Cognition — Lecture Notes 1

Lecture 1 — What is Cognitive Psychology

- What is cognitive psychology?
- The scientific study of the mind and brain
- Studying basic processes in:
- Perception
- Attentional resources
- Memory
- Language
- Problem Solving
- History of cognitive psychology
- Greek Philosopher: Aristotle — things that exist in the world are somehow represented in the mind
- Descartes — mind/body dualism, mind and body are separate but interact — he thought possibly
through pineal gland (circular = perfect)
- Modern thought — perception, memories are consequences of brain activity, not separate (like
Descartes’ theory)
- Materialistic Approach — study the brain to understand the mind
- Early days of psychology
- Thinking through mental imagery
- Major methodology — introspection
- Thought about what was going on inside their own head — carried out by philosophers or
trained others to introspect
- Original belief: Thought was carried by mental images, and from these, could create abstract
ideas
- The behaviourist revolution
- If we want to build a scientific based psychology we cannot depend on mental images
- What we do know is what we can control – the input we present and output
- Want to find relationships between input and output
- We must concentrate on OBSERVABLES
- Interested in finding the laws that describe the relationship between input and output
- The cognitive revolution
- From the onset of behaviourism for almost 40 years cognitive psychology was a neglected field of
study
- With the onset of cybernetics — experimental work occurred in many fields including cognition
- In putting something into computer and getting output — people realized there is something
occurring in between those processes
- Cognitive maps — navigation of thought (i.e. how rats navigate a maze)
- In 1950s-60s, cognitive psychology became the central area of psychology
- Information Theory
- All communication involves 3 steps:
- Coding a message at its source
- Transmitting the message through a communications channel
- Decoding the message at its destination
- A bit (binary unit) — basic unit of information in digital communication
- A bit can only have one of 2 values: 0 or 1
- In the first step, message must be put into some kind of symbolic representation (coding)
- i.e. writing “Hello”, we encode a greeting
- i.e. writing a musical score, encoding sounds
 - For any code to be useful it needs to be transmitted to someone
- Transmission can be through voice, letter, billboard, telephone conversation, radio, TV etc.
- At the destination, someone or something has to receive the symbols, and then decode them by
matching them against his or her own body of information to extract the data
- Channel capacity — limited capacity of things we can attend to and process
- Alan Turing & the Turing Machine
- A machine that would read a symbol, perform a simple operation on it and then write the answer
back
- Symbols can be combined using a set of rules. This means that they can be used to perform
deductive reasoning and understand language
- A turing machine could potentially perform a set of procedures to produce the solution to a problem
— these procedures are known as algorithms
- In humans: we use heuristics
- Do computers think?
- Computers are similar to minds in the ways they process information
- But can we program computers to perform intelligently — computer models:
- Artificial Intelligence (AI)
- Computer simulation
- Robert Holt: return of mental imagery
- Studying things that forces us to study mental images
- i.e. phantom limbs or FA in signal detection

Lecture 2 — Studying the Brain

- Colin Cherry’s Dichotic Listerning Task (1953)
- Behavioural approach to attention
- Study:
- Listened to messaged through head phones — different messages/material to each ear
- Must shadow one of the messages — forcing people to pay attention to the attended ear
- People couldn’t report back much of the unattended ear
- If you don’t attend — don’t derive any meaning to it
- EXAMPLE: Broadbent’s Filter Model
- An early-selection model — filtering occurs before incoming stimuli are analyzed to the semantic
level
- Attention is a FILTER — allows only some information to go forward
- Only things that get through are those that meet the characteristics of the filter (“pay attention
to left ear message”)
- Shown to be incorrect later on
- Pandemonium
- Serial versus parallel processing
- Within each “stage” processing is parallel — between is serial
- Bottom-up processing theory — taking input and elaborating on it until you come to some sort of
conclusion
- Feature detection
- Image demons: record image from retina
- Feature demons: fire if features are present
- Cognitive demons: analyze from features
- Decision demons: make final decision
- When placed in context — easier recognition (C/-\T, T/-\E)
- Brain Damage
- Concept of “localization” — different parts of the brain are specialized for doing different things
- Pierre Paul Broca
- Studied patients who were able to understand language but not speak
- Nothing wrong with the production system — lesion in posterior frontal lobe (Broca’s Area)
- Wernike
- Found opposite results — patients who were able to produce grammatical sentences, but
disabilities in comprehension
- Sensory and Motor skills
- Central fissure divides sensory and motor areas (one side sensory, the other motor)
- Corpus collosum connecting hemispheres
- Techniques to study the brain
- ERP (Event-related potentials)
- Fast temporal resolution
- Poor spatial resolution
- Electrodes located over the head — pick up electrical activity
- Patterns change with brain activity
- Measure brain waves during certain input situations = event related potentials
- ERPs are derived after averaging EEG signals through multiple trials
- fMRI (functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging
- Good spatial resolution (know part of brain active)
- Poor temporal resolution
- Functional — measures brain activity during a task
- Correlate brain activity in certain areas with task — localization
- Neurons and Synapses
- Types of neurons:
- Sensory — to brain
- Sensory receptors
- Receive input from environment and transmit stimuli to neurons
- Primary human senses: photoreceptor, chemoreception, mechanoreception, thermoreception
- Sensory neurons
- INPUT from sensory organs to the brain and spinal cord
- Afferent nerves
- Motor — to muscles
- Motor neurons
- OUTPUT from the brain and spinal cord to the muscles and glands
- Efferent nerves
- Interneurons — between neurons
- Interneurons carry information between other neurons
- Only found in the brain and spinal cord.
- Structures of a neuron
- Cell body
- Contains the cell’s nucleus — does not do any signalling it’s self
- Relative inability to grow new neurons
- Dendrites
- Branch from the cell body to receive and collect incoming information/inputs
- If enough inputs the cell’s AXON may generate an output
- Dendrites are able to grow when they are new — allowing to branch and get connections
 - Axon
- The cell’s output structure
- One axon per cell — 2 distinct parts: tubelike structure, & branching area to other dendrites
- Myelin sheath
- White fatty casing on axon — acts as an electrical insulator
- When present increases the speed of neural signals down the axon
- How neurons communicate
- Inter-neuron communication by means of electrical signal called the Action Potential
- Action potentials are based on movements of ions between the outside and inside of the cell
- Difference in electrical potential between inside and outside of the cell — resting state: inside
more negative than outside (-70mv)
- Typically: inside the cell — potassium, outside the cell — sodium and chloride
- Cell membrane is semi-permeable — small things can get through
- As information passes along the neuron during an AP, the cell becomes more positive from the
outside chemicals moving in — wave of excitation moving along the neuron as it becomes
increasingly positive *depolarizing the cell*
- After an AP, cell returns to back to resting state (re-polarization)
- For a period it is hyper-polarized and unable to fire — refractory period
- Synapse
- Axon terminals contain small storage sacs with neurotransmitters — synaptic vesicles
- AP causes vesicles to open — releasing neurotransmitters into the synapse, locking onto receptor
molecules in postsynaptic membrane
- Neurotransmitters and receptors are specially shaped for binding
- Positive ions — depolarize : make firing easier
- Negative ions — hyper-polarize: make firing harder
- Nervous System
- Central Nervous System (CNS) — Brain & Spinal cord
- Peripheral Nervous System (PNS) — come in and out of spinal cord
- Motor neurons — carry signals away from CNA
- Somatic — voluntary
- Autonomic — involuntary
- Sympathetic — fight or flight response
- Parasympathetic — rest and rumination
- Sensory neurons
- The Brain
- Hindbrain
- Medulla — controls autonomic functions
- Pons — controls sleep stages
- Cerebellum — coordinates movement, stores some motor memory
- Midbrain
- Reticular formation — “traffic cops” of the brain
- Filters sensory input, allowing us to concentrate
- Forebrain
- Thalamus — relay station channelling sensory information
- Limbic system — basic emotions, drives, behaviours
- Hypothalamus — master controller of endocrine system
- Amygdala — sensations of pleasure or fear
- Hippocampus — formation of memories
- Cortex — higher thought
 - Cerebrum — largest portion of the brain, 2 hemispheres each with 4 lobes
- Functions: speech, memory, vision, personality, and muscle control
- Hemispheres connected by Corpus Callosum
- Central fissure — touch and motor
- Wiring is plastic — i.e. blind people from birth use parts of visual cortex for auditory processing
- The visual system
- Photoreception
- Light enters the eye through the cornea and the pupil
- Light is focused by the lens
- Light strikes the retina, and stimulates receptors
- Retina has multiple axons that bind together to create the optic nerve — blind spot here
- Photoreceptors
- Cones — concentrated around fovea
- Rods — concentrated in peripheral
- Visual information crosses over so that the Right VF is analyzed in left hemisphere (visa-versa)
- Information pathways
- Dorsal stream — “where”
- Ventral stream — “what”

Lecture 3 — Pattern Recognition

- Pattern Recognition
- Pattern can be any visual object, string of sounds, or lines on a page
- Main Question: How do we recognize objects?
- VOCAB:
- Bottom-up process — processes that start at the input and are elaborated until completed
- Top-up process — processes that involve established knowledge or context in reaching object
recognition
- Viewer-centered representation — the object as represented proximally (based on orientation)
- Object-centered representation — the object as represented independently of one’s orientation
- Template theory
- When the internal representation matches the input = the recognition of an object
- Assumption that we compare a retinal image of an object to stored mental representations
- Problems:
- Variability of input (size, orientation, etc.)
- Sometimes parts of an object are obscured
- There can be slight variations in the input (i.e. many ways to write the letter “a”)
- Prototype theories
- Modification of template matching (flexible templates)
- Criterion for matching to common characteristics of an object
- Advantage over template theory — less need for mass mental representation of objects
- Feature models
- Objects of the world decomposed into a limited set of basic parts (or features)
- Evidence: Hubel & Wiesel
- Simple cells detect orientations of edges in specific locations
- Complex cells detect orientations of edges in abstract locations
- Hypercomplex cells detect particular colours, edges of a particular length, or moving in a
particular direction
- Gestalt theories of perception
- Phi phenomenon — apparent movement created by the mind between 2 static objects
- Basic premise: Humans are not passive receivers of sensory information, our perceptions are active
- We actively organize perceptions into coherent wholes (top-down processing)
- Gestalt laws:
- Law of Pragnaz — mind organizes input into the most simple, stable, good form as it can
- Law of Proximity — elements that are closer together are perceived as a coherent object
- Law of Similarity — elements that look similar are perceived as a whole
- Law of Closure — our mind tends to close gaps by completing a mental contour
- Law of Continuity — mind’s preference for good continuation over disruption
- Pattern recognition requires BOTH bottom-up and top-down processes
- Top-down processes
- Perception is not automatic from raw stimuli
- Top-down processing occurs quickly and involves making inferences, guessing from experience,
and basing one perception on another
- Need for both processes — input inherently “noisy”, use of information from context and raw data
- Expectations — can lead to errors, but allow for increased efficiency
- Evidence for need of features:
- Visual Search Tasks
- Targets defined by a single feature are easy to detect — not affected by # of items in display
- Targets defined by a conjunction of features are hard to detect — inc. with # of items in
display (slope = 0.5)
- Word Recognition
- Frequency Effects
- Word frequency: Frequent words are recognized more easily
- Repetition priming: Words seen recently are perceived more easily
- Context Effects
- Word superiority: Individual letters are easiest to identify when they are part of a word
- Well-formedness: Individual letters are recognized more easily as part of “word-like” stimuli
than in a random strings of letters
- Interactive Activation Model (IAM)
- Explains word superiority effect:
- Letters in words benefit from bottom-up and top-down activation
- But letters alone receive only bottom-up activation
- Feature detectors signal up, while context signals back down
- Configural superiority effect
- Objects in context are easier to recognize than objects presented alone

Lecture 4 — Attention
- Attention — process of concentrating on specific features of the environment, or on certain thoughts or
activities
- Orienting
- We actively look and listen (we aren't passive)
- Different ways to orient to a stimulus
- Covert Orienting — intentionally attending to things in our environment
- Overt Orienting — unintentionally paying attention
- Attentional Gaze — Attention can be drawn to a particular location independent of where our eyes
are looking or our ears are oriented
- Attention features:
- Selective — cant attend to everything going on around
- Divisible — able to attend to multiple things
- Shift voluntary — able to consciously switch attention from one thing to another
- Shift involuntary — attention can be drawn to something, whether I want to or not
- Orientating Mechanisms
- Exogenous — reflexive, engaged by peripheral cues (even uninformative cues)
- Endogenous — voluntary, engaged by central cues (only with informative cues — arrows)
- Cueing attention
- Give people a cue where a target will appear in the visual field
- Manipulate: the kind of cue
- Valid cue — helps
- Neutral cue — no effect
- Invalid cue — hinders
- Selective attention
- Ability to focus on one message, and ignore others in a Dichotic listening task
- Shadowing to ensure attention on attended channel
- Physical attributes on unattended channel are detected, while semantic are missed
- Broadbent’s filter model of attention
- Message processed or eliminated BEFORE meaning is attached to input
- Other studies show that meaning CAN get through
- Context effect
- Disambiguating word in unattended ear
- Name mention in unattended ear
- Early versus late selection
- Early Selection: Attenuation theory
- Attenuator – flexible system that allows different amounts to get through
- Not giving it that much attention – stuff that gets through depends on relevance, context etc.
- Early selection — happens right after perception
- Late Selection
- Everything goes through, attention selects from short term memory to choose what is meaningful
- Pertinence — based on task demands

Early Filtering (Broadbent):

Filter

Input Detection Recognition

Attenuation (Treisman):
Attenuator

Input Detection Recognition

Late Filtering (Deutsch & Deutsch):

Filter

Input Detection Recognition

- Divided Attention
- You can’t do 2 tasks at once at the same performance level as either task on their own
- Simulated driving task — cell phone use causes decrease in driving performance
- Even hands free — the multitasking causes affects on performance, takes up attentional resources
- Attention as a resource
 -When a particular task demands lots of processing resources, then other tasks get fewer resources
-Only so much can be attended at once (limited capacity)
-Tasks take mental effort — limited resources to allocate
-Resource allocation model
- What affects allocation
- Resources — arousal, available capacity
- Other effects —enduring dispositions, momentary intentions
- Dual Task performance
- Divided attention is difficult when tasks are: similar, difficult, both requiring conscious attention
- Divided attention is easier when tasks are: dissimilar, simple, one not requiring conscious
attention, practiced
- Schneider and Shiffrin (1977)
- Divide attention between remembering target and monitoring rapidly presented stimuli
- Memory set: 1-4 target characters — observers must report if they saw the target items
- Manipulates: (1) number of items in memory set, (2) speed at which frames went by, (3) Type
of items looking for
- Pop-out effect occurring after 600 trials — 4 target items
- Effect of practice:
- Controlled processing — slower, takes up more attentional resources
- Automatic processing — fast, parallel, requiring few resources
- Stroop effect
- Name of the word interfering with the ability to name the text colour
- Cannot avoid paying attention to the meanings of the words
- Neely (1977)
- 2 Components to priming
- Automatic component — fast, effortless, unaffected by expectation
- Controlled component — show, effortful, benefits (if correct), costs (if incorrect)
- Priming:
- Neutral — no FX
- Relevant prime — faster RT
- Irrelevant prime — slower RT
- Neurophysiology of attention
- Reticular Activating system (RAS)
- Arousal and wakefulness
- Set the pace of brain activity
- Damage = reduced attention
- Parietal lobe
- Visual and spatial aspects of attention — attention resources
- Top-down processing
- Frontal lobe
- Executive control of attention
- Neglect syndrome: the lack of attention to one side of space, usually the left, as a result of
parietal damage
- Show bias in memory description — right side
- Mental ‘spotlight’ fails to illuminate left-sided features, 50% of patients recover after injury