PSY1EFP Lecture Notes - Lecture 10: Representativeness Heuristic, Availability Heuristic, Sunscreen

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tanjackal830

18 Jun 2018

School

La Trobe University

Department

PSY

Course

PSY1EFP

Professor

Simon Crowe & Annukka Lindell

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EFP Lecture 10 Session 1 – Memory, Thinking and Intelligence (3)

What is thought

Cognition: the mental activity that includes thinking and the understandings that result from thinking

Thinking: the mental manipulation of representations of knowledge about the world

Thinking allows us to take information, consider it, and use it to build models of the world, set goals, and plan our actions

accordingly.

The purpose of thinking is to understand our world as well as is possible and to make smarter decisions on how to survive and live.

Our thinking reflects our map of reality. This is our view of the world and what we find to be true about it. The more accurate our

map of reality, the better we can adapt to our surroundings.

The function of our thinking is to make decisions that eventually guide our behaviour. Our map of reality is therefore instrumental to

how we act and respond to the world.

Thinking involves two types of mental representations

The challenge for cognitive psychologists is to understand the nature of our everyday mental representations.

We use two basic types of mental representations.

-Analogical representations i.e. (a): mental representations that have some of the physical characteristics of objects; they are

analogous to the objects

-Symbolic representations: i.e. (b): abstract mental representations that do not

correspond to the physical features of objects or ideas

Mental maps can include both analogical and symbolic representations.

Symbolic representations can lead to errors, because we can represent only a limited range

of knowledge analogically and thus use memory shortcuts unconsciously.

Concepts and Symbolic Representations

Grouping things based on shared properties, or categorization, reduces the amount of

knowledge we must hold in memory and is therefore an efficient way of thinking.

Much of our knowledge of the world is based on concepts, or categories of items organized

around common themes.

-Concept: a category, or class, of related items; it consists of mental representations of

those items.

Concepts are symbolic representations

Prototype model: a way of thinking about concepts: Within each category, there is a best example, a prototype, for that category.

Exemplar model: a way of thinking about concepts: all members of a category are examples (exemplars); together they form the

concept and determine category membership.

-It assumes that, through experience, people form a fuzzy representation of a concept because there is no single

representation of any concept.

Conceptualising the world

- The exemplar model holds that all members of a category are exemplars. For example, even this strange-looking feline is an exemplar of

the category cats. (This cat happens to be a brown tortie white and tabby sphinx.)

The Prototype model of concepts

According to the prototype model, some items within a group or class are prototypes. That is, they are more representative of that

category than are other concepts in the category. For this reason, an orange seems to be the prototype of the category “fruit.” By

contrast, olives do not seem to be very representative of the category.

Schemas organize useful information about environments

Schemas are cognitive structures that help us perceive, organize, and process information.

-What we view as appropriate is shaped by culture.

Schemas and scripts may lead us to think and act in stereotypical ways.

-Stereotypes: cognitive schemas that allow for easy, fast processing of information about people based on their membership in

certain groups.

-Gender roles are the prescribed behaviours for females and males and represent a type of schema that operates at the

unconscious level.

-The schemas and scripts that children learn are likely to affect their behaviour when they are older.

Scripts are schemas that dictate appropriate behaviour.

Schemas and scripts are adaptive in that they enable us to make quick judgments with little effort.

What to believe? Using psychological reasoning

Making Relative Comparisons (Anchoring and Framing): Why Is It Hard to Resist a Sale?

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-Gigantic bold sale advertisement proclaims “80% off!”

-But when you shop around you discover that the store’s regular prices are substantially higher than the competition’s.

-The sale simply lowers prices to match the going market rate.

-Why would the store use such an obvious tactic?

People love to think they are getting a bargain, so having high regular prices and big discounts is a very effective marketing strategy.

-JC Penney tried to break this mold by ending weekly sales and offering “fair and square” everyday low prices for its

merchandise.

-Shoppers quit going to JC Penney—they want discounts.

Advertisers exploit the tendency to view benefits and costs differently.

-Advertisers usually frame the decision in terms of a discount (money gained) instead of a surcharge (money lost). In the

grocery store, people are much more likely to purchase meat that is described as 75 percent lean than food described as 25

percent fat.

Beachgoers presented with information that frames sunscreen in terms of its benefits are more likely to request sunscreen than

those who are told about the hazards of sunburn.

-Positively framed information is more influential in changing behaviour than negatively framed information.

Car dealers often wait until the price of a new car has been agreed upon before suggesting additional options.

-Once a buyer agrees to pay $20,000 for a car, that price becomes an anchor, against which the cost of options seems small.

Anchoring and framing are among the major tools that marketers use to increase sales.

Heuristics

Availability heuristic: making a decision based on the answer that most easily comes to mind

-When we think about events or make decisions, we tend to rely on information that is easy to retrieve.

Representativeness heuristic: placing a person or object in a category if that person or object is similar to one’s prototype for that

Document Summary

Efp lecture 10 session 1 memory, thinking and intelligence (3) Cognition: the mental activity that includes thinking and the understandings that result from thinking. Thinking: the mental manipulation of representations of knowledge about the world. Thinking allows us to take information, consider it, and use it to build models of the world, set goals, and plan our actions accordingly. The purpose of thinking is to understand our world as well as is possible and to make smarter decisions on how to survive and live. This is our view of the world and what we find to be true about it. The more accurate our map of reality, the better we can adapt to our surroundings. The function of our thinking is to make decisions that eventually guide our behaviour. Our map of reality is therefore instrumental to how we act and respond to the world. The challenge for cognitive psychologists is to understand the nature of our everyday mental representations.

Related Questions

For many of us, smartphones have become indispensable, but they have also come under fire
for their impact on the way we think and behave, especially among children. Two of the largest
investors in Apple Inc. are urging the iPhone maker to take action against smartphone addiction
among children over growing concerns about the negative effects of technology. An open letter
to Apple on January 6, 2018 from New York-based JANA Partners and the California State
Teachers’ Retirement System (CalSTRS) stated that the firm must do more to help children
fight smartphone addiction. These two shareholders together control about $2 billion in Apple
stock. The investors’ letter urged Apple to offer tools to prevent smartphone addiction and to
provide more parental options for monitoring children’s smartphone usage. The iOS operating
system for Apple smartphones and tablets already has limited parental controls for restricting
Examiners: Dr. Emmanuel Awuni and Dr. Acheampong Owusu Page 2 of 4
apps, features such as location sharing, and access to certain types of content. The investors
felt Apple needs to do more—for example, enable parents to specify the age of the user of the
phone during setup, establish limits on screen time, select hours of the day the phone can be
used, and block social media services.
The average American teenager who uses a smartphone receives his or her first phone at age
10 and spends over 4.5 hours a day on it (excluding texting and talking). Seventy-eight percent
of teens check their phones at least hourly and 50 percent report feeling “addicted” to their
phones. The investors’ letter cited a number of studies on the negative effects of heavy
smartphone and social media use on the mental and physical health of children whose brains
are still developing. These range from distractions in the classroom to a higher risk of suicide
and depression. A recent survey of over 2,300 teachers by them Center on Media and Child
Health and the University of Alberta found that 67 percent of the teachers reported that the
number of students who are negatively distracted by digital technologies in the classroom is
growing. Seventy-five percent of these teachers think students’ ability to focus on educational
tasks has decreased. Research by psychology professor Jean Twenge of San Diego State
University found that U.S. teenagers who spend 3 hours a day or more on electronic devices
are 35 percent more likely, and those who spend 5 hours, or more are 71 percent more likely,
to have a risk factor for suicide than those who spend less than 1 hour. This research also
showed that eighth-graders who are heavy users of social media have a 27 percent higher risk
of depression. Those who spend more than the average time playing sports, hanging out with
friends in person, or doing homework have a significantly lower risk. Additionally, teens who
spend 5 or more hours a day on electronic devices are 51 percent more likely to get less than 7
hours of sleep per night (versus the recommended 9).
Nicholas Carr, who has studied the impact of technology on business and culture, shares these
concerns. He has been highly critical of the Internet’s effect on cognition, and these cognitive
effects extend to smartphone use. Carr worries that excessive use of mobile devices diminishes
the capacity for concentration and contemplation. Carr recognizes that smartphones provide
many useful functions in a very handy form. However, this extraordinary usefulness gives them
too much influence on our attention, thinking, and behaviour. Smartphones shape our thoughts
in deep and complicated ways, and their effects persist even when we aren’t using the devices.
Research suggests that the intellect weakens as the brain grows dependent on the technology.
Carr points to the work of Adrian Ward, a cognitive psychologist and marketing professor at
the University of Texas at Austin, who for a decade has been studying how smartphones and
the Internet affect people’s thoughts and judgment. Ward has observed that using a smartphone,
or even hearing one ring or vibrate, produces distractions that make it harder to concentrate on
a difficult problem or job. Divided attention impedes reasoning and performance.
A study published in Applied Cognitive Psychology in April 2017 examined how smartphones
affected learning in a lecture class with 160 students at the University of Arkansas at
Monticello. It found that students who didn’t bring their phones to the classroom scored a full
letter-grade higher on a test of the material presented than those who brought their phones. It
didn’t matter whether students who brought their phones used them or not. A study of 91 U.K.
secondary schools, published in 2016 in the journal Labour Economics, found that when
schools ban smartphones, students’ examination scores go up substantially, and the weakest
students benefit the most. Carr also observes that using smartphones extensively can be
detrimental to social skills and relationships. Connecting with “friends” electronically via
smartphones is not a substitute for genuine person-to-person relationships and face-to-face
conversations.

rubyarmadillo521

QUESTION 26

Age 65 has come to be considered the onset of old age in the U.S. because:

	a.	This is when most older adults find their abilities diminishing
	b.	At age 65, physical appearance makes it evident that a person is old
	c.	This is the age identified in Social Security and Medicare at the time these were enacted
	d.	This is the age at which life expectancy diminishes most rapidly

1 points

QUESTION 27

The concept of "dependency ratios" has been criticized because:

		Individual differences in needs as well as differences in aging and activity choices make it difficult to ascertain which generation depends on which other generations.
		Very few older adults ever rely on younger individuals for support and assistance
		The most dependent generation may well be young adults
		It is common knowledge that older adults are dependent on younger individuals

1 points

QUESTION 28

Which of the following is the most accurate statement about the purpose of theory in understanding aging?

	a.	Theories attempt to explai what we observe in empirical research or practice
	b.	A goal is to consolidate practice around a simple set of principles
	c.	Theories resolve disputes about the nature of reality and definitions of aging
	d.	The most important purpose is to reduce apparently complex phenomena to a few basic factors

1 points

QUESTION 29

Explanations that focus on the situations and problems that accumulate during the life span and cannot be understood separate from developmental experiences are considered to reflect:

	a.	The aged
	b.	Aging
	c.	Age
	d.	The meaning of life

1 points

QUESTION 30

Early theories of aging, described later life as a:

	a.	Problem
	b.	normal, welcomed stage of life
	c.	rare and unique process
	d.	Too idiosyncratic for generalized description

1 points

QUESTION 31

Theories that explain aging as resulting from the accumulation of "insults" from the environment, which eventually reach a level incompatible with life are labeled:

	a.	Sociocultural theories
	b.	Selective optimization with compensation
	c.	Model of Human Occupation
	d.	Stochastic theories

1 points

QUESTION 32

Psychological theories of aging seek to explain

	a.	Reasons for the emergence of mental disorders in late life
	b.	Why older individuals are likely to be pessimistic
	c.	Relationships among older and younger individuals
	d.	The multiple changes in individual behavior in late life

1 points

QUESTION 33

It is now believed that neurological theories of aging that focus on decline in neurological functioning may be:

	a.	Too optimistic
	b.	Lacking in clarity
	c.	Too pessimistic
	d.	Too limited

1 points

QUESTION 34

In the theory of Selective Optimization with Compensation, "optimization" refers to the idea that:

	a.	People engage in behaviors that augment or enrich their general reserves and maximize their chosen life courses
	b.	People make efforts in middle age to accumulate needed resources to ensure successful aging
	c.	Changing biological and psychological factors that enhance the abilities of older adults in memory and problem solving
	d.	Political initiatives that reduce stigma associated with later life

1 points

QUESTION 35

Mrs. Adams, an 87 year-old widow, has begun to distance herself from some of her extended family members. At the same time, she spends increasing time with her adult children, grandchildren, and some of her close neighbors. This would be an example of:

	a.	The Model of Human Occupation
	b.	Evolutionary Theory
	c.	Cognition and Aging theories
	d.	Socioemotional Selectivity Theory

1 points

QUESTION 36

A theory of particular relevance to occupational and physical therapy is:

	a.	Theory of Free Radicals
	b.	Systems theory of motor control
	c.	Stochastic theories
	d.

1 points

QUESTION 37

Theory is important to therapeutic decisions as a way to:

	a.	Reduce the therapist's need to address individual differences
	b.	Guide decisions about evaluation and intervention
	c.	Minimize the idea of complexity in understanding older adults
	d.	Clearly identify the specific evaluation instruments to be used

PSY1EFP Lecture Notes - Lecture 10: Representativeness Heuristic, Availability Heuristic, Sunscreen

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