Questions tagged [cognitive-psychology]
For questions focusing on the interaction of many internal mental processes. If your question involves only one of memory, attention, language, decision-making, or perception then use the associated specialized tag instead of cognitive-psychology.
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Why aren't sleep measures consistently measured as mediators/moderators of cognitive performance?
Knowing that sleep quantity and quality affects cognitive performance across many domains, why aren't pre-test sleep measures or intra-test measures of arousal a standard part of all cognitive test ...
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When is higher confidence predictive of less accuracy?
Normally, when an individual is more confident in a particular response (e.g., memory decision, general knowledge answer), he or she is also more likely to be accurate. There are also studies in which ...
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How does the brain act on the information gained via eye saccades?
I've often heard that the process of saccading can be described as a statistical sampling technique. Specifically, the standard textbook definition of the function of saccades seems to be that the ...
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How can I find open access journals for cognitive science research?
What open access journals that publish research in cognitive science/psychology exist?
Apart from PLOS ONE, are there any other open access journals that publish research in cognitive science/...
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Any attempts at testing or modeling the 'cognitive conception' of language?
For those unfamiliar, the 'cognitive conception of language' refers to a claim made by some theorists that, in the words of Carruthers:
"besides its obvious communicative functions, language ...
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Is it possible to create a false memory by trying to remember something that eludes you?
Sometimes I have difficulty remembering the specifics of an event, specifically if I'm tired or possibly have recently consumed alcohol. A close friend of mine has gotten me in the habit of ...
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Are there any laws of memory?
Several years ago, my adviser wrote an article discussing the observation that a hundred years of studying memory had not resulted in the discovery of a "law" of memory. He wrote (p. 247):
When one ...
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What can cognitive psychology tell us about the results of the Stanford Prison Experiment?
One of the experiments that are always taught as prime examples of social psychology in action is the Stanford Prison Experiment
In 1971, Zimbardo accepted a tenured position as professor of ...
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What causes systematic under- or over-estimation of general knowledge quantities?
What psychological theories predict whether individuals will underestimate or overestimate when responding to particular kinds of general knowledge quantity questions?
For instance, I have seen an ...
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Obey any command given suddenly, as in the Jumping Frenchmen of Maine [closed]
There is behaviour I'm looking for information about, below are two examples of this behaviour, although the 2nd example is from fiction.
The first example is featured on the TV show QI, "Jumping ...
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Bias by which we tend to accept vague descriptions of ourselves
There's an effective strategy employed by horoscopes and "psychics" where they say vague statements like "You like being with friends but you value your time alone"; statements that basically "cover ...
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Why do some people seem to disregard the choice of doing nothing (The Zero Choice)?
In many areas of life we have a choice between multiple options: if we are hungry and we want to go out to eat, we have a number of places to choose from (McDonalds, etc). However, we also still have ...
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What processes underlies confidence ratings in cognitive decision-making?
Many experiments in cognitive psychology and other domains ask for confidence ratings (e.g., on a 0-100 scale, 100 meaning "I'm sure I experienced this stimulus"). What accounts describe how these ...
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Why are people inclined to praise or fear the unknown?
Human beings are inclined to "praise" the unknown, and are often afraid of the unknown. This inclination has led to the creation of mythology and many gods. To this date we are still carrying this ...
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By learning to read and write upside down, what did I do to myself?
If you've ever read Encyclopedia Brown books, you'll be familiar with the backwards writing in the back of the book that explains the solution to the case.
When I was in my mid-late teens (I don't ...
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Has the neuro-linguistic programming visual model been scientifically tested?
According to the NLP visual model, fast flickers of the eyes in left/right and the 4 diagonal directions map to simple cues related to how a person is thinking. Thease are "visual constructed", "...
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Cognitive explanation of why beta blockers are effective for anxiety
Beta blockers essentially reduce physical effects of anxiety and panic disorder, but there is no proof that there is a direct effect on anxiety. Some scientists believe there is an indirect effect.
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user26
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What are the current suggested models for Primacy Effect in memory recall or personality impression?
What are the current suggested normative, mechanistic or phenomenological models for explaining primacy effect as was observed by Solomon Asch (1946) on personality impression, list-of-words memory ...
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Does evidence support Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs?
Maslow's Heirarchy of Needs (shown below) is a popular concept and is often taught in basic psychology courses, and often less objectively taught in Business and Marketing courses.
A common problem ...
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What are the "Must Know" papers of Cognitive Science? [closed]
What are the works/papers/results/theories any expert in cognitive science should know, even if they're outside his/her specific field of expertise?
One paper/theory per answer please, and state why ...
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What term describes people that cannot feel pain?
I remember a case study about a girl who could not feel pain due to lacking certain somatosensory receptors; she went on to burn herself on a radiator because she could not feel her flesh burning and ...
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What is the difference between solving a problem and acquiring a skill?
Within the confines of cognitive psychology, what is the difference between these two tasks? In the literature, playing chess is generally seen as the exemplar of problem solving. But recently (thanks ...
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Motivation vs Goal Oriented Behavior
What's the difference between these two terms when used in the context of cognitive psychology? To the best of my knowledge, research on 'Goal Oriented Behavior' refers to the subset of motivation ...
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Why do you sometimes write down one word while actually intending to write another?
I've caught myself writing (typing) "possible" instead of "possibly" a few times over the past few days, while I do intend to write "possibly". Only upon rereading the sentence I notice my mistake.
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Is Behaviorism incompatible with Cognitive Psychology?
Both disciplines have historically been at each other's throats, and Radical Behaviorists like B.F. Skinner often completely reject cognitive psychology at a philosophical level.
It seems that today ...
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Why is recognition easier than recall?
The main ways of memory retrieval are recognition and recall.
Why has it been found that recognition is "easier" to perform, meaning it is usually faster or is more likely to yield an accurate ...
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Do children show top-down processing as much as adults do?
There has been much research into how top-down processing works, such as the suggestibility of patients to mishear lyrics based on what the patients are told they are.
Is there any research to show ...
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How is a young child able to learn language so easily?
It's a well known fact that the earlier children are exposed to languages the better, as young children have a better ability to learn new languages than adults.
Why is this?
At what age does a ...
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Does writing something down help memorize it?
This is a question inspired by this recent question on the Chinese Language & Usage website.
Someone asked why they needed to learn how to write Chinese characters, since today we mostly use ...
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Beyond a certain level, is reading comprehension affected more by psychological intuition than by verbal intelligence?
Certainly, you have reading comprehension passages on the SAT, GRE, and LSAT. But beyond that point, is it really possible to measure reading comprehension through multiple-choice tests? There are ...
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