PSYC 213 Lecture Notes - Lecture 2: Information Theory, Mental Chronometry, Information Processing

• School: McGill University
• Department: Psychology
• Course: PSYC 213
• Professor: Signy Sheldon

Document Summary

Information processing: not a theory but a view related to many other scientific fields: main idea: the world contains information for us to store and process, focuses on the process that transforms, store, recover sense and perceptions. The mind is a general purpose processing system that performs a series of specific computations: 2. Information: the most basic unit of information is a binary digit bit typically used in computer programming and allows us to make predictions about the functions of information in our environment. Increasing the number of lights participants had to name increased reaction time to correctly name the light: 2. Manipulated over trials the sequential probabilities of the lights: a. High sequential probability: a particular light is very likely to follow another particular light: b. Try to study it in the lab by slowly simplifying relevant factors of the observed behaviour: 3. Test if lab findings can predict and explain natural behaviour.