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CARDSE-MAIL LIST
SOMETHING ABOUT GRADES
QUESTIONS
Abstract on Applications of Cognitive Psychology
QUIZ on FRIDAY will be on CHAPTER 1 and 2, Guest Lectures 1 and 2.
In particular, study in greater detail:
* More recent historical antecedents
* Methods in Cognitive Psychology
* Major anatomical subdivions of the brain
* Methods in Cognitive Neuroscience
What to STUDY:
* Try to understand what are the important things in the chapter and in the lessons
* Do not focus on the details of the examples that are used to explain a concept. Focus on the concept.
Vision (1982)
Levels of Explanations in Cognitive Theories
(or: things that we always need to know when we study an information processing device)
1. THE COMPUTATIONAL LEVEL
What is the input? What is the output? What is the type of computation that is performed and what are its properties? WHAT
2. THE REPRESENTATIONAL OR ALGORITHMIC LEVEL
What are the possible sequences of logic operations that we can use to carry out this computation? HOW
3. THE HARDWARE IMPLEMENTATION
Which algorithm is actually used in the device we are studying? What is the hardware structure of the device? How is the algorithm implemented?
ARE THEY?
Churchland and Sejnowski (1991), Perspectives on Cognitive Neurosciences
"There are indefinitely many computational models one might dream up, and it might be that none are even close to how the brain in fact achieves solutions to difficult computational problems." (p. 16)
Complex system can be more efficiently studied by integrating information from the algorithm level with information from the hardware level, that is, using data on the organization of the brain to constrain models of cognition.
HELMHOLTZ
DONDERS
The SUBTRACTIVE METHOD
Task A -> simple reaction times
Task B -> choice reaction times
Task C -> go/no go task
C - A gives the stimulus selection time
D - C gives the response selection time
Assumptions:
(1) MENTAL OPERATIONS OCCUR IN REAL TIME
(2) THE NATURE OF THE MENTAL OPERATIONS DOES NOT CHANGE WHEN THE TASK IS MADE MORE COMPLICATED (PURE INSERTION ASSUMPTION).
STERNBERG
The ADDITIVE FACTORS METHOD
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