Cognitive Psychology: Perception and Memory - Research Paper Example

? Psychology: Perception and Memory Thesis ment This paper aims at investigating the importance of perception theory and hence underlines its major roles in the current situation. Question 1 Introduction According to Larsen (1989), perception is a discipline which involves human and animal physical senses such as taste, preconception, touch, smell, sight and hearing to understand and represent the surrounding. It involves transmission of signals in nervous system thus is as a result of physical stimulations of sense organs. For instance, when light strike the eye retina causes an individual to see using the eye, the hearing sensation is triggered by waves of pressure. Perception is shaped by learning, expectation and memory hence making this theory an active signal of passive receipts which involves both the bottom up and top-down effects of sensory inputs. The top down process is mainly used in building the higher information levels such as shapes of objects and recognition processes. While the bottom up processes include the individual’s conceptual and expectation for example knowledge which plays a major role in perception influence. Perception takes place subjectively in a most effortless process outside conscious know how hence its dependency on the complex functionality of nerve organisms. Understanding of perception amongst psychologist since the growing of experimental psychology in 19th century has given rise to various techniques like psychophysics which is a measure of perception effect under physical qualities of inputs. This discipline can also be studied in terms of information processes computationally. The extend by which sensory qualities for examples smell, sound and color existing in objective reality are some of the philosophical issues of perceptual rather than in mind of the individual. Although viewed as passive receptors traditionally, the study of ambiguous images and illusions shows that brain’s system attempts to make sense active and preconscious to their inputs. Perception is still viewed as hypothesis testing in various debates with respect to active process. Even though sensory information is not complete and varies rapidly, the brain perceptual system enables an individual perceives the world around as stable. This is because most human beings and animals brains are made in a modular manner with many processing area of sensory information. Some are believed to have maps as forms of sensory modules to help in mapping world across the brain surface. The modules are connected and influenced by each other for example the taste is much influenced by the odor. Psychologists such as Aristotle has proposed common sense over 2000 years past to explain how human beings and animals perceive qualities which are common but different in sense such as form, number and unity. Philosophers such as George Berkeley and Locke over centuries later have proposed that human beings need to assimilate information across different sensory channels before they perceive it as the output for example the ringing bell to be differentiated from light and sound. By doing this, it depicts that the brain is able to pose the binding perception problem to help in the construction of coherent world of information. This critical thinking of perception has dominated in the 20th century which included Piglet’s cognitive theory of development. According to Horry & Wright (2009), this psychologist argued that, assimilation takes place gradually over a period of time as an individual grows and develop in the first few years as they interact with objects and coordinate information in their sensory organs. Young children are taught how to perceive information by their parents prior to assimilation through unrelated sounds, sights, tactile impressions and smell just as the buzzing confusion as Piaget’s theory was described by William in 1890. In the ecological perception The Sense Considered as Perceptual System published by James Gibson in 1966 he talked much about cognitive development of infants after it was explained by Piaget hence he addressed the arising questions about perception in length. Gibson says that human sense organs work hand in hand as a system hence existence of these sensory organs are advantage to perception rather than simulation disadvantage in incorporated events and objects. He said so after studying human beings as creatures that do not tie themselves to one sense modality of information which is redundant or the same across the senses for example rhythm, duration, intensity change and spatial location which is common to audiovisual happenings, substance, shape, size and visual tactile events because all these takes place in space and given time to provide information that seem modal. In contrast to Gibson view on Piglet's theory of development, it holds that there is integration which holds that at birth, there is differentiation of senses he further claims that at birth the senses are separated and characterized by perceptual change of development which takes place gradually in an individual. This continues at a finer level of stimulation in the sensory organs. This best describe why at this stage there is no buzzing confusion at the early development a view accepted by most of the psychologists. Infants therefore detect general features of cohesive multimodal happenings from the time of their birth and thus learn the act of perception in a more complex and subtle differentiations through listening, looking and social interaction with their surroundings. Modal information detection among many infants is depicted as temporal synchrony in that between the sounds and sights, the unified multimodal happening provides the bond that brings together information across the sensory organ and serves as the outcome solution to the old age problem of binding. For instance, when the sense detects the synchrony, tempo and rhythm which are common to sight, tactile and sound from a clapping hand, the senses of human beings attends to all the happenings other than separating sounds, sight and the tactile stimulation. In a situation whereby modal information is available concurrently and synchronized more than one across the sense modality then it is referred to as the intersensory redundancy. This process is said to be more salient to human beings than animals according to researchers. For instant, when an infant concentrates much on any event in a social simulation of many species, it results into a higher degree of intersensory redundancy provided since there is providence from the social partner. This also explains the multimodal processes of the infant since it highlights urinary modality happenings besides properties of these modal at the expense figured out on the effects. This is also evident when a young child is able to differentiate voice and faces of different persons speaking to them through modality specify which is characterized by pitch or face and timbre of their voices. When redundancy is not available, for example when the person is silent and still, the young child therefore explores the non redundant specific modality aspect like appearance of the person in contrast to social simulation. Significantly, modal information and redundant plays a major role in guiding and holding back which sides to happenings selectively attended to at the early age of development when concentration is not that flexible and its capacity is limited. At a later stage when concentration is flexible enough and efficient, then human can attend to all the properties of modality besides other specific properties of the like happenings in a short while. Moreover, since selective concentration gives the basis of what to be perceived learned and stored for remembrance, thee powerful organization of intersensory redundancy influences early perceptual, social, emotional development and cognitive. The mind eye also plays a major role to enable individuals have shift of percept in case of visual perception. While for those who do not think much on what they have seen from photos do not see any change in the world since their shape shift is poor or undeveloped. This is more evident in everyday life situation more so in camouflage and technology. For animals such as birds do have confusing vagueness in perception for example most birds are not able to notice the European peacock butterfly when it lands on the tree since it copies or mimicries the surrounding. Human beings also suffer from this ambiguity but a smaller number compared to animals. This ambiguity helps the insects as a defensive device from prays. This study of perception has given rise to different disciplines under thoughts of psychology namely; Gestalt psychology through holistic emphasis on its approach. Question 2 Psychology: Memory Researchers have carried out assess to establish hypothetical structures to account for different phenomenon in the field of psychology such as memory models, memory and perception. The memory is depicted to have two different units of activation namely; temporary for short time storage and permanent storage where information is stored for later references. The memory storage organs are organized in a way that an individual can access information directly from the sensory codes besides interpreting the events automatically without thinking much on that particular happening on if the information has been stored into the permanent storage. Hence paves way for memory organs to direct the intended meaning in a momentary psychological pertinence. The information given out during this process is therefore delivered as an output to the audience thus considered valid only after originally it has posed questions to the memory. This process of memory model is as a result of level of criticism in the storage model. Memory is a product of inner process of information according to the great psychologists which showed a clear difference between the long and short term memory. According to James William a psychologist in the in 1890, he defined memory as concentration and focus of consciousness of human beings through the process of withdrawing some things to deal with most important. He therefore described it as a process which is far different from opposite of confusion. Titchner later defined memory as a state of the sensory clearness with a marginal and focal point. In that it is an aspect of related amount of consciousness effort exerted to focus on aspects of value relative to experience. Eder & Spohn (2005) asserts that, memory history can be traced back from 1850 to 1900 during the time of William James. During this time of the year, memory was mainly used as introspection before 1885 when Donders Franciscus employed the use of mental chronometry in the study of this discipline hence becomes the major intellectual field of inquiry in a diverse consideration by Sigmund Freud, Max Nordau and Benjamin Walter. There major focal point during the study of memory was to whether an individual was able to attend to more than one thing. Walter in the process of study described this practice as a state of reception distraction. The group of thinkers later came into conclusion that this was not possible in that an individual’s ability to focus is only directed to one thing at a time not unless in experiment. As the field of memory becomes relatively inactive from 1900 to 1950, behaviorism comes in as psychological paradigm because of its dominance. Behaviorism became rooted in a positive manner in that the epistemology to discard the study and making of supposition about processes that is seen directly such as gravitational force in the field of physics and cognition. Memory is believed to be a form of behavior that is purely understood in an objective analysis of experiment and thus not as a subject to cognitive processes. By 1950s to present year, the study of memory was referred to as cognitive revolution because researchers renewed their curiosity in memory when the prevailing epistemology shifted from positivism to pragmatism. This period of study admitted that memory was unobservable cognitive process legitimated to objects of systematic study this was after performed experiment by Cherry Colin and Donald Broadbent to determine the listening dichotic in human beings and other animals. This explained why their subject was only able to listen to one stream of sound from the headphone after subjecting two different sets of ear headphone to their subject. At the end of the experiment which was typically carried out, they asked the subjects questions of which it was clear that the subject had selectively attended to one stream of sound from the headphone. This was the period when debate’s major motion was to determine between the early selection and late models of selection and it was decided that the early the selection the faster the memory and hence analysis of the mind to attend to. Even though this point was reached, still many arguments have not been resolved on to how the later model was not attended to thus the ear consciously accessed the sound in the process. In the latest research according to Robinson (1994) article, it is shown that memory maintains its stand as the major area of concern within neuroscience and psychology. From major debates by James William time of has not been resolved for memory and analysis of information by an individual for instance, most scientist believe memory can be divided contrary to strong proof which stays elusive. This also explains why there is not universal acceptance of definition of memory which is more concrete besides that given on James’ quote about memory. Hence lack of clear progress has forced observers to hypothesize that memory refers to many different processes without a general mechanism. Areas of investigation to determine effects of signal on sensory neurons and their relationship between other cognitive processes such as memory has resulted into a turning properties and the outcome shows that flies do have neurological properties just as human beings and that they are able to attend to different signals. Status is believed to differentiate memory in overt verse covert. Overt memory refers to the process of directing the sensory organs towards a given source of stimuli. While covert refers to the mental focus to a one part of sense panorama. Mechanism of covert and overt memory in most studies suggest that they are separate from the recent believes. Only primates and human beings have the ability to attend to stimuli as the look at the other event through a neutral circuitry which link covert memory to change direction of stimuli. This is explains why human beings are able to move their eyes in different directions and at the same time attend to active result. Memory is affected by other mechanism such as movement, size, and change of stimulus, novelty, habit interest and frequency. This is because when the there are unnecessary movement as when an individual is attending to a particular event this distracts one’s memory to a particular stimuli. To maintain a coherent neural memory, the stimulus should remain the same from the starting point so as to obtain a constant feedback expected. In most life situation, people lose tangible information because of these factors which affect memory (Davis & Schwartz,1978). Memory has various characteristics which enhances its perception unlike perception theory which depends much on the cognitive theory. Memory depends on the perceived event to give a valid outcome intended by the subject or administrator. For instance when an individual is watch football match all other stimuli remain constant until after the concentration is over. This is evident in life in that one may fee hungry as the game continues but ignores the stomach reaction and pay much memory to the first selection and consider the late selection minor. After the game, the marginal focus shifts to concentrate to another event and that is where one starts feeling the pangs of hunger. Just as perception, the sensory organs act dimly on the vague event in the presence of active event. This is all as a result of cognitive theory of development. In conclusion, both perception and memory depends on one way or other on cognitive theory of development as argued by psychologists in their fields of study. Perception plays a major role to output correct information to the subject through memory. It is therefore advisable for parents and concerned people to help the infants develop these fundamental principles of development fully for a later benefit. This help boost one’s morale in whatever he or she is doing. When a child is attentive therefore the outcome perception of information becomes relevant to the field of study. Reference Robinson, H. (1994). Perception. London: Routledge. Eder, K., & Spohn, W. (2005). Collective memory and European identity: the effects of integration and enlargement. Aldershot, Hants, England: Ash gate Pub.. Larsen, S. (1989). Coping with procedures - how programming affects memory of actions. Risskov: Psykologisk Institut, Aarhus Universities. Mace, N. L., Mace, N. L., Rabins, P. V., & Rabins, P. V. (2006). The 36-hour day: a family guide to caring for people with Alzheimer disease, other dementias, and memory loss in later life (4th ed.). Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. Davis, P. J., & Schwartz, G. E. (1987). Repression And The Inaccessibility Of Affective Memories. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 52(1), 155-162. Horry, R., & Wright, D. B. (2009). Anxiety And Terrorism: Automatic Stereotypes Affect Visual Attention And Recognition Memory For White And Middle Eastern Faces. Applied Cognitive Psychology, 23(3), 345-357. Ruva, C. L., & McEvoy, C. (2008). Negative And Positive Pretrial Publicity Affect Juror Memory And Decision Making. Journal of experimental psychology: applied, 14(3), 226-235. Read More