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Unit 7BThinking, Problem Solving, Creativity, and Language
Monday, November 18, 2013
Thinking: Concepts Cognition: the mental activities
associated with thinking, knowing, remembering, and communicating Studied by cognitive psychologists
Concepts: mental groupings of similar objects, events, ideas, or people helps simplify things Give us a lot of information with little
cognitive effort
Thinking: Concepts Example: Chair
Many different types—high chair, reclining chair, dentist chair—but it’s their common features—meant for sitting—that define the concept of chair
What would life be without concepts?
Thinking: Concepts To further simplify things, we organize
concepts into category hierarchies
Once we perceive something, we also identify it’s category
Thinking: Concepts Ways to form concepts:
By definition Example: told that a triangle has 3 sides =
classify all 3-sided geometric forms as triangles Developing prototypes (a mental image or
best example) Most common way of forming a concept The more closely something matches our
prototype of a concept, the more readily we recognize it as an example of the concept
Example: Picture a bird.
Which matches your prototype more?
Thinking: Concepts Once we place an item in a category,
our memory of it later shifts toward the category prototype Example: Shown an ethnically mixed face
(70% Asian, 30% Caucasian), people categorized the face as Asian but later recalled it being a more prototypically Asian face then it was (90% Asian rather than 70%)
Thinking: Concepts Concepts speed and guide thinking, but
don’t always make us wise Example:
Prototype of prejudice = white against black, male against female Prejudice that goes the other way is often
overlooked
Thinking: Solving Problems Strategies
1. Trial and error2. Algorithms—methodical, logical rules
or procedures that guarantee solving a particular problem
3. Heuristics—simple thinking strategies that often allow us to make judgments and solve problems efficiently
Thinking: Solving Problems Insight—a sudden and often novel
realization of the solution to a problem Contrasts with strategy-based solutions Some animals also use insight
Example: Sultan the chimpanzee http
://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fPz6uvIbWZE
Thinking: Solving Problems Brain Teasers
The maker doesn’t want it, the buyer doesn’t use it, and the user doesn’t see it. What is it?
A man left home one morning. He turned right and ran straight ahead. Then he turned left. after a while, He turned left again, running faster then ever. Then he turned left once more and decided to go home. In the distance he could see two masked men waiting for him. Who were they?
Thinking: Solving Problems Activity:
You have two minutes to come up with as many uses of a paper clip as you can.
Thinking: Solving Problems Activity results
You just took a creativity test Add up the total # of uses and divide by
two 4 is average, 8 is high
Thinking: Solving Problems Creativity—the ability to produce novel
and valuable ideas Not related to IQ
IQ tests measure convergent thinking Creativity tests measure divergent thinking
Thinking: Solving Problems Components of Creativity:
1. Expertise2. Imaginative thinking skills3. Venturesome personality4. Intrinsic motivation5. Creative environment
Thinking: Solving Problems Obstacles to Problem Solving
Confirmation bias—a tendency to search for information that supports our preconceptions and to ignore or distort contradictory evidence Example: WMD in Iraq
Fixation—the inability to see a problem from a new perspective, by employing a different mental set
Thinking: Solving Problems Examples of Fixation:
Mental set: a tendency to approach a problem in one particular way, often a way that has been successful in the past
Funcitonal fixedness—the tendency to think of things only in terms of their usual functions
Thinking: Solving Problems What are the final three letters in the
following sequence? O-T-T-F-?-?-?
Thinking: Solving Problems What are the last three letters in the
following sequence? J-F-M-A-?-?-?
Thinking: Making Decisions and Forming Judges Representaiveness heuristic—judging the
likelihood of things in terms of how well they seem to represent, or match, particular prototypes May lead us to ignore other relevant information
Availabilty heuristic—estimating the likelihood of events based on their availability in memory If instances come readily to mind, we presume
such events to be common
Thinking: Making Decisions and Forming Judges Which are you more afraid of: car
accident, being murdered, terrorist attack, or choking?
Thinking: Making Decisions and Forming Judges Overconfidence—the tendency to be
more confident than correct—to over-estimate the accuracy of our beliefs and judgments
Belief perserverance—clinging to one’s initial conceptions after the basis on which they were formed has been discredited
Thinking: Making Decisions and Forming Judges Intuition—an effortless, immediate,
automatic feeling or thought Usually enables us to react quickly and
adaptively
Thinking: Making Decisions and Forming Judges Framing—the way an issue is posed
Example: Which sounds more dangerous? 10% of people die while undergoing a
particular surgery 90% of people survive a particular surgery
Review http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bKTA
UcoKCLo
Exit Slip Answer the following questions. Put answers on
front table before you leave.1. Give an example of a concept.2. People are more concerned about a medical
procedure when told it has a 10% death rate than they are when told it has a 90% survival rate. What is this an example of?
3. What is the inability to see a problem from a fresh perspective called?
4. Why do people often underestimate the amount of time it will take to complete a project?