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Concepts and Knowledge Representation

47 important questions on Concepts and Knowledge Representation

How are concepts placed in the long term memory?

the long term memory consists of concepts placed in hierarchical structure, and relationships along these concepts.

What kind of concepts are used in higher mental activity, like problem solving and reaoning?

processing concepts.

How do we call the mental representation of sensory properties, and objects?

imagery.

What is the main problem with concepts?

all objects that belong in a concept should be equally representable, but in reality this s not the case, people thin an eagle is much more representable for the concept 'bird', than a pinguin.

How do we call the extend to which an object is representative for its category?

the typicality.

Describe the experiment by McCloskey and Glucksberg on the definitional approach to a concept.

the task of the subjects was to verify if pairs of sentences were true or not.
a possible pair could be;
An eagle is a bird and A chicken is a bird.

What were the results of the experiment by McCloskey and Glucksberg on the definitional approach to a concept?

the subjects were faster to answer the eagle question, compared to the chicken question.
this is because people don't see all objects as equally representable for the concepts.
this shows that concepts can't be approached as a strict definitional approach.

How do we call the tendency for members of a category to be similar to each other but without having characteristics in common?

family resemblance.

Describe the experiment by Rosch and Mervis on family resemblance.

subjects were given a set of categories, with a list of objects in each category.
the task was to give as many attributes to each object as possible.
the family resemblance was calculated by adding the amount of times an attribute of an object was also named in the lists of attributes from the other objects in the category.

What were the results of the experiment by Rosch and Mervis on family resemblance?

the object in the list with the highest score on family resemblance, was the prototype of this category
the family resemblance correlates with the typicality

In what forms can a prototype of a category occur?

as an actual object
as a mental representation of the average picture of the category, people don't actually once have seen the prototype.

How does categorization of prototypes work?

wether an object belongs in a category depends on the distance of that object to the prototype of the category.

What is the critique on the prototype theory?

some objects are closer to the prototype of another category than to their own category, hond en katten foto van likelihood principle
some categories don't have a prototype. art.

How do we call a category formed of items that are highly similar at an intermediate level in a concept hierarchy?

basic level categories.

How do we call theories that state that categories are represented purely by stored examples or instances and each example is linked to the category name.

exemplar theories.

What is the major difference between the prototype theory, and the exemplar theory?

the prototype theory sees categories as groups that should be equal to a prototype.
the exemplar theory explains categories with respect to the variability that can occur in a category.

How do we call categories for items that met a given goal?

Ad-hoc categories.

For what type of category is the family resemblance, and the typicality less clear?

ad-hoc categories.

Describe the experiment of Ahn on knowledge based categorization and causal knowledge.

Subjects had to learn a category and their attributes.
half of the subjects received only the category name, and the attributes
the other half received the causal chain relationships between the attributes
rooban eats fruits, therefor gets sticky feet, thus climbs tree to build nest.
after learning, the subject task was to determine wether a new object belonged in the category, an attribute was altered.

What were the results on the experiment of Ahn on knowledge based categorization and causal knowledge?

in the group without the causal knowledge it didn't matter which attribute was removed.
in the group who were presented a causal chain there was a clear difference in the importance of the attribute
the first attribute was the most important.

How do we call the theory that describes that all members of a category share a key property?

essentialism.

According to essentialism which broad three types of concepts are there?

nominal
natural
artefacts.

Which broad type of concept of essentialism is described; clearly defined, like odd numbers.

nominal

Which broad type of concept of essentialism is described; naturally occurring, animals, stones.

natural

Which broad type of concept of essentialism is described; human-made and designed items.

artefacts.

What kind of essential properties do the categories have?

functional
physical
molecular

What essential property makes an item in an artificial concept belong there?

functional properties.

How do we call representations that involve sensory en motor processes

grounded representations.

How do we call representations that are abstract and do not involve any sensory codes?

amodal representations.

How do we call the extended re-enactment of a previous experience?

simulation.

How do we call the partial repetition of the internal processes involved in previous perceptions or actions?

re-enactment.

Describe the experiment by Glenberg and Kaschak on grounded representations.

subjects were instructed to verify wether a sentence was correct or not.
verification was by either a pull movement of a handle, or a push movement.
sentences were either counter intuitive, or matching like i opened the drawer, i puched the door.

What were the results of the experiment by Glenberg and Kaschak on grounded representations?

sentences that matched movement were answered quicker.
shows that grounded representations exist with certain objects.

How do we call the replicating of actual experiences but which are less vivid, and more under a person's control?

imaginations, imagery

How do we call the mental manipulation of visual or spatial information?

visuo-spatial processing.

Describe the experiment by Brooks on imagery and visuo-spatial processing.

subjects were asked to imagine a capital letter F, and going around it clockwise.
if the subject arrived at a corner they had to report either verbally or by pointing yes or no, if the corner was at the bottom/top of the F or not.

What were the results of the experiment by Brooks on imagery and visuo-spatial processing?

subjects who had to report verbally there response was faster than subjects in the pointing group.
shows that visuo-spatial processing and imagery share mental and neural resources.

Describe the experiment by Baddeley and Andrade on imagery and visuo-spatial processing.

subjects in group 1 had to imagine a sound or an image and report how vivid it was.
group 2 had to imagine and report and at the same time tap a spatial pattern with their finger.
group 3 had to imagine and report and count repeatedly from 1 to 10.

What were the results on the experiment by Baddeley and Andrade on imagery and visuo-spatial processing?

the control group did the best of all the groups.
the tapping group did worse on image imagination than on sound imagination (doing worse is reporting lower vividness).
the counting group did worse on the sound imagination than on the image imagination.
so image imagination relies on the VSSP, and sound imagination relies on the phonological loop.

Describe the experiment by Reddi on imagery and visuo-spatial processing.

subjects were presented with images of food, tools, faces and houses while their brain activity was measured with fMRI.
other subject were asked to imagine these objects while being monitored as well.

Describe results of the experiment by Reddi on imagery and visuo-spatial processing.

researchers were able to predict the stimuli the subjects in the perceiving group were presented based on the similarities in fMRI images with the imagining group, and vice versa.
so imagining and actually perceiving share the same neural structures in the brain.

Which activities can you perform with imaginations?

scanning and rotating.

Describe the experiment by Kosslyn on mental rotating and scanning of an image.

participants were showed an image of a horse and were told to remember the image
the task was to focus on either the left or the right side.
they were asked to report wether there were ears present on the image.

Describe the experiment by Kosslyn on mental rotating and scanning of a map.

participants were showed a map with a few objects indicated on it.
task was to learn and remember the map
during test phase the task was to mentally travel from one point on the map to another and report when you arrived.

Describe results of the experiment by Kosslyn on mental rotating and scanning of a map

time to press increased linearly with the distance travelled.

Describe the experiment by Shepard and Metzler on scanning and rotation.

subjects were shown two images of what could be the same object but rotated.
task of the subjects was to tell if the objects on the images were the same through mental rotation.

Describe results of the experiment by Shepard and Metzler on scanning an

there was a correlation between the angle of rotation and the reaction time.
indicates that mental rotation is similar to actual rotation of a present object.
indicates that we treat mental representations of object the same as actual objects.

The question on the page originate from the summary of the following study material:

Cognitive Psychology | 9780077122669 | Gilhooly, et al

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