Psychology 361— Chapter 9: What to study

p. 366: What is the computer metaphor for human thought? (4 similarities are mentioned.) p. 367: What are the limitations on human information processing?

p. 367: What is meant by information processing? (Note the 5 italicized terms on p. 367-368). Define Microgenetic analysis. This is important because it is touted as a key contrast with Piaget.

p. 368-370: Information Processing models: See Figure 9-1 and know the terms multistore model, sensory register long-term and short-term memory. Figure 9-2 shows developmental changes in a key component of the model--working memory. What is the Executive Control Process?

p. 370: Connectionist models: Note that they applied to areas of learning and concept formation. For example, when a child sees a ball, this would trigger a variety of associations depending on past associations with balls. These associations are maintained in neural networks, so the theory is regarded as biological, but note that the associations a child has depends on it's experiences.

p. 370: Neo-Piagetian models. Robbie Case's model. Note that stages are not dead. Define Executive Control Structure (basically the same as Executive Control Process in Figure 9-1). What are its three components? Take a look at Table 9-1 but don't try to memorize it. This is basically a re-working of Piaget's stages in terms of executive control structures.

 pp. 372-373: Information handling processes. Understand encoding, mental representation (including script), strategies (including the example of the count-all and the min rule strategies; what's the advantage of the min rule?); automatization (be able to give an example from learning to drive a car), and generalization.

p. 373: What are executive control processes? Notice the active verbs (direct, choose, decide, select) in this section.

pp. 374 and Figure 9-3: Knowledge affects memory. Know the study by Chi on memory for chess positions.

p. 375: Distinguish perception from attention.

p. 375-376: Be able to distinguish enrichment theory of differentiation theory. What is an invariant? (Give an example.) Know what affordances are.

p. 377: Note the developmental changes in ability to sustain attention. What were the results of Ruff and Rothbart (1996) mentioned on p. 377? What point does Figure 9-5 on p. 378 make? (Seems counter-intuitive.)

p. 378: What is selective attention?  

p. 380: What were the results of the Davidson (1996) research? (See also Figure 9-7 and discussion of it on p. 381). How did the study illustrate one of Vygotsky's principles?

p. 382: What were the results of Vurpillot’s research on planfulness? How did Miller and Aloise-Young (1995) alter these results? (Again, we see the Vygotsky influence.)

p. 384: What three aspects of memory improve with age? We focus on the first of these: basic processes which are broken down into memory span, processing efficiency, and processing speed.
pp. 384: Memory span increases with age, but are we sure that it's because of a change in capacity? What is chunking?

p. 385: Under processing efficiency what are executive processing space, operating space and short-term storage space? How does the amount of space given over to operating space and storage space change with development (see Figure 9-9). What two factors does Case propose as increasing children’s processing capacity as they get older? What process in the brain is thought to be responsible for the effects of biological maturation on processing efficiency?

p. 386: Processing speed: Describe Kail’s work. What is global about processing speed as a basic process? (This is related to the material on general intelligence in Ch. 11.) Note that similar changes in processing speed occur for very different tasks and is independent of practice. The phenomenon also occurs in other cultures, and is linked to indexes of physical maturation, again suggesting a biological basis for this ability.

pp. 386-390: Know the definitions of Rehearsal, Organization, and Elaboration, mediational deficiency, production deficiency, and utilization deficiency. (The difference between production deficiency and utilization deficiency is subtle.) Which one of these last three deficiencies is not supported by the data?

p. 392, Box 9-1: How do researchers study children’s suggestibility? (1st para.) Be able to describe the “Simon says” study by Ceci and colleagues. What happened in the “Sam Stone” study?

Note that people tend to discount and distrust children’s testimony even though they think they are trying to tell the truth. What happens when an “intimidating and forceful” person does the interviewing compared to a kind and supportive interviewer?

p. 395: Rule-based problem solving:  Understand the balance beam problem (see also Fig. 9-12).  Note that there is a progression where older children are more likely to use more advanced rules. p. 396: How does the discussion relate to Figure 1-1c on p. 7?

p. 402: In the DeLoache work, why did the younger children have a hard time finding the doll in the model of the room? What procedure helped the younger children, and, according to DeLoache, why was it effective? Why would this research suggest that using anatomically correct dolls in cases of sexual abuse may not be effective?

p. 405: Why  do we say that the child whose counting is described in the third paragraph has a basic competence with numbers? In the Saxe (1979) research, what is the relation between conservation of number and counting? (This implies that you understand conservation of number.)

p. 407: Define metacognition. What are the basic developmental changes in metacognition?

Box 9-2: How does the Chinese language facilitate counting and arithmetic compared to English?