Thinking or Cognition begins with three basic building blocks--mental images, concepts, and language. When we think we may get a mental picture in our head. along with a concept or category it can be placed in and finally some linguistic statement .
Mental Images: The mind's representation of a sensory experience, including visual, auditory, gustatory, motor, olfactory, and tactile elements.
Concepts: mental categories used to class together objects, relations, events, abstractions or qualities where they have common properties. We also form concepts for ideas, such as love, intelligence,or insanity. They simplify and organize the world for us. Piaget refered to concepts as schemas. Schemas, like concepts are used to class things together that have common properties. Much of thinking has to do with categorizing new concepts (accommodation) and manipulating relationships among concepts (assimmilation).
A prototype is an example that best matches the essential features of a category. They are good examples of a category. They are normally acquired through experience in humans. Ex. Which best describes a fish? sea horse or shark
An exemplar is a specific example. Many simple prototypes are explained or taught by this means.
Problem Solving: One tribute to mankind is our ability to form and use concepts. Another is our skill to solve problems.
The three techniques for solving problems:
Algorithms- a specific procedure for solving a type of problem that works every time used correctly. Systematic radnom search is a specific type of algorithm in which each possible solution is tested according to a set of rules.
Heuristic- a "rule of thumb" approach to solving problems that work most of the time. a) Means-end analysis is a specific type of heuristic where we try to solve alem by evaluating the difference between the goal and our current situation and then lessening the difference between the two. Represenativeness heuristic is where people make (snap) judgements about samples according to the populations they appear to represent (stereotypes and genearalizations). Availability heuristic is our estimates of frequency/probability of events is based on the easy availability of examples.
Analogies- a partial similarity among things that are different in other ways. Analogy heuristic refers to an earlier problem and apply that solution to a new problem (try what worked befor...)
Factors that affect problem solving
Expertise: practice and familiarity with the type of problem reduces solution time
Mental Set: solving a problem with an approach that was successful with a similar problem (the approach becomes a mental set of steps to solve the problem...but we can be fooled!)
Insight: aHa! a seemingly sudden perception of relationships in a new perceptual field, when actually it is the result of mental trial and error.
Cognitive Maps: mental representations or pictures of elements in a learning situation that allows for problem solving.
