Sean Kim

Chapter 9: Thinking and Language

Thinking
Concepts

cognition
: all mental activities associated thinking, knowing, remembering, and
communicating
concept
: mental grouping of similar objects, events, ideas, or people
prototype
: mental image or best example of a category
move away from prototypes, and category boundaries may blur

Problem Solving: Strategies and Obstacles

algorithm
: methodical, logical rule or procedure that guarantees solving a particular
problem
heuristics
: simple thinking strategy that often allows to make judgments and solve
problems efficiently, speedier but error prone
insight
: sudden realization of a problems solution
confirmation bias
: tendency to search for info that supports our preconceptions
fixation: inability to see problem from fresh perspective
mental set
: tendency to approach a problem in one particular way, often a way that has
been successful in the past
perceptual set predisposes what we perceive

Forming Good and Bad Decisions and Judgements

intuition
: effortless, immediate, automatic feeling or thought, contrasted with explicit,
conscious reasoning
The Availability Heuristic
availability heuristic
: estimating the likelihood of events based on their availability in
memory, if instances come readily to mind, we assume they are common
we fear the wrong things that are unlikely to happen
Overconfidence
overconfidence
: tendency to be more confident than correct, overestimate accuracy of
our beliefs
can feed extreme political views
can have adaptive value, overconfident people seem to be happier
Belief Perseverance
belief perseverance
: clinging to ones initial conceptions after basis on which they
were formed is discredited
to rein in belief perseverance, consider the opposite
The Effects of Framing
framing
; the way an issue is posed; how an issue is framed can significantly affect
decisions and judgments
those who understand the power of framing can use it to nudge our decisions

The Perils and Powers of Intuition

intuition is analysis frozen into habit
intuition is usually adaptive, enabling quick reactions
intuition is huge
our mind harmonizes critical thinking with creative whispers of unseen mind

Thinking Creatively

creativity
: ability to produce new and valuable ideas
aptitude: ability to learn
convergent thinking
: narrowing the available problem solutions to determine the
single best solution
divergent thinking
: expanding the number of possible problem solutions, creative
thinking that diverges in different directions
five components of creativity:
Expertise, Imaginative thinking skills, A
venturesome personality, Intrinsic motivation, A creative environment

Do Other Species Share Our Cognitive Skills?

Using Concepts and Numbers
pigeons can sort objects into concepts
great apes can do even better
Displaying Insight
apes and birds have shown to display insight
Using Tools and Transmitting Culture
many other species invent behaviors and transmit cultural patterns to their peers and
offspring
Other Cognitive Skills
great apes demonstrate self-awareness
elephants can discriminate between themselves

Language and Thought

language
: our spoken, written, or signed words and the ways we combine them to
communicate meaning

Language Structure

phenomes
: in a language, the smallest distinctive sound unit
morpheme
: smallest unit that carries meaning, may be a word or a part of a word
(prefix)
grammar
: system of rules that enables us to communicate with and understand others,
semantics is set of rules for deriving meaning from sounds, syntax is set of rules for
combining words into grammatically correct sentences

Language Development
humans have astonishing facility for learning language
When Do We Learn Language?
Receptive Language
childrens language development moves from simplicity to complexity
past 7 months, babies learn to segment spoken sounds into individual words

Productive Language
babbling stage
: beginning at 4 months, the stage of speech development in
which infant spontaneously utters various sounds at first unrelated to household
language
one-word stage
: age 1-2, child speaks mostly in single words
two-word stage
: beginning at age 2, child speaks in 2 word segments
telegraphic speech
: child speaks like a telegram, mostly nouns and verbs
Explaining Language Development
universal grammar: basic elements of language that all share
we are not born with a built-in specific language
Statistical Learning
when adults listen to unfamiliar language, syllables run together, not so with
infants
7month olds can learn simple sentence structure
Critical Periods
childhood represents critical period for mastering certain aspects of language
before language-learning window closes
Deafness and Language Development
deaf people who learn to sign late do not have a strong a grasp of language as people who
learn earlier
cochlear implants are an option for deaf children
deafness can be considered vision enhancement
Living in a Silent World
360 live with disabling hearing loss
school is difficult for these people if they are students
older people use more brainpower in hearing words

The Brain and Language

aphasia
: impairment of language, usually caused by left hemisphere damage either to
Brocas or Wernickes area
Brocas area
: control language expression, area of frontal lobe
Wernickes area
: controls language reception, involved in language comprehension
and expression, usually in left temporal lobe
in processing language, brain operates by dividing mental function into subfunctions

Do Other Species Have Language?

humans have longed proclaimed that language sets us apart

animals display impressive comprehension and communication
if definition of language is verbal or signed expression of complex grammar, only
humans can do it
if language means simple communication, apes can do it too

Thinking and Language

Language Influences Thinking

linguistic determinism
: Whorfs hypothesis that language determines the way we
think
bilingual individuals have different sense of self
words may not determine what we think, but they influence our thinking
expanding language is expanding ability to think
bilingual advantage is ability to inhibit their attention to irrelevant info
Thinking in Images
we often think in images
watching activity will activate brains internal simulation of a skill
its better to spend fantasy time planning how to get somewhere than to dwell on
imagined destination
thinking affects our language, which then affects our thought