PYSC 341 Cognitive Psychology 

Study Questions for Exam 1

 

 

  1. What are the five disciplines that shaped cognitive psychology and what did each contribute?

 

 

  1. Contrast and compare structuralism and functionalism.

 

 

  1. Discuss briefly, the history of Cognitive Psychology from Wundt’s laboratory to the present.  Include Ebbinghaus in your discussion.

 

 

  1. List and describe three influences on cognitive psychology -- What events contributed to its emergence as a separate discipline?

 

 

  1. What is the definition of cognitive psychology?  And what are its three main assumptions?

 

 

  1. Describe the basic Information Processing approach to psychology.  Include in your discussion the basic information processing model, its components, and the properties of each component.

 

 

  1. Discuss the Sternberg paradigm.  Include a discussion of the methodology and the results of his experiment.  Also include a discussion of how the information processing approach accounts for the results.

 

 

  1. Describe the four Gestalt principles of organization. Include an example of each.

 

 

  1. What is perception?

 

 

  1. What are the 3 models of pattern recognition?  Describe each.

 

 

  1. What are the early, middle and late models of auditory attention?  Describe each with examples.

 

 

 

 

  1. What is the spotlight theory?

 

 

  1. What is attention?

 

  1. Describe George Sperling’s (1960) procedure for studying visual sensory memory.  What is the typical result of his studies and what do they tell us about visual sensory store (iconic memory).

 

 

  1. Describe the characteristics of automatic processing.  Give an example of automatic processing not provided in class or the book.

 

 

  1. Describe the dichotic listening task.  For what purpose was it used?

 

 

  1. Describe the evidence that supports Treisman’s Attenuation theory of attention (Middle selection model)?

 

 

  1. Describe the capacity model of attention.

 

 

  1. Describe the multiple-resource model of attention.

 

 

  1. How do the two different models of attentional resources (# 15 and # 16) account for the decrease in performance with the increase in the demand for attention?

 

 

  1.  What is the Stroop effect?

 

 

  1. Compare and contrast perceptual based knowledge representation with meaning - based representation.  Give an example of each.

 

 

 

 

  1. What is the dual-code theory?

 

 

 

  1. What did Santa (1977) find with respect to perceptual-based and verbally based information?

 

 

  1. How are mental images like perception?  How are they different than perception?

 

 

  1.  What is Front anchoring?  Give an example experimental result demonstrating Front anchoring.

 

 

  1. How is verbal material represented?  What about hierarchies?

 

 

 

  1. What is a meaning-based representation?  What are three such representations discussed in class?

 

 

  1. What is a mnemonic?  Give an example.

 

 

  1.  How is knowledge assumed to be represented in a propositional representation?  Give a simple example.

 

 

  1.  What did Bransford & Franks find in their study?

 

 

  1.  What is the within propositional priming effect?  How is this evidence for propositional representations?

 

 

  1.  Describe the essence of semantic networks?  How is information represented in semantic networks?  What is the idea of cognitive economy?  What did Collins and Quillian find in their research on semantic networks?

 

 

  1.  Sketch a simple semantic network for the category automobile.  Go three levels deep.  Include in your sketch the features associated with each level.

 

 

  1.  What is a schema?  What are the default values & slots?

 

 

  1.  Compare and contrast frames and scripts.  Give an example of each not discussed in class or the book (briefly describe each example).

 

 

 

 

  1. How do cognitive psychologists measure cognitive processes?  Discuss three major dependent variables used by cognitive psychologists.

 

 

  1. What do you think was the most important factor to the emergence of cognitive psychology (you are free to discuss, people, events, or things).  You must give an argument for why you think it is the most important factor, and your argument should be strong enough to convince me that you are right.

 

 

  1. Identify a domain, which you think would benefit from research on attention, perception, or perceptual knowledge.  Identify a research question and discuss why you think research would be important in this domain.  (In class I identified the need for cognitive research in Air Traffic Control (ATC).  I described the task, and identified a research question.)

 

 

  1. What is a schema?  What are the default values & slots?

 

 

  1.  Compare and contrast frames and scripts.  Give an example of each not discussed in class or the book (briefly describe each example).

 

 

  1.  What did Loftus find in her eye-witness study (car accidents)?  What are the implications of this research for eye-witness testimony?

 

 

  1.  What factors affect or influence eye-witness memory?  Describe each with respect to some cognitive principle (some are from perception, attention, memory, and knowledge).

 


  1. Mary-Jo Sapulla was her evening walk as always.  Mary decided to take her usual route along the Smoky River trial.  Along the way Mary passed a young dark hair man walking rather quickly in the opposite direction.  Mary thought it was odd to see someone whom she did not know as most of the people who walk along the trail live in Mary’s neighborhood.  About 15 minutes after passing the man on the trail, Mary was startled by a loud gun shot.   She looked up and saw a person running up the hillside.  Although Mary was far enough away to not be seen, she swears that she’ll never forget what the person looked like.  .... (time passes)....  Mary id’s a person in the line-up as the person she saw running up the hill away from the crime, a young man with dark hair and a mustache.  The defense has called upon you as an expert witness in the case.  As an expert witness you are asked to give the facts with respect to eye-witness testimony.  What do you tell the court (give you testimony)?

 

 

  1.  What are typicality effects?  Give an example of a typical and an atypical member of some category not discussed in class or the book.

 

 

  1.  Compare and contrast instance-based and abstraction based models of categorization.

 

 

  1.  Some people have criticized Loftus’s work on eye-witness testimony.  Choose a side, do you agree or disagree with Loftus’ contention that eye-witness testimony is unreliable?  Defend your position citing experimental  results either discussed in class or the book or from any other empirical studies.

 

 

  1.  What is graded-category membership?  Give an example.

 

 

  1.  Why are some categories considered to be fuzzy?

 

 

  1.  Compare and contrast propositional representations and schemata with respect to what people remember.

 

 

  1.  Describe the modal model.  Use a diagram, name and describe each components function.

 

 

  1.  How long is information stored in STM?  What experimental result suggests this limitation on duration (describe the experiment briefly).

 

 

  1.  Compare and contrast decay theory with interference theory.

 

 

  1.  What is pro-active interference?  Retro-active interference?

 

 

 

  1.  What was Miller’s finding with respect to the capacity of STM?

 

 

  1.  How is working memory different from STM?  Describe the working memory model.  Include a discussion of the component and what each component is responsible for.

 

 

  1.  What is the dual task method?  What does research using this method suggest?  (explain how finding using this method suggests this)

 

 

  1.  Describe the working memory model.  Draw a diagram & label the parts.  Then describe what each component is responsible for.

 

 

  1.  What is spreading activation?

 

 

  1.  Describe the associative priming experiment by Meyer and Schvalaveldt (1971).  What do the results of this experiment suggest?

 

 

  1.  What is the depth of processing theory?  What useful idea came from this theory?

 

 

  1.  Describe five ways to improve your test performance by improving your memory (name and describe each cognitive principle).

 

 

  1. What are serial position effects in memory? What happens when a bazaar word is added to the middle of a memorized list (what is it called)?