Please read chapter 10. After reading the chapter, please respond
to the following questions:
Next you will be asked what three things from the chapter that you
found interesting?
1a) What did you find interesting?
1b) Why was it interesting to you?
2a) What did you find interesting?
2b) Why was it interesting to you?
3a) What did you find interesting?
3b) Why was it interesting to you?
4a) What one (1) thing did you find the least interesting?
4b) Why wasn't it interesting to you?
5) What did you read in the chapter that you think will be most
useful to in understanding Cognitive Psychology?
6) How, in what ways, does this chapter relate (build on) to the
previous chapters?
7a) What topic would you like to learn more about?
7b) Why?
8) What ideas related to what you were reading (what did you think
about) did you have while reading the chapter?
9)
Once you are done with your post make list of the terms and terminology you
used in your post.
Thanks,
--Dr. M
1a) The first concept I found interesting in this chapter came from one of the blue boxes titled Cognition in Everyday Life: Mental Imagery and Sports.
1b) This concept was interesting to me because back in high school when I was involved in sports our coaches used to tell us to visualize all the time, and I often would engage in it, and a lot of the times I could see improvement in my performance. Every time we would ride the bus to a different school I would imagine their soccer field, the bleachers, the goals, etc. I would also imagine the task of me shooting penalty kicks just in case it were to happen. I would close my eyes and imagine myself doing all of this, and this is exactly what the book says to do. It is interesting to put psychology into real life terms and see how we use it presently and how we used it in the past without even knowing it.
2a) The next concept I found interesting in this chapter was the section on L.H.
2b) I always find case studies interesting to read about, especially when a person encounters some type of damage to their brain that results in a loss of some type of skill or memory. IN this case L.H. had damage to both his temporo-occipital regions, his right temporal lobe, and the right inferior frontal lobe. Outwardly he seemed normal but he had severely impaired visual recognition; he couldn’t even recognize his family unless they were wearing distinctive clothes. He also had difficulty recognizing animals, plants, foods, and drawings but he could make copies of these figures. All in all L.H. had good elementary visual capabilities.
3a) One last thing I found interesting was the A la carte: Spatial Skills of Gamers.
3b) This was interesting to me because once again it is applicable to our lives. I personally was intrigued because my boyfriend is a gamer, but I disapprove of them so I wanted to read and find out if they actually do have a benefit in spatial skills. All in all the findings used tetris and compared it’s skill to the mental rotation task and they found that there was little support for their general transfer hypothesis. They also made the conclusion off of this that using more modern games that involve similar themes there still wouldn’t be an advantageous transfer, this was surprising to both me and my boyfriend.
4a) The topic I found the most uninteresting in this chapter was the section on the mental rotation task.
4b) It wasn’t that the content was that uninteresting, the book provided a lot of great in depth information on what the MRT is, how it is designed, and what it measures. However, we just got done learning all about this in biopsych and I know all there is to know on the subject so I just skimmed over this section.
5) I think that understanding the three different hypotheses (dual-coding, conceptual-propositional, functional-equivalency) at the beginning of the chapter will be the most important in understanding cognitive psychology down the road because they provide a good base about our visual representation of knowledge and the different directions that you can go while studying it.
6) This chapter builds off of previous chapters because once again it is describing different cognitive skills and how we use them. So far we have discussed dreaming, consciousness, neuroscience, sensation and perception, and with all of this came different visual capacities, but in chapter 10 we take a deeper look into how we represent what we see into knowledge.
7a) I would like to learn more about synesthesia.
7b) Like I said earlier in this post, I really enjoy learning about different case studies, so I think it would be interesting to read up on some different examples of people who have synesthesia since it is such an unusual condition.
8) While reading this chapter, I thought about how I used to visualize during sports, I predicted the outcome in the video game section, I remembered learning about the MRT in bio and how there is a sex difference, along with spatial skills in general, I also thought about all of the different things we learned about the visual system in bio.
9) Terms: Synesthesia, visual system, mental rotation task, spatial skills, dual-coding, conceptual-propositional, functional-equivalency hypotheses, L.H..
1a) The first concept I found interesting in this chapter came from one of the blue boxes titled Cognition in Everyday Life: Mental Imagery and Sports.
1b) This concept was interesting to me because back in high school when I was involved in sports our coaches used to tell us to visualize all the time, and I often would engage in it, and a lot of the times I could see improvement in my performance. Every time we would ride the bus to a different school I would imagine their soccer field, the bleachers, the goals, etc. I would also imagine the task of me shooting penalty kicks just in case it were to happen. I would close my eyes and imagine myself doing all of this, and this is exactly what the book says to do. It is interesting to put psychology into real life terms and see how we use it presently and how we used it in the past without even knowing it.
2a) The next concept I found interesting in this chapter was the section on L.H.
2b) I always find case studies interesting to read about, especially when a person encounters some type of damage to their brain that results in a loss of some type of skill or memory. IN this case L.H. had damage to both his temporo-occipital regions, his right temporal lobe, and the right inferior frontal lobe. Outwardly he seemed normal but he had severely impaired visual recognition; he couldn’t even recognize his family unless they were wearing distinctive clothes. He also had difficulty recognizing animals, plants, foods, and drawings but he could make copies of these figures. All in all L.H. had good elementary visual capabilities.
3a) One last thing I found interesting was the A la carte: Spatial Skills of Gamers.
3b) This was interesting to me because once again it is applicable to our lives. I personally was intrigued because my boyfriend is a gamer, but I disapprove of them so I wanted to read and find out if they actually do have a benefit in spatial skills. All in all the findings used tetris and compared it’s skill to the mental rotation task and they found that there was little support for their general transfer hypothesis. They also made the conclusion off of this that using more modern games that involve similar themes there still wouldn’t be an advantageous transfer, this was surprising to both me and my boyfriend.
4a) The topic I found the most uninteresting in this chapter was the section on the mental rotation task.
4b) It wasn’t that the content was that uninteresting, the book provided a lot of great in depth information on what the MRT is, how it is designed, and what it measures. However, we just got done learning all about this in biopsych and I know all there is to know on the subject so I just skimmed over this section.
5) I think that understanding the three different hypotheses (dual-coding, conceptual-propositional, functional-equivalency) at the beginning of the chapter will be the most important in understanding cognitive psychology down the road because they provide a good base about our visual representation of knowledge and the different directions that you can go while studying it.
6) This chapter builds off of previous chapters because once again it is describing different cognitive skills and how we use them. So far we have discussed dreaming, consciousness, neuroscience, sensation and perception, and with all of this came different visual capacities, but in chapter 10 we take a deeper look into how we represent what we see into knowledge.
7a) I would like to learn more about synesthesia.
7b) Like I said earlier in this post, I really enjoy learning about different case studies, so I think it would be interesting to read up on some different examples of people who have synesthesia since it is such an unusual condition.
8) While reading this chapter, I thought about how I used to visualize during sports, I predicted the outcome in the video game section, I remembered learning about the MRT in bio and how there is a sex difference, along with spatial skills in general, I also thought about all of the different things we learned about the visual system in bio.
9) Terms: Synesthesia, visual system, mental rotation task, spatial skills, dual-coding, conceptual-propositional, functional-equivalency hypotheses, L.H..
Reading Activity Chapter 10
1a) The functional-equivalency hypothesis is interesting.
1b) This hypothesis is interesting as it believes that imagery and perception are very similar. Studies have shown that individuals believe two objects are identically the same just rotated differently to appear different. However, the objects are actually different, but the individual is experiencing a mental rotation because the two objects are seen at different angles. It is interesting as some of the objects are the same while others are different, but it is up to how are brains interpret the degree of the rotation between the two object imageries.
2a) The concept of cognitive map was interesting.
2b) A cognitive map is a picture or image that is based on the spatial knowledge of a situation. This concept is interesting to me as it reminds me of the experiment of placing a rat in a maze and determining how long it takes the rat to find its way to the other end of the maze where food has been placed. As the rat becomes more familiar with the maze, the quicker the rat is able to find its way to the other end. This is the same for humans. As we become familiar with a route or form a routine, we are able to accomplish something in a quicker manner.
3a) Synesthesia is another concept I found interesting.
3b) Synesthesia is being able to experience a sensation through one perceptual modality such as vision and also experience it in another modality such as audition. This is very interesting to me because without my senses, I would not be able to experience life in the way I do. I am able to feel sounds, see objects in color, and taste objects or shapes. Synesthesia is intriguing as it looks at how individuals’ senses are entwined.
4a) The measurements of the regional cerebral blood flow (rCBF) were least interesting to me.
4b) I was not interested in this concept as it seemed to be something I have thought about before. Areas of our brain that have a higher concentration of blood tend to correlate with a higher amount of functioning within that area. Therefore, if we are visually processing something, then this area of our brain and the area of our memory storage will have a high concentration of blood. This concept seems to be something that we could think about in a more common sense type of manner.
5) The three theoretical positions of dual-coding hypothesis, conceptual-propositional hypothesis, and functional-equivalency hypothesis will be most useful in understanding Cognitive Psychology. These hypotheses look at how information is imaginally coded at a level of processing while the same information is conceptually coded at another level of processing. This coding of information is broad within our cognitive processes and are unique to the way we think. These hypotheses will help us better understand Cognitive Psychology and the different ways individuals can interpret information and apply information to their way of thinking.
6) This chapter builds on previous chapters as it now shows how we can visually represent knowledge. Prior, we discussed how we verbally represent knowledge. Now we look at different theories of visualization and how our vision changes the way in which we think and store information within our brain.
7a) I would like to learn more about synesthesia.
7b) Synesthesia is a very interesting topic as it looks at how each of our sensations are overlapped. It also explains how we can use multiple senses to interpret a situation. I want to learn more about which of our senses are able to be entwined in order to make sense in our mind and how our brain is able to handle the capacity of two or more of our senses entwined in order to be logically for us.
8) While reading this chapter, I thought a lot about our cognitive map and how we use this to understand concepts and situations. I also thought about the importance of our senses and how important our vision is. Without having vision, our other senses would be highly relied upon. There would be more emphasis on the feel of objects and the sound of objects. This chapter made me curious about how important our vision is and how blind people are able to store information in their brain without understand the sight of something.
9) Functional-equivalency hypothesis, mental rotation, cognitive map, synesthesia, regional cerebral blood flow (rCBF), dual-coding hypothesis, conceptual-propositional hypothesis, conceptually coded, imaginally coded
I thought that this weeks chapter had a lot of interesting information that helped with my understanding of cognitive psychology. I really thought that the section on reading comprehension had information that I had never heard of before. It was cool to see what all goes into reading comprehension besides just actually reading the text. The next section that I thought was interesting was the on top down processing. I liked the example experiments that the book provided because it gave me a better understanding. The last section that I thought was interesting was the section on bottom down processing. I also liked the examples that the book provided because they were easy apply to my existing knowledge of the information. The section that I did not find to be interesting was dyslexia. I think that the information in the section was important to the chapter, but I would have liked to see more information that what was provided in the chapter. I will also talk about what I would like to learn more about, what was important to my understanding of psychology, how this chapter related to previous chapters, and then thoughts I had while reading the chapter.
I thought that the section on reading comprehension was interesting because the information intrigued me. What learned from the section was that there is a lot more that goes into reading. I thought that it was just my eyes moving over the page, but it turns out that there is a lot more that is going on cognitively. A study that the book talked about was conducted on college students, and eye tracking. What researchers were trying to see was if students took longer on certain areas of a newspaper that was harder to read. It turned out that students that had trouble reading a certain word would take longer or have longer pauses on that section of the page. It took longer for these students because there was no link for the student to fall back on. Usually it is easier to understand information that someone has heard or has ties to in the brain. A sentence "the ball is red" is easy to remember because most everyone has a good visual of what that sentence is trying to portray. When encountered with a harder sentence or words that one is not familiar with, it is harder for that person to process. I thought that this section was interesting because I learned a lot more about reading comprehension.
The second section that I liked in this chapter was the section on top down processing. The section was confusing at first until it provided an example that was easy for me to understand. The basis of the section is that a person places a schema on a topic before they hear about it. The example that the book provided was about a house. The researcher talked about a house that was up for listing. One group was told to listen to the listing as a burglar, and the other group was asked to listen to the listing as a person wanting to purchase the home. What the study showed was that people who were the burglars pointed out more thing that were of value in the home, and the person wanting to purchase the home pointed out more things that made the house less of value. The research proved the point that people have schemas of a topic, so when told to view something from a certain perspective they have a schema that tells them how to think. I thought this section was very helpful in my understanding of top down theory, and also my understanding of cognitive psychology.
The last section that I found to be interesting was on bottom up processing. Again, this section provided me with an example that made it easier to understand the topic. The example was a lot like a study that I had heard of before the deals with recall days and months after hearing a story. Students were told a story and then brought in later to retell the story. The increments in which they were brought back were one week, one month, and three months. What researchers found was that the longer the time between recall, the worst the recall was. There were three recall account summaries that were linked and those were reproductions, reconstructions, and metastatements. A reproduction is a statement that accurately reflects the comprehension of the text. A reconstruction is a statement that is plausible inferences from the main theme aided by the participant' world knowledge. And metastatements are participants comments, opinions, and attitudes on the text. This section was helpful to my understanding of cognitive psychology.
The section that I thought was not the most interesting was on dyslexia. I liked the information in this section, but there was not a lot of information within the section. What the section talked about was that the United States has the highest rates of dyslexia because words and sounds have the same meanings. Some people believe that dyslexia is a visual disorder, hearing disorder or a disorder that comprises both into one. Some researchers believe that dyslexia could also be a brain defect, but no one knows for sure. Researchers used PET scans on 72 patients and found that there was a common brain abnormality in all of the patients. Like I said, the section could use more information because I believe it would help in my understanding of cognitive psychology. I think that doing a topical blog on the study would help in doing so.
A section that I would like to learn more about would be dyslexia. I thought that the information in the chapter was interesting, but there was not enough. I would like to do a topical blog on the topic because it is something that interests me. the book talked about that it could be a numerous amount of things that could cause dyslexia, so maybe there is some research that had been done to prove. I also thought that the section on reading comprehension was also interesting, so I have a couple of options.
I thought that this section was helpful to my understanding of cognitive psychology in a number of ways. I liked the section on reading comprehension and how it can be tied to so many things. I did not know so many processes went into reading comprehension. Also that eye tracking also was an important study that went along with reading comprehension. There were a lot of things that I found to be helpful in this chapter, and probably the best chapter in the book yet.
This chapter relates to other chapters in a big way. In on of the first couple of chapters the book talked about top down and bottom up processing. It was a good base for this chapter because now it was applied to reading comprehension. It was interesting to read about the topic in this chapter because I got to see the application process, and that was very helpful. I like how the book is structured because it always seems to tie back to previous chapters.
Ideas that I had while reading the chapter had to do with dyslexia. I wondered how it has not been found what causes dyslexia yet? That is why I would have liked to have more information on the topic within the chapter. I also wanted to know if it was a combination on both visual and hearing defects?
terms: dyslexia, reading comprehension, top down processing, bottom up processing, schema
1a) What did you find interesting?
1b) Why was it interesting to you?
I found duel-coding hypothesis interesting. I never thought about what format does information usually stored as. When discussing in class last week about “verbal” information is stored in deaf people, whether it is an image or sign language, I thought it would be an interesting topic to look more into. As a hearing person, I believe that this dual-coding hypothesis is accurate. There is some information that can be explained verbally when asked, and there is some information that can be better explained with images rather than verbally. We all have those moments where we have an image in our head but cannot verbally describe it to other people. This may prove that there are two information processes. However, which kind of information is mostly processed verbally? And which kind of information is mostly processed in images?
2a) What did you find interesting?
2b) Why was it interesting to you?
I also thought that conceptual-propositional hypothesis was an interesting concept. It is true that the minds of humans do not work like video cameras, taping all events as it happens and plays it when attempting to retrieve it. Rather, our minds interpret the events and store them the way they are interpreted, which makes the retrievals hardly 100% accurate. This hypothesis is true and thus explains false memories and why sometimes people strongly believe in events that did not happen or did not happen the way they remember it did. I am very interested in false memory and therefore this hypothesis appears very interesting to me.
3a) What did you find interesting?
3b) Why was it interesting to you?
Functional-equivalency hypothesis was also an interesting topic to me. The study of the degree of rotation and time used for judging whether it is the same image is brilliant. I thought that the smaller the degree of rotation the quicker it takes to give a correct answer and I was right. When trying to learn the images provided in the textbook, I looked at the two images and try to rotate the second one in my head. I guess the less degree of rotation takes less time to visually rotate in your mind, therefore the less time it takes to gives a correct answer.
4a) What one (1) thing did you find the least interesting?
4b) Why wasn't it interesting to you?
I found historical perspective less interesting. I know that it is important to know the history background of a subject in order to know where the theories and ideas came from, but I have never been a big fan of history and especially what people from one thousand years ago think about regarding the same subject.
5) What did you read in the chapter that you think will be most useful to in understanding Cognitive Psychology?
I thought it is useful to learn about the theories of visual representation of knowledge, because these theories allow us to have a glimpse into how information is processed and stored, which is an important concept in cognitive psychology.
6) How, in what ways, does this chapter relate (build on) to the previous chapters?
The previous chapter discusses about the verbal representation of knowledge, and this chapter relates to the previous one very well by discussing basically the same matters but in a different concept: the visual representation of knowledge.
7a) What topic would you like to learn more about?
7b) Why?
I would like to learn more about synesthesia because an episode of House M.D. presents synesthesia as a symptom for a life threatening disease. It might be scary to see sound or taste shapes, but these experiences open up another door for scientists to learn more about cognition. I think that drugs can also provoke synesthesia.
8) What ideas related to what you were reading (what did you think about) did you have while reading the chapter?
I thought about false memory when reading the section regarding conceptual-propositional hypothesis. False memory happens because we do not regard events by videotaping it, we store the interpretation instead, and hence the false information in our memory when we interpret it wrongly when storing it.
9) Once you are done with your post make list of the terms and terminology you used in your post.
False memory, conceptual-propositional hypothesis, functional equivalency hypothesis, synesthesia, dual-coding hypothesis.
1a&b) I found the section that involved studies that examined the effect of cognitive processing when dealing with the size and spatial properties of an object. I really liked the examples they provided and when I attempted some of the examples they gave it actually worked which really intrigued me as well. I was particularly interested in the study they did where they had participants imagine a target animal next to a small or large animal. This experiment is really cool because if you were to picture a rabbit next to an elephant our minds focus on giving the elephant detail but are very general with the rabbit. But if you switched them around and picture a tiny elephant and a giant rabbit, your brain immediately gives the rabbit a ton more detail and barely spends time on the little elephant. I found the concept to be really interesting and I would love to learn more about it.
2a&b) The second thing that I found interesting was the study on L.H. He had serious brain injuries after a car accident and his right temporal lobe, right inferior frontal lobe, and tempero-occipital region were all damaged. Many experiments were done on him as he recovered and it was interesting how it affected his being able to recognize people and objects. His visual recognition was really impaired to the point that his family had to wear specific clothing in order for him to recognize them. I always find experiments like this interesting because it gives us some of the best data on the roles that each part of our brains play and how much damaging those sections can really harm other parts of your life. L.H. suffered from what they call visual agnosia and his case helped researchers to understand that visual tasks and spatial tasks seems to be distinctly different.
3a&b) The third subject I found interesting was cognitive maps. I think our memory and how our brains work is amazing and cognitive maps has always been one of my favorite subjects. Through experimenting it was found that humans use two different kinds of cognitive maps. They are route knowledge and survey knowledge. These are two types of spatial knowledge skills that we are all very aware of using. We often help people with directions by using route knowledge. We incorporate land marks and simple directional cues. We also use survey knowledge which is more general. They did a lot of studies with this where they had students form different countries attempt to draw maps of the earth. The maps were markedly different depending on where the student was from.
4a&b) I found the historical perspective at the beginning of the chapter to be the least interesting because I have already been taught most of that information so it was just review. I am familiar with the philosophers and psychologists that they named briefly so there just wasn’t much learning involved as opposed to just brushing up on some detail.
5) I think just learning about visual skills in general was really helpful. It helped me to get a better idea of how our brains work and how we process visual information.
6) This chapter really builds on the previous chapters because it goes even deeper into vision itself and gives a better explanation of how we take in information and use it to recognize things. It builds on the chapter four which was about object recognition the most and it talks more in depth about how our brains actually take in that information.
7a&b) I want to learn more about how we interpret size and spatial properties because I really enjoyed reading about that section. It is interesting to me how our brains choose to put emphasis on certain things but gloss over other information that it’s receiving. I want to learn more about how or why our brains do this.
8) I really tried to take what I was reading and put it into my life to better understand how I experience these things every day. This chapter really helped me to visualize things and I was able to think about how my brain reacts and recognizes information.
9) Terminology: spatial properties, object recognition, cognitive maps, route knowledge, survey knowledge, L.H., temporal lobe, right inferior frontal lobe, tempero-occipital region, visual agnosia
1a) What did you find interesting?
I enjoyed reading all of the information in the section about cognitive neuroscience.
1b) Why was it interesting to you?
It was interesting because they had a lot of interesting findings in the one section. They talked about a Rhesus monkey study where the monkey was required to do a mental rotation task, and the cells in the monkey’s brain showed corresponding directional patterns, which is really fascinating. They also talked about studies where participants where to image things smaller, and then it took more time for them to answer questions about the image as the details where smaller or nonexistent. One of the coolest findings presented though was the distinction between brain areas required in visual tasks and in spatial tasks, with spatial representations being not confined to the visual modality the way that visual representations are.
2a) What did you find interesting?
I liked reading about synesthesia.
2b) Why was it interesting to you?
I’ve already read multiple sources of information about synesthesia and watched lectures, but it is still incredibly interesting. It seems almost like it should be a condition that exists only in fantasy, in a Lewis Carroll book. This section was very interesting in that it had a lot of quotes from S., the famed synesthete. My favorite was that he described someone’s voice as a flame advancing toward him. I think, what a fascinating life that would be. I also wonder, with synesthesia associated with words, if the synesthetes experience their own words the way they do others. If so, I’m sure that would have a profound effect on their choice of words and would be interested to hear a synesthete talk about anything. Also, a quote was featured by my favorite neuroscientist, V.S. Ramachandran, which made me like the section that much more.
3a) What did you find interesting?
I enjoyed the section on cognitive maps and egocentrism.
3b) Why was it interesting to you?
Cognitive maps are interesting and all, and I enjoyed reading about the neuroscience evidence for them, but the reason I found this section interesting was because of the egocentrism in the maps. I find it interesting that not all maps are like the maps that we are accustomed to seeing in America. It also always interests me that there is no up or down in space, and we are egocentric in putting America on the top of the world.
4a) What one (1) thing did you find the least interesting?
If there was anything in the chapter that I found less interesting than the others it would be the three theories on the visual representation of knowledge.
4b) Why wasn't it interesting to you?
When I read something knowledgeable, I prefer to read primarily facts. When I read different theories, then it helps my overall understanding, but then I have multiple theories in my head with no definite one that I can say is right, and that bugs me a bit. I did enjoy how the section on neuroscience provided support for the dual-coding hypothesis, and find that hypothesis to be pretty interesting.
5) What did you read in the chapter that you think will be most useful to in understanding Cognitive Psychology?
I think the most important thing from this chapter to my understanding of cognitive psychology would probably be the overall understanding that mental images are indeed a thing, and they are subject to be imagined at different sizes with differing levels of detail. One interesting fact from the book that helps my understanding in this area was that it too subjects more time to scan longer areas of their mental images, the same way that they would an actual picture.
6) How, in what ways, does this chapter relate (build on) to the previous chapters?
This chapter dealt a lot with neuroscience, which was the big topic of the second chapter. The main topic of this chapter, being the visual representation of knowledge, obviously relates to the last chapter, which was the verbal representation of knowledge. I don’t recall what previous chapter dealt with cognitive maps, but we returned to those in this chapter. We also discussed synesthesia, which was a topic last discussed in one of the memory chapters.
7a) What topic would you like to learn more about?
I would like to learn more about neuroscience in general.
7b) Why?
This chapter made me realize how much I love the field of neuroscience, because all of the findings in the field are so much more interesting to me than any other field. Specifically though, I would like to learn about the neuroscience of synesthesia, which I have tried to do before but did not find anything substantial as there is a lack of studies on the topic. I would like to learn more about the different brain areas responsible for visual and spatial tasks, and that is something that I would probably be able to find.
8) What ideas related to what you were reading (what did you think about) did you have while reading the chapter?
This chapter focused a lot on the support from cognitive neuroscience, and I thought about how much I enjoy neuroscience. It was interesting because they talked about hard results of interesting studies, instead of simply hypotheses based off extremely isolated studies. I am always interested in studies that include the activity in the brain, because that is fairly conclusive. Granted, after the study, the findings can be inferred to mean a plethora of different things relating to previous brain studies, but regardless of inferences, the brain areas found to be active during a particular task will consistently be active during that task. I suppose I like the consistency, and I especially like that I don’t necessarily have to base my knowledge on someone else’s inferences. I also thought about cognitive maps and how I may be able to increase my ability to take directions.
9) Once you are done with your post make list of the terms and terminology you used in your post.
Cognitive neuroscience, spatial representations, visual representations, mental rotation task, cognitive maps, synesthesia, dual-coding hypothesis,
1a) What did you find interesting? 1b) Why was it interesting to you?
I thought it was interesting that behaviorism was responsible for the end of the measurement era for mental imagery. This is interesting to me because I have always heard of behaviorism as a great movement for the field of psychology but it actually put a hold on a lot of important questions in the field.
2a) What did you find interesting? 2b) Why was it interesting to you?
The dual-coding hypothesis was interesting to me. This was interesting because this hypothesis describes my experience of coding information. I store information visually and verbally. For example, I can often “see” the page of a book that I read something from but can only access the content of the page verbally. This hypothesis also accounts for how people with varying verbal skills store information. It would not make much sense for someone with limited verbal skills to store all information verbally and conversely it would not make much sense for someone who has a lot of experience with language to store all information verbally.
3a) What did you find interesting? 3b) Why was it interesting to you?
I thought the role that brain imaging techniques played in supporting mental imagery hypotheses was interesting. This was interesting to me because the topic of mental imagery has been debated for hundreds of years and technology has drastically changed the hypotheses. It is interesting to think that we now have ways to represent concepts that were once limited to philosophy because we could not measure the concepts. I can only imagine a scientists sitting in his lab thinking “if only I could see what actually happens in the brain” and then one day that becomes a reality. Brain imaging techniques have definitely advanced the field of cognitive psychology and have helped cognitive psychology regain credibility in the face of fields like behaviorism.
4a) What one (1) thing did you find the least interesting? 4b) Why wasn't it interesting to you?
I found mental rotation tasks to be least interesting. Mental rotation tasks are not interesting to me because I am terrible at mental rotation tasks. I usually can’t tell the difference between the two images.
5) What did you read in the chapter that you think will be most useful to in understanding Cognitive Psychology?
I thought the role that technology played in investigating mental imagery was useful in understanding cognitive psychology. I thought this was important because it highlights the idea that the types of questions we can attempt to answer change with technology. Technology also helps give credibility to ideas or concepts that previously were not taken very seriously.
6) How, in what ways, does this chapter relate (build on) to the previous chapters?
Chapter ten builds on previous chapters by discussing the representation of another type of knowledge. Previous chapters started out with the broad concept of perceiving, processing, and encoding information and now the chapters are getting more specific with how certain types of information are perceived, processed, and encoded.
7a) What topic would you like to learn more about? 7b) Why?
I would like to know more about mental imagery while reading or day dreaming. I am interested in this topic because it combines different representations of knowledge. I would like to know how that works and what is happening in the brain when both types of representation are being accessed.
8) What ideas related to what you were reading (what did you think about) did you have while reading the chapter?
I was thinking about synesthesia and evolution. In some cases, synesthesia is distracting to the individual but in other cases, it really helps people remember information. This would definitely be beneficial. I was also thinking about how having experience with two different disciplines would influence the types of representations of knowledge a person might use. For example, does a book editor use verbal representations of knowledge more often than an artist?
9) Once you are done with your post make list of the terms and terminology you used in your post.
Dual-coding hypothesis, mental rotation
One thing I found interesting was the section on cognitive maps. There are thought to be two different types of spatial knowledge: route and survey knowledge. Route knowledge is used when you give explicit steps on how to get somewhere providing street names and the like. Survey knowledge is when you would point in the general direction in which the person would like to go, or knowing where you are in relation to other things. It is thought that geographic information is stored more in terms of generalizations than specific images. This allows us to compartmentalize and look at things either on a small scale (my house is in Cedar Falls) or a large scale (I live on planet Earth). Relying on this way of thinking can be misleading, such as the Reno and Los Angeles question given in the book. Because we compartmentalize, we generalize, and our generalizations may be incorrect. I liked this section because I have frequent issues with my cognitive maps and it is interesting to understand how they work.
Another section I found interesting was the one on synesthesia. This is a condition where a person experiences one sense through a different sense. An example of this would be a person hearing colors or tasting sounds. There appears to be a rule that always exists in synesthesia. For example, a higher pitched sound would appear to be a brighter color. It is possible to measure synesthesia, and people can be more synesthesic than others. It is thought that synesthesia arises when connected areas in the brain experience something at the same time. The increases in medical technology is allowing scientists to better research and understand what is happening to the brain during synesthesia. I found this section interesting because this is a condition I have heard about before, but have never really gained a full understanding of.
The last section in this chapter that I enjoyed was the section on the spatial skills of gamers. Video games rely on cognitive skills, and people can often become experts in a particular game. Researchers wanted to know if these cognitive abilities could be appplied to another skill. Researchers used older style games, such as tetris, to test this. It was important to use games like this so that other factors, such as the people you are playing with, do not interfere. The people who were experts at tetris were asked to rotate the shapes in tetris to make them fit and then were asked to rotate shapes not found in tetris. The players only appeared to be experts in rotating the tetris shapes. This seemed to show that these cognitive skills, such as spatial mapping, do not transfer to another skill outside of the game. This section interested me because I am part of the generation that grew up with video games and it would be nice to know that it can help us in different areas, but that wasn't the case.
One thing that I did not find interesting about this chapter were the different hypotheses of imagery. The first theory is the dual-coding hypothesis. This idea claims that there are two codes, as well as two storage systems. One of each is for images and one is for verbal items. Information can be stored in either, or both, of these storage systems. The conceptual-propositional hypothesis says that visual and verbal information are both represented abstractly. The final hypothesis, the functional-equivalency hypothesis states that imagery and perception use similar processes. This didn't interest me because it was all very analytical and didn't really explain the differences in ways that we could imagine or provide any examples.
I think that the most important thing I read in this chapter in relation to cognitive psychology is the imagery theories. This information really allows you to see how the images you see everyday are created in the brain.
This chapter builds on previous chapters in that we are talking about senses used to perceive the environment and the functioning in the brain that allows this to occur. Sensation and perception have been big sections in this book and this adds on to that.
I would like to learn more about the experiences of a person with synesthesia. I think that this would help me to gain a better understanding of it and it really interests me to learn about a person who experiences things differently than I do.
While reading this chapter I thought about my own personal experiences regarding spatial memory and imagery. I also thought about what it would be like to have synesthesia.
terms:
cognitive maps,route knowledge, survey knowledge, synesthesia, spatial skills, cognitive skills, spatial mapping, dual-coding hypothesis, concept-propositional hypothesis, functional-equivalency hypothesis, imagery
1.I thought the dual-coding hypothesis was interesting because it addressed how we store informatin in different manners in our brains. It makes sense because there are instances where you may be trying to recall the image of someone’s face and you struggle to do so, yet you can distinctly recall their voice telling a joke you thought was really funny. It’s possible that the memory of meeting that person was stored in you verbal system but not your imaginal.
2.Another topic I found interesting was visual imagery. It’s a little bit mind-boggling to try and wrap your mind around how you can “see” something without actually looking at it with our eyes. These abilities may have very functional purposes though, particularly when it comes to mental recall. We seem to be able to most effectively recall times that we can actually visualize.
3.A third topic I found interesting was mental rotation. This was interesting for me to read about because I know that these sorts of mental tasks are my major downfall. I struggle visualizing images that are rotated, and I also struggle strongly with directional skills, which I feel are somewhat related. It’s very hard for me to visualize how to get from one place to the next without being able to clearly see it indicated or drawn out, as I struggle with visualizing rotated images without being able to see the manner in which they were rotated and are actually the same object. It was also interesting that they were able to find a correlation between the degrees of rotation and how long it took a participant to compute if the shape was the same as the original unrotated one or not.
4.While I did find many things in this chapter interesting and it was difficult for me to choose something to write about that I didn’t find interesting, there was one topic I just didn’t quite understand and therefore didn’t find it as interesting or fascinating as the rest. I had a hard time grasping what second-order isomorphism was exactly and how it worked or why it was important. I felt that if there was a way to more clearly explain this topic, it’d be nice to have done so in order to be understand and appreciate it.
5.In this chapter I read about how our brains store and use some knowledge in visual representations. This is useful in understanding more about cognitive psychology as a whole because it gave more insight on how we actually function cognitively. Our ability to see and visualize very much contributes to our cognitive processes, therefore helping me to understand more about cognitive psychology and another manner in which we store and use knowledge.
6.This chapter built on previous chapters by expanding most directly on the types of knowledge we gather, store, and use. Other chapters have helped us learn about how our brain works and how we function and learn and use knowledge. This chapter went more deeply into that and explained in some detail how our visualizations greatly contribute to our knowledge base and function.
7.A topic I’d be interested to learn more about is synesthesia. I’m sure I’m not the only one in the class who had my attention caught by this concept. As someone who doesn’t experience the world in this manner, it’s so hard to imagine how shapes can be tasted or sounds can be felt. I’d be interested to learn about how this may or may not affect daily functioning and if it ever interferes with perceptions of the world and makes “normal” life more challenging.
8.While reading this chapter I thought a lot about how interesting many of these topics were and how many interesting research questions could be derived from these concepts. Most of us are always visualizing our world around us and using what we see to learn and store information.
9.Dual-coding hypothesis, visual imagery, mental rotation, second-order isomorphism, synesthesia
1. One thing that I found interesting from this weeks chapter was the case study of L.H I found this interesting because I really enjoying reading case studies that take the information that make them relatable to everyday life or occurrences in the real world. LH was in a car accident when he was eighteen which caused damage to the temporo-occipital regions of his brain, the right temporal lobe, as well as the right inferior frontal lobe. LH was able to recover and go on to live a normal functioning life though he was left with impairments to his visual recognition. when going through tests of visual and spatial tasks, LH showed to perform normally on the tests of spatial tasks but poorly on the visual tasks. These results show that visual and spatial information processing and encoding use different types of mental representations and well as occur in different neurological locations.
2. I found the section focused on cognitive maps to be interesting. Cognitive maps are mental representations our environment which allow for us to navigate through familiar locations without a large amount of mental effort. Human mental maps use route knowledge and survey knowledge in order to create their mental maps. Route knowledge is the typical mapquest like directions and understanding of the environment that allow for a person to get from one location to another. Survey knowledge puts more focus on the relationship between environmental cues and location to navigate the surroundings. In a previous class, I learned that there is a gender difference between the preference and use of these two types of knowledge. Men generally tend to use more route knowledge when giving directions where as females tend to use more survey knowledge when giving directions. Once our cognitive maps are formed for a familiar environment humans are able to rotate the view or perspective of the mental map by either using object-based spatial transformation or egocentric perspective transformation. Using the object-based spatial transformation you rotate the object and environment around where you are located on the cognitive map. Using the egocentric perspective you rotate you own position on the cognitive map leaving the environment still. I found it interesting that there were two types of rotation. When thinking about my own ways of forming mental maps I realized I tend to use more of the egocentric perspective transformation.
3. I found the functional-equivalency hypothesis of visual representation of knowledge to be interesting. This hypothesis states that the process of perception and the process of imagery are similar in their workings. Researchers have used studies of mental rotation to aid in providing support for this hypothesis. The studies showed that there is a linear relationship between the time required to determine if an image was the same object as the comparison image and the degree that the image was rotated. This theory introduces the idea of second-order isomorphism which is the relationship between external objects and internal representations. This relationship does not create a one to one match with imagery and perception. With second-order isomorphism they have been able to show that the two processes work in a very similar way, though not in the exact same process.
4. One thing that I found the least interesting in this chapter was the section on the dual-coding hypothesis. I didn't feel as though the section gave enough information about the hypothesis to get a good understanding of what it argues about the visual representation of knowledge. I would have liked to have more in depth information on all three of the hypotheses, but this is the one that had the least amount of density in the material. I liked the idea that our cognitive system encodes information into these two storage systems but we were given no further information on how we use that coding to form our mental representations.
5. I think that the three theories of visual representation of knowledge are important to understand for the overall understanding of cognitive psychology. All three of the theories point out that it is not soley images that are involved with visual representation of knowledge. We are able to hear a sound or smell an odor and visualize the object in which that sensation arises from. The three hypothesis show that these processes are not easily understood or studied which makes it difficult to get a concrete answer for how the process of visual representation works.
6. This chapter builds on to the idea that our brain can be localized for particular overall abilities and processes. Studies have shown that the right hemisphere is associated with memory of visual material. They have also shown that increased blood flow to the occipital and temporal areas of the brain during visual tasks using PET scans which have been explained in previous chapters. The same technology was able to show that the visual cortex works harder during imagery than during perception. The idea of bottom-up and top-down processing was extended during this chapter regarding this particular phenomenon. During perception we are able to use bottom-up processing because we receive the visual information and build up the perception of the environment. During imagery we use top-down processing because we must recreate the environment before we are able to break it down and determine particular aspects of it.
7. I would like to learn more about imagery and its effectiveness when used in sports or performing arts. Before every performance for show choir out director would have us all sit silently in our home rooms and visualize parts of the our show that we wanted to put specific emphasis on for that performance. I would like to know if this actually increased the quality and execution of out performance or if it simply was a way of getting us all quiet and focused on the show ahead of us.
8. While reading this chapter I began to realize how much imagery I use every day. While reading the formation of cognitive maps and the ways of transforming them I began to contemplate how I navigate around known and unknown environments and how that effects which type transformations and knowledge I prefer to help my navigation be successful. I found it extremely interesting to read about the different ways that people around the globe would draw a map of the world and it made me think about how are cultural environment also shapes and influences are cognitive processes.
9. mental representations, cognitive maps, survey knowledge, route knowledge, object-based spatial transformation, egocentric perspective, transformation, functional-equivalency hypothesis, imagery, mental rotation, second-order isomorphism, bottom up processing, top down processing, PET scan
1) One thing from the chapter that I found interesting was the dual-coding hypothesis which suggests that there are two codes and two storage systems-one imagine, other verbal- and that information may be coded and stored in either or both. Studies by paivio has led to the development of the dual coding hypothesis a theory as to how information is represented in memory. The information that is being stored could potentially overlap in the processing of information within one coding scheme being dominate for a particular word. I found this particularly interesting because it makes you stop and think how much of the information that I am taking in on a daily basis is actually trying to be stored in more than one place and is actually taking up more time thinking about the situation and the different tasks that your mind go through.
2) The second thing that I found interesting was looking at the term second-order isomorphism to represent the relationship between external objects and internal representations of those objects that is not a one to one kind. This was particularly interesting because I found it difficult to be able to understand what it meant. I had to actually take time and reread before I actually understood the way that the isomorphism worked in relationship internal is very similar to the way it’s represented in our brains. This made me stop and think of how the things in the world are related to the relationships with information that we may have already obtained in an earlier time.
3) The third thing that I found interesting was the section on cognitive maps. I found it interesting that there were two focuses on the different aspects of cognitive maps. The first one is object based which means rotating your head a particular object or location and the second one is egocentric perspective transformation in which you translate your point of view. This research is an example of using multiple methods by using neurophysiological and cognitive research we are able to know more about how our brain can use cognitive maps and the different ways that we are able to obtain the information for the cognitive maps. I found this interesting because it is something that I have been trying to use more with cognitive maps in studying and how to relate the different types and ways to take in information to help move the information into my long term memory.
4) There was not really anything from this chapter that was least interesting to me. I thought that the whole chapter was interesting as it actually puts pieces together as how we are storing information in our life. If I had to pick something it would have to be the history of it because it is something that I cannot change and really does not give much information about the new ideas that I could potentially look further into.
5) I think that the whole chapter will help me to better understand cognitive psychology, but something that I think that will carry on is dual-coding hypothesis. As it goes further into depth about how information is stored and the ways that our brain can overlap information.
6) This chapter relates to previous chapters in that it continues to look farther into memory and storage and what our brains do to add more information into our long term memory over the course of time.
7) The topic I would like to learn more about is synesthesia because it is not something that I am very knowledgeable with and I think that it will be very interesting. I also have herd it talked about a lot but never took the time or had the chance to look further into it.
8) One thing that I thought about while reading this chapter was how much time our brain spends remembering everything that we do on a daily basis. I often wonder why I can’t remember things I did yesterday and that might be because my brain is going all the time trying to remember things that I do learn and try to retain in one day.
9) synesthesia, dual-coding hypothesis, cognitive maps, isomorphism, cognitive, neurophysiological
1) Cognitive Maps I found was quite enjoyable reading especially the part of the chapter that discussed research in which students were told to draw a map of the world. By drawing these maps, inferences can be made about spatial knowledge and visual representation. Evidence has pointed to the idea that the sketches we make and graphic figures is a window into our subjective reality. Because almost all school children are exposed to varying degrees of geography, it is easier to test school aged children on their reality of the geographic world. Several years ago, a study was done in which students in a first year geography class were told to draw a map of the world. This was done at the time to mostly understand cultural differences and promote world peace. Of the 4,000 maps drawn of the world, a majority of them drew a Eurocentric map, even if the students who drew the map were from countries like Hong Kong or Singapore. This was mostly because of the Eurocentric maps that were used in their education systems for many years. Unsurprisingly, the American students drew maps that were Americentric. Australian students then tended to draw maps that placed Australia and Asia in the center. Also, more than one Australian student drew a map in which Australia was in the Upper Hemisphere and majority of the other continents were on the lower. Some students drew their continent largest, but not all. Almost all of the maps had the US, Russia, England, etc., which are the more prominent countries. Africa was the least represented with the least known about the countries. American students did the poorest on this task, especially in relation to the location of other countries.
2) Synesthesia this is something quite interesting to me and I have briefly heard of it before but have never gone into great detail of discovering more about it. Synesthesia is a condition in which one perception modality, such as vision, is experience in another modality, such as taste. People may taste shapes, feel sounds or see number or letters in color. It tends to be governed and not random, however increasing a pitch may mean a brighter color, for instance. Evidence points to the reason this happening is because people with synesthesia have sensory systems that are entwined and experience “cross-talk.”
What causes synesthesia? Of course, things in nature tend to be linked, even if different. Loud pitches and bright lights may make you experience the same kind of reaction. However, that doesn’t explain the psychological reasons behind this. Our nervous system is set up in a way in which cross-talk is valuable. Then, it is possible that connected areas in the brain that have activity simultaneously may give rise to synesthesiatic experiences. However, the exact cause doesn’t appear to be known, but with the advanced brain imaging systems we have now, we should be able to pinpoint why this happens.
3)Functional-Equivalency Hypothesis described the cognitive neuroscience support behind the theories that describe mental rotation, one of the examples was math. Not only are you using memory to recall how to do a problem, for instance, but you are also using visual parts of the brain to complete the task. I thought this was really interesting and read more about the functional-equivalency hypothesis. This hypothesis was mostly as a result of the excitement around the idea of mental rotation. When shown one image in different rotations, the degrees of rotation would decide how much time it took to decide if it was indeed the same object. A slight rotation would take very little time to make a decision, but a more severe rotation would take much longer. This indicates that the participants internal represents of the images required about 1 second for every 50 degrees of rotation. The relationship between the time required and the degree of rotation suggests that the internal process is an order function of the amount of transformation required. What this all is indicating is that imagery and perception are very similar cognitively.
4) Dual coding hypothesis, while this part of the chapter was relatively small, I found it to be the least interesting. It didn’t make a lot of sense to me.
5) That while we think we can think of ourselves as having 5 distinct senses, there also is a lot of overlap and combining of the senses.
6) Just continues to build on knowledge about our cognitive functions and how they are all related.
7) Synesthesia or maybe a disorder that stunts certain parts of sensing. I find topic to be very interesting and I would like to learn more about it!
8) Just how related all of our senses are.
Terms: cognitive map, dual-coding hypothesis, functional-equivalency, mental rotation, visual imagery.
1.
a. I am interested in the topic synesthesia.
b. I find it very interesting that one type of perception can make another activate. Like seeing color when you hear sound. I have personally done this, but it is very rare anymore. When I would close my eyes and listen to music and with every note I could see different colors. This was a very fun thing to do and I couldn’t just do it by mental thought. I would have to listen to just the music and nothing else to see colors. Although tasting colors would be a little strange for me to experience I would think. I also have experienced someone who has constant sound to vision color sight in one of my classes that I have been in. So synesthesia is nothing new to me to learn about because I was given an in depth look from someone who actually has synesthesia. So finding people with this condition is kind of fun. Plus there are some great authors that reference synesthesia in their works as time has passed.
2.
a. I am interested in the topic of I like where they do size comparison.
b. Size comparison is a cool way to make objects seem larger or smaller than they actually are. To see two objects next to one another and to see reaction time and what the size difference of the images are and how they are seen to people. Each person perceives them so seeing things differently is okay for people to see. Each thing is different and each mind is different from each other so is each perception. We have to perceive this world as we live in it and what we perceive we must use size comparison to see things as they are in this world.
3.
a. I liked the topic of typical visual forms used in mental rotation task.
b. It’s kind of cool how the mind can tell that shapes are the same and just rotated somehow or they are different from the shape from the original one. That is cool that you can have your brain do that without really trying and that means that the brain is a very interesting to study what it can do. There are things that the brain can do when you just put your cognitive brain to it and think of all the things that it does on its own.
4.
a. I wasn’t interested in the theories of visual representation of knowledge.
b. I didn’t really find the information on visual information all that interesting to read about in this chapter. Although they did make the chapter easier to understand what was going on in the chapter as I read it. The thing that the visual cortex does is an amazing thing.
5. I think that the thing that will help the most is the theories of visual representation of knowledge. Although I didn’t like these theories very much they are very important to learning things about the cognitive brain and how it processes the information that is sent through the patways.
6. This chapter builds on how the brain processes knowledge and what the pathways that are doing to keep that information working. The brain takes in a lot of data at one time and that means that there is a lot of things that can be seen from what you do in life and your brain has to create signals from neural pathways and information to pass information on to other areas of the brain.
7.
a. I want to learn more about synesthesia as a topic.
b. I really am interested in how synesthesia affects the brain and how it would affect your daily life. It is a really is a cool condition that the brain can have.
8. This chapter relates to how knowledge is processed in the brain and how our cognitive mind is processing this information.
9. Topic of visual forms used in mental rotation task, synesthesia, size comparison, theories of visual representation of knowledge, knowledge
1. The first thing that I found interesting was the subject of mental rotation in the discussion of the functional equivalency hypothesis. I found this interesting because I have done mental rotation tests before and found them to be fairly easy. It was interesting to read that response time and the extreme of the rotation were correlated. It was disappointing that a difference in genders wasn't discussed in this section. I was curious on whether a difference exists in the ease of mental rotation tasks as I remembered hearing something about it previously.
2. The second thing that I found interesting was the discussion of cognitive maps. In this section, two types of spatial knowledge are mentioned: route knowledge and survey knowledge. Route knowledge is related to the specific pathways used to get from one location to another. Survey knowledge is a more global relationship between various environmental cues, such as the general direction of the desired location. It was interesting to read about this and think about how I navigate around town on a daily basis.
3. The third thing that I found interesting was the subject of synesthesia. Synesthesia is when sensations from one sense are experienced in another. This can involve "tasting" a shape or "hearing" a color. While reading through this discussion I continually thought of what it must be like to experience such a sensation. I would imagine that it would be jarring if it was the first time.
4. This chapter again wasn't really one that I found anything uninteresting in. It was more interesting than last week's chapter for sure.
5. I feel like cognitive maps with be the most useful thing in the chapter. It is a good example of how visual and locational information are stored within the brain, which is an important thing in everyday life.
6. This chapter builds on last week's chapter by being the second part of the discussion of representation of knowledge, this time relating the visual part instead of the verbal part. It also builds on the subject of object recognition, particularly with the discussion of mental rotation.
7. I think that I would like to learn more about the subject of synesthesia. The whole concept seems strange to me and reading about more case studies involving it and the condition itself would likely be very interesting.
8. While reading the chapter I mainly related the concepts to my everyday experiences. As I said previously, I considered how I use cognitive mapping throughout my day and also tried to imagine what experiencing synesthesia might be like. There was also the consideration of gender differences in mental rotation.
Terms: mental rotation, functional equivalency hypothesis, cognitive maps, route knowledge, survey knowledge, synesthesia, sense, object recognition
1a) What did you find interesting?
The first thing I liked in this chapter was the section on cognitive maps.
1b) Why was it interesting to you?
I liked this section for multiple reasons. First off, I liked that I already had some background information on it because I have studied the topic before in other classes. I also like how when I think of a cognitive map, I can apply it to my everyday life. Every time I got somewhere without needing directions it is because of the cognitive maps I have in my head. What I liked most about this section were the examples that were given. I like the example about giving directions to the library because I could relate to it in multiple ways. I could relate to the example because it is the campus that I live on and I have given directions like that on campus before.
2a) What did you find interesting?
I also liked the section on Synesthesia.
2b) Why was it interesting to you?
I think it is interesting how certain individuals can taste shapes, feel sounds, or see numbers or letters in color. The thing that interested me the most in this section were the maps that were drawn by the students. I think it is interesting that most students were not well aware of what the map looked like but they knew what should go on the map. Even though they didn't know where certain things on the map belonged, I thought it was interesting that they knew a lot of what goes on the map and that they tried to make their home the center of the map
3a) What did you find interesting?
Lastly, I thought the story on L.H. was interesting to read about.
3b) Why was it interesting to you?
I find most cases where only part of someone's brain is injured interesting. I thought the way he could remember was interesting. I think it is crazy that he could only remember his wife and kids if they were wearing certain clothing. Learning about visual agnosia was interesting as well since I had never heard of it before. I also think it is interesting that he still has good elementary capabilities. It is interesting that he can't recognize certain objects but he can make copies of them.
4a) What one (1) thing did you find the least interesting?
The least interesting thing in this chapter to me was the Historical Perspective section.
4b) Why wasn't it interesting to you?
I think this was the least interesting section for me because right when I see the word historical, I assume that the section is going to be boring. I also did not enjoy reading the information on the philosophic and measurement era. I did find the breakfast table scenario a little interesting but the rest of the section could not keep my attention. I prefer to read about more recent research and experiments.
5) What did you read in the chapter that you think will be most useful to in understanding Cognitive Psychology?
I think the most useful information from this chapter is the section on cognitive maps. This subject is obviously important because it has been mentioned in my other classes as well. I also think cognitive maps are helpful to know because they teach us about our brain and our memory.
6) How, in what ways, does this chapter relate (build on) to the previous chapters?
This chapter builds on the previous chapters because it goes into more depth on cognitive science. It also gives more information about our memory.
7a) What topic would you like to learn more about?
I would like to learn more about Synesthesia.
7b) Why?
I would like to learn more about this because I am interested in the story that was told about HG. I would be interested in knowing what he is doing now.
8) What ideas related to what you were reading (what did you think about) did you have while reading the chapter?
While reading this section, I thought about things I have previously learned, such as the story of S.
9) Once you are done with your post make list of the terms and terminology you used in your post.
Cognitive maps, synesthesia, L.H., visual agnosia, cognitive science, memory
1) One topic I found to be interesting was the section on dual-coding hypothesis. I thought it related well to last week’s discussion about the hearing and the deaf. Dual-coding is where a mental picture, sound, or other sensory pictures are thought of. This hypothesis is if there are two ways that information can be represented in the memory. I feel like this is true, because we are able to speak what we want to say as well as picture it. Sometimes when our words fail we can see what we want to say and picture it. I am not sure because I am hearing, but I feel like it might be the same for those who are deaf. They are able to see so they also have the images in their head, along with using their sign language, which is their form of communication. It wouldn’t be a sound dual-coding, but it could be a mental picture or sensory picture form of dual-coding.
2) Another topic I found interesting was the section on cognitive maps. This section talked about how we all use imagery to navigate through the world. I like how it brought up that everything has cognitive maps, such as fish and birds, but theirs is different, because they see the world differently that we do on a daily basis. Fish swim in the water so that is their home and where they survive, we as people survive on land, and birds also are on land, but they are able to fly, so their imagery helps them when they are in flight. Cognitive maps I think can vary a little from person to person. In the text it talked about giving people directions, and in my memory and language course we talked about how people in different cultures give directions in some different ways, so if we were to give someone from a different country directions their perception of those directions might be a little different, depending on how we word them.
3) Another topic I found interesting was the part on synesthesia. This is where sensations from a perceptual experience are experienced in another modality. This would be like people having colors for sounds. An example given in the book about it not being random was that it has a positive relationship when a sound pitch increases as to the brightness of the sound will also increase.
4) I guess the least interesting part to me was the history section part. I am not a big fan of history, but I think it is important to know.
5) I think talking about how the information is processed is a very important part in understanding cognitive psychology, because it is our whole cognitive system.
6) This chapter continued more on the visual representations of knowledge, and continued on past discussions that we have had in class about synesthesia and imagery.
7) One topic I would like to learn more about is the topic on synesthesia. I think it is interesting how people are able to see colors for certain sound or how each number has a color, that was given as an example in a class discussion one day.
8) I thought a lot about how this compared with what I was learning in my memory and language course. I also thought about previous discussions that we have had in class to help me understand this chapter.
9) dual-coding, cognitive maps, synesthesia, sensory, knowledge, imagery, visual.
1a) What did you find interesting?
Visual Imagery
1b) Why was it interesting to you?
This caught my attention when it said some people seem capable of composing very vivid mental images, while others find the task to be more difficult. It was difficult for me to imagine not being able to close my eyes and imagine being somewhere else or thinking up some abstract object. Our other senses like touch, taste, hear and smell can illicit very strong feelings of nostalgia or sensations that take us somewhere we have been prior. Visual imagery is poor in some people but could be greatly improved through memory mnemonics or by pairing the visual images with other senses.
2a) What did you find interesting?
Dual-coding hypothesis.
2b) Why was it interesting to you?
As one of the current theories about mental imagery, this theory focuses on images being coded into two storage systems. One which we just discussed in the previous chapter, verbal and the other imaginal. While the theory suggests that information can be stored in either it can also be stored in both. Studies by Paivio have shown that some words can arouse a mental picture or sound and others are more abstract. The two codes, imaginal and verbal man also overlap from time to time which can allow the coding to become stored stronger.
3a) What did you find interesting?
Synesthesia.
3b) Why was it interesting to you?
We have already discussed this topic in our open discussions during class and I have also seen documentaries about the condition but it always interests me further whenever I hear or read about it. This section was very interesting in that it had many quotes from S. a person who has an incredible memory and also has synesthesia. While S. might have social problems I feel like I would never have to talk to anyone again if I never had to remember anything and all my senses were intertwined together. It is very hard to even imagine what consciousness is for like him because it would be so much different from my daily life. After reading this section I more and more want to speak with or meet a person with this rare gift.
4a) What one (1) thing did you find the least interesting?
Cognitive maps.
4b) Why wasn't it interesting to you?
This was a subject that we have discussed briefly in our class talks but we have also covered in the book and most of us in other classes. The idea of cognitive maps is a very convincing theory but I was interested in other areas during this chapter.
5) What did you read in the chapter that you think will be most useful to in understanding Cognitive Psychology?
This chapter was very heavy on theories for mental imagery and how the images we see on a daily basis are coded into memory which is helpful in understanding how we can improve our mental imagery. I think it is also important to note how each theory also has its holes, so far there are only theories, and none are concrete answers.
6) How, in what ways, does this chapter relate (build on) to the previous chapters?
This chapter builds directly from the last which dealt with verbal representations of knowledge. The visual and verbal representation of knowledge are very similar and in some theories work together to help us form a better understanding of our environment and also code those stimuli in to memory.
7a) What topic would you like to learn more about?
Synethesia
7b) Why?
Synethesia is a topic I have been interested in since first learning about it a few months ago. I would like to know more about the number and kinds of people it affects. I would also like to learn more about if it encompasses more than the visual and verbal stimuli or all of our modalities.
8) What ideas related to what you were reading (what did you think about) did you have while reading the chapter?
I found myself imagining places I have spent copious amounts of time, a beach in Hawaii, the mountains of Germany or the fields of Iowa. The images propagate in my mind in an instant and I can be taken back to each place but I also realize this is an ability that not everyone is privy to, so I feel lucky to have these vivid memories but also the capacity to reconstruct them in my mind’ eye.
9) Once you are done with your post make list of the terms and terminology you used in your post.
-synethesia, cognitive maps, visual imagery, dual-coding hypothesis, mental imagery, Paivio
Chapter 10 Blog
The first thing I found interesting about chapter ten is the little blue box labeled “’Seeing’ Without Sensing”. This box talks about how we use visual imagery. Visual imagery is when we can “see” something that we are not even viewing. The example that the book gives asks us to recall how many windows are in our living place. Before I even kept reading, I caught myself picturing my little apartment. I saw myself walking into the front door, through the living room, and then peering into the bedrooms. This is a prime example of visual imagery. I was able to picture my apartment and how many windows it had without actually being there. It also talks about how some people are better at visual imagery than others. I didn’t realize that that was the case. And now that I know it is, I think that I am very good at visual imagery. This whole concept is pretty interesting to me because I use it so much. There are many times when I am trying to recall or remember something and I automatically start picturing things in my head. I think it is a really spectacular phenomenon that we can “see” things without them being in front of us. We can see things in our mind’s eye even if these things were never sensed.
The second thing that I found interesting in chapter ten was the experiment that Kosslyn did on small objects vs. large objects and how clearly they are seen. It was shown that the bigger animal was seen in much more detail and much more vividly. The first example was a small rabbit next to a large elephant. The large elephant was seen more clearly than the rabbit. But when the rabbit was next to a fly (which is smaller than a rabbit) – there was more attention paid to the rabbit. The rabbit then had more detail, and the fly had less. Kosslyn thought that maybe this was because the person had a bias towards rabbits, elephants, or flies. In order to get rid of the possible bias, she faced the participants with gigantic flies and tiny elephants. The larger of the animals was still seen with much more detail, and it was still paid the most attention to. I think that this is a very interesting experiment. It makes sense that the larger animal would get paid more attention to. But it is really interesting that when the smaller animal is made the largest, that becomes the animal that gets paid the most attention to. This is really interesting to me because it shows that our mind shapes what we see without us even knowing. We automatically pay attention to certain stimuli. There are things that our minds are always doing that we don’t know about.
The third thing that I found interesting in chapter ten was the concept of synesthesia. Synesthesia is where someone perceives in one modality and experiences what they perceive in another modality. The examples that the book gives are people tasting shapes, feeling sounds, or seeing numbers and letters in color. I remember when I was in middle school and I read a book about a little boy who had the ability to see colors with words. He would go around and tell people what colors their names were. I figured that this novel was based on true events, but I have never really heard of it until now. I think that this is really interesting because I have never experienced anything like this – or not that I remember. I think if I have ever done this, in the slightest, I have been able to taste certain smells. This is something I feel that a lot of people can do though because your sense of smell is directly related to your sense of taste. I think it would be pretty cool if I could put certain colors to certain words. I’m sure that I have experienced some of these examples a little bit. I think that I have felt sounds before. That would be similar to when you are watching a scary movie and they start to play the suspenseful music. I always start to feel really anxious and wonder what is going to happen next.
The concept that I found the least interesting was mental rotation. Mental rotation is when someone has the ability to tell if two objects are the same (except for orientation). If I have an object that is a certain shape and then I rotate it 90 degrees, would the person be able to tell that it was the same object? Or would they think that it was a different object? I think that this is an interesting concept, but I couldn’t do it! I looked at the images in the book over and over again and my brain just wouldn’t recognize the objects that were different. I tried so hard to rotate them in my mind, and I kept seeing them as the same object. I thought that they all looked the same. I didn’t think that any of the objects were different; I just thought that they were all rotated. So it’s not that I found this topic uninteresting, I just couldn’t do it myself, so I started to become confused as I read on.
I think that this information will help me in learning about cognitive psychology because it is all about how we interpret things visually. This chapter is all about the visual representation of knowledge. It’s about how we can visualize what we know. I think that this information will help me in my learning about cognitive psychology because now I know more about how, why, and to what extent we visualize information. Sometimes we purposely visualize things and sometimes visualization happens on a more subconscious, unplanned level. I think that this shows how unique the mind is. There are some things about it that we just can’t control. I think that that has a lot to say for cognitive psychology. Usually when a person thinks about cognitive processes, they probably envision someone thinking. But I am starting to learn that some of the information that we use and store cognitively is not planned.
The main way I think this chapter builds on other chapters is because of all of the sections on memory. Whenever I think about visualizing things, I think about myself trying to recall or remember information. Whenever I need to remember things, I use visual imagery. I use visual imagery to store information and I also use it to recall information. I think that the way our knowledge is visually represented has a big part to do with memory and recalling information. If it isn’t that way for everyone, I know that this is the case for me.
I would like to learn more about visual imagery. I would like to know why certain people are better at it. And I would like to know why some people use visual imagery more often. I think the main reason I find visual imagery so interesting is because I use it so often. I am constantly picturing things in my mind. I use visual imagery as a study technique and I use it as a remembering technique. There are a lot of things about visual imagery that I don’t know. I would like to know what people use if they are not using visual imagery. I can’t imagine living a life without visual imagery. What about people who are blind? Do they have any sort of visual imagery? That would be interesting to find out. I will have to do more research on visual imagery and people who have no sight.
When I first started reading this chapter I was very scared that it was going to be similar to the last chapter. As I said in last week’s blog, I did not enjoy going over the last chapter about the verbal representation of knowledge. None of that information was appealing to me. And since this chapter is all about the visual representation of knowledge, I figured I would not enjoy it equally as much. I was surprised to find that I thought this chapter was very interesting indeed. I think that this chapter was interesting to me because I am such a visual learner. That would also explain why I didn’t enjoy the last chapter because I don’t think that I learn very well by listening. It is hard for me to store information if it is simply auditory.
Terms: Visual Imagery, Kosslyn, Synesthesia, Mental Rotation, Cognitive Psychology
1a.A topic in the chapter I found interesting was the one on synesthesia. Synesthesia is a condition in which sensory experiences get crossed. For example, in this condition someone may see an object and hear a sound, or taste something and see an image. From different reports it appears that this condition follows a set of rules and is not completely random. If someone sees sounds then it is most likely that the louder the sound they hear the darker the color and the softer the sound the lighter the color.
1b. I found this interesting because I have never personally heard of this condition. It would be crazy to me to experience something like this and in my opinion it drive me crazy. Also in the book it says that they don’t really know why it occurs or what the mechanism is behind it. I would be very interested in researching some of the newer research behind the biological mechanisms.
2a. The next topic I found to be interesting was the section on Cognitive Neuroscience: Cognitive Maps. There are two aspects to cognitive maps. The first aspect being object-based spatial transformations, which basically means mentally rotating the image of an object or location in your mind. The second aspect is egocentric perspective transformations, which is where we rotate (or translate) our point of view. These two aspects confused me at first but the books example made it much clearer. In the object-based spatial transformation we can imagine shopping and being in the dry goods isle and thinking, “I want ice cream.” In your head you would mentally rotate the isle to envision where the ice cream isle would be. The second aspect would be you mentally envisioning yourself moving around the isle and going to where the ice cream is.
2b. I found this interesting because I took for granted this process. After reading this section I came to realize that I do in fact do this all the time. For example, when I drive to places I envision which roads to take and mentally rotate the different directions I’ll turn and envision myself driving to that area. When I walk around campus I see where have to go mentally and envision myself walking there. It is something we do all the time.
3a.Another section I found highly amusing is the Spatial Skills of Gamers section. This section explains that researchers are interested in the cognitive skills of gamers because there is a lot of complex cognitive and spatial abilities. Typically reseachers in this area want to test the “general transfer hypothesis” which is basically seeing if skills developed in one video game can transfer to another game. It was found that only very specific skills can be transferred to another similar game. For example skills learned from playing Halo will transfer to Halo 2 but not necessarily transfer to Call of Duty.
3b. I found this interesting because I am a huge gamer. I have noticed this transfer effect now that I think about it. I am really good a Guitar Hero and my skills transfer to other guitar hero like games (Rock Band), but not so well to another pattern dominant game like Dance Dance Revolution. Video games have very specific skills it seems.
4a.The section I found least interesting was the bit on the functional-equivalency hypothesis. This hypothesis has to do with the mental rotation of objects. In an experiment done by Sheprd and Metzler, participant had to distinguish if a rotated object was a match to the target object or different object all together. This required participants to mentally rotate the object to see if it matched the target object. It was found that the time it took to mentally rotate the object was a linear function of how many degrees the object was rotated. If the object was rotated 90 degrees it took less time to identify it than if it was rotated 180 degrees.
4b. I didn’t find this as interesting because I have previously learned about this hypothesis before. Furthermore, I have had to do this experiment before and I absolutely sucked at it (the slowest in the class). So my pre-conception of the topic made not like it as well. Apparently my spatial abilities are not that great!
5. I think the section on cognitive maps will be the most useful. I feel like it is an important function of our cognition that is invaluable in our daily lives.
6. This chapter continues to build on our understanding of cognitive psychology as a whole. Visual representation of knowledge is just another category of cognitive functioning, such as the chapter before being about the verbal representation of knowledge. All the chapter thus far have hit on the different ways in which cognition effects our lives.
7a. I would like to learn more about synesthesia.
7b. I want to learn more about it because the book really did not explain the mechanism behind why this condition happens to some people. I would like delve deeper into what happens in the brain when this happens to people and what structures involved. Also I want to see if there is any newer research on the topic that can clarify just what causes it.
8. I found myself relating the topics to my experiences in order to clarify the meanings to myself. For example the topics I found most interesting were the ones I could identify with, such as the gaming section, I had experienced the things that section was talking about, and the section on cognitive maps as well. The more I relate the sections to my personal experiences the better they stick out to me and the better I understand them.
9. Cognitive maps, mental rotation, functional equivalency hypothesis, synesthesia, object based spatial transformations, egocentric perspective transformations.
1a) What did you find interesting?
-”Seeing” without Sensing. I thought this was an interesting topic. I feel like daydreaming could be like this. Wishing you were in a different place and visualizing it without actually being in the situation. Sensing something without actually being in the situation is interesting. We can imagine we are on a beach with the smells, sights, feel, without actually having that beach with us.
2a) What did you find interesting?
-Mental Imagery and Sports. This topic is intriguing to me. I did some traveling sports in high school. I never would have thought that visualizing about doing better could actually make you perform better. I never had a coach or anyone on the team tell use to visualize what steps we need to take in order to do better. Reading and thinking about it I could see how it would show improvements. Taking a step back and thinking and visualizing about what you need to do when the situation comes could make you more focused and ready when the time comes.
3a) What did you find interesting?
- The case of L.H. This case is like another one from a previous chapter. Where they had one ability but not the other. I think it is really interesting how something can affect one part of the brain but not the other like visual and spatial skills. This tested him and his visual skills which were very below the normal control but for spatial skills he was high than the normal control. Like the figure they show he didn’t know what the items were but he was able to draw them with really good accuracy.
4a) What one (1) thing did you find the least interesting?
-Mental Rotation. I didn’t like this part of the chapter. I have learned about it in two other classes so I have seen it before. I got to participant in some of the rotation activities. It is something that I know about so it made it uninteresting but I would like to see other people perform the tasks.
5) What did you read in the chapter that you think will be most useful to in understanding Cognitive Psychology?
-I think all of it is pretty useful. Visual representation how we see and perceive stuff everyday. It helps in seeing how the brain works with visual things like a picture they had with the guy with the upside down spoon. It said that darrell suspected someone had once again slipped him a trick spoon with the concave spoon reversed. He would visually not see this unless he flips it over to realizes it a normal spoon.
6) How, in what ways, does this chapter relate (build on) to the previous chapters?
-This relates to other chapters by seeing how we take in information and use it or our judgements on it. Like L.H. is a case that in previous chapters there was a guy who could do one thing but not a another and it was dealing with the same objects. It’s all dealing with the brain just different parts.
7a) What topic would you like to learn more about?
- I would like to learn more about L.H. and visual agnosia. I think his case is really interesting how it can affect one skill but not another.
8) What ideas related to what you were reading (what did you think about) did you have while reading the chapter?
9) Once you are done with your post make list of the terms and terminology you used in your post.
-Mental Imagery, visual skills, spatial skills, Mental Rotation, visual agnosia
1) i thought that the blue box about seeing without sensing was pretty neat. i do this all the time i can sit and daydream and go anywhere that i want to. its neat how a smell or color can take you anywhere that you want or you can see things to so much detail its like its right in front of you.
2)the section about the mental rotation. you can have an object in front of you and you know what it is but then if you would rotate it and then get shown another picture of the same thing your mind can get confused and you may take you a little bit to decided if it is the same thing or if it is different.
3)the other thing that i found interesting is the mental size comparison. i does happen when you are told to imagine some thing big you can see all the details but if there is something small next to it all you can see is the out line of it or just the basics, no real detail.
4) Just like all of the chapters that i have read i like it all
5) with the mental imagery i think that it is very important. it is easier to understand what people are talking about or where they were or what they saw with seeing it in your head.
6)it all builds on the previous chapters you imagine it you remember it your memory pictures it and you recall it.
7) i would like to learn more about it all.
8)randomness was going through my head. just picturing the things that were being talked about like the island and other things like that.