract the basic rules of
  grammar. (aka language acquisition or the
  nativist theory)

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Language and Thinking

• Linguistic determinism hypothesis (aka linguistic
  relativity hypothesis) Benjamin Whorf theorized
  that language can control or limit our thinking
• Hopi Indians have no past tense verbs. This
  affects their ability to a Hopis ability the
  think in the past tense.
• English is a language of many self-focus emotions
  whereas Japanese has many words for interpersonal
  emotions (sympathy)
• Bilinguals report having a different sense of
  self when speaking two different languages