Split (1)

train · 25k rows

text stringlengths 13 991
Studies regarding mood have shown that positive and negative cues can influence global versus local attention during image-based tasks.
Some studies have shown that positive priming decreases local response time, demonstrating a lessening effect of global precedence, while negative priming increases local response time. Mood dictates one's preferences for processing type.
The result that negative priming reduces flexibility correlates to the Psi theory states that negative emotion inhibits one’s access to extension memory, reducing cognitive flexibility. This also supports the theory that positive affect increases cognitive flexibility.
Positive mood priming also increases cognitive flexibility when prime words do not have individualistic specificity and when primes are visual. Positive affect does not simply promote local processing, but rather improves one’s abilities in his non-preferred dimension. For example, one preferring the local aspect of stimuli would show increased performance in identifying the global aspect and vice versa. This further supports the cognitive flexibility theory.
Priming with Navon figures aides the recognition of faces, a holistic task, when the response elicited from the figure matches the precedence of the figure. For example, if the stimulus has local precedence and the participant is cued to respond with the local feature identification, his accuracy in facial recognition improves. The same occurs when global responses are asked of global stimuli.
When a facial task requires local processing for identification, participants’ facial recognition improves when they must respond to global precedence stimuli with local responses and vice versa. They are forced to show cognitive flexibility in their responses to the Navon figure primes.
One theory explains that normal facial recognition requires automatic processes, whereas special facial recognition requires controlled processes. Automatic processes are aided by correlative stimuli and responses, while controlled processes are aided by stimuli and responses that do not correlate. This indicates that facial recognition depends on type of attention, automatic or controlled, rather than focus on global or local features.
When identifying inverted faces, those showing stronger global precedence show a more prominent Those showing a stronger global precedence also have a greater deficit in identification abilities when the faces are inverted; their identification abilities decrease more from upright identification to inverted identification than weak global precedence individuals.
This correlates to the theory that upright faces are processed holistically, or with a special mechanism. Those with stronger global precedence should perform better at holistically processing a face upright. Stronger global precedence should show a greater decrease in accuracy of identification of inverted faces because the task relies on local processing.
The degree of global precedence one demonstrates has been found to differ in relation to the variable of an individual's field dependence.
Field dependency is the amount that one relies on Gestalt laws of perceptual organization. High field dependency corresponds to a greater bias toward the global level, while field independence corresponds to a lesser dependency on the global level.
This indicates that individual characteristics have an effect on the prevalence of global precedence and that global and local processing exist on a continuum.
Neuropsychological evidence based on PET scans suggests that the global aspect of visual situations activates and is processed preferentially by the right hemisphere, whereas the local aspect of visual situations activates and is processed preferentially by the left hemisphere. The classical view of Gestalt psychology also suggests the right hemisphere is involved in the perception of wholes and thus plays a stronger role in global processing, whereas the left hemisphere involves separate local elements and therefore plays a stronger role in local processing.
However, hemispheric specialization is relative because it depends on the experimental setting as well as the individual’s “attentional set.” In addition, stimulus type may influence the neural structures underlying hemispheric specialization. Global processing is the default strategy for most individuals, but local stimuli are often more perceptually demanding to recognize and identify, showing the effect of stimuli on visual processing.
The Navon figure has been used in relating theories regarding processing to assessing cognitive learning disabilities, such as developmental dyslexia, dyscalculia, obsessive-compulsive personality disorder, and autism.
When given a Navon figure test, people with dyslexia have difficulty automatically identifying graphemes with phonemes, but not with identifying numbers with magnitudes. On the other hand, people with dyscalculia have difficulty automatically identifying numbers with magnitudes, but not letters and with phonemes. This suggests a dissociation between subjects with dyslexia and dyscalculia. These developmental learning disabilities do not cause general problems with identifying symbols to their mental representations, but rather create specific challenges.
Obsessive-compulsive personality disorder (OCPD) subjects are prone to be distracted by the local aspects of stimuli when asked to identify global aspects of figures such as the Navon figure. This is likely because individuals with OCPD characteristically have sharp, detail-oriented attentions, and tend to focus more on specifics rather than the larger context.
There are correlations between global or local performance on a task and the abilities to identify emotion and canine age for autistic children. In both cases, global responses correlate to better identification. In general, autistic children demonstrate much weaker global precedence than those without the disorder. Within the group of autistic children, those who respond more globally to a discrimination task perform better on emotion and canine age tasks.
One explanation is a possible biological dysfunction in the brain region where facial processing occurs. Research indicates that global processing, facial recognition, and emotional expression recognition are all linked to the right hemisphere. A defect in that area would explain the characteristics of autism. For further information on facial recognition and processing in individuals with autism see the autism and facial recognition section of face perception.
A contrast effect is the enhancement or diminishment, relative to normal, of perception, cognition or related performance as a result of successive (immediately previous) or simultaneous exposure to a stimulus of lesser or greater value in the same dimension. (Here, normal perception, cognition or performance is that which would be obtained in the absence of the comparison stimulus—i.e., one based on all previous experience.)
Perception example: A neutral gray target will appear lighter or darker than it does in isolation when immediately preceded by, or simultaneously compared to, respectively, a dark gray or light gray target.
Cognition example: A person will appear more or less attractive than that person does in isolation when immediately preceded by, or simultaneously compared to, respectively, a less or more attractive person.
Performance example: A laboratory rat will work faster, or slower, during a stimulus predicting a given amount of reward when that stimulus and reward are immediately preceded by, or alternated with, respectively, different stimuli associated with either a lesser or greater amount of reward.
The oldest reference to simultaneous contrast in the scientific literature is by the hand of the 11th century physicist Ibn al-Haytham who describes spots of paint on a white background appearing almost black and conversely paler than their true colour on black:
He also describes that a leaf green paint may appear clearer and younger on dark blue and darker and older on yellow:
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe writes in 1810 that a grey image on a black background appears much brighter than the same on white. And Johannes Peter Müller notes the same in 1838 and also that a strip of grey on a brightly coloured field appears to be tinted ever so slightly in the contrasting colour.
The subject of the impact of the surrounding field on colour perception has been a subject of ongoing research since. It has been found that the size of the surrounding field has an impact, as does the separation between colour and surround, similarity of chromaticity, luminance difference and the structure of the surround.
There has been some debate over the degree to which simultaneous contrast is a physiological process caused by the connections of neurons in the visual cortex, or whether it is a psychological effect. Both appear to have some effect. A possible source of the effect are neurons in the V4 area that have inhibitory connections to neighboring cells. The most likely evolutionary rationale for this effect is that it enhances edges in the visual field, thus facilitating the recognition of shapes and objects.
Successive contrast occurs when the perception of currently viewed stimuli is modulated by previously viewed stimuli. In the example below you can use the scrollbar to quickly swap the red and green disks for two orange disks. Staring at the dot in the centre of one of the top two coloured disks and then looking at the dot in the centre of the corresponding lower disk makes the two lower disks briefly appear to have different colours, though in reality their colour is identical.
Metacontrast and paracontrast involve both time and space. When one half of a circle is lit for 10 milliseconds (ms), it is at its maximal intensity. If the other half is displayed at the same time (but 20–50 ms later), there is a mutual inhibition: the left side is darkened by the right half ("metacontrast"), and the center may be completely obliterated. At the same time, there is a slight darkening of the right side due to the first stimulus ("paracontrast").
The contrast effect was noted by the 17th century philosopher John Locke, who observed that lukewarm water can feel hot or cold depending on whether the hand touching it was previously in hot or cold water.
Imagination is the ability to produce and simulate novel objects, sensations, and ideas in the mind without any immediate input of the senses. It is also described as the forming of experiences in one's mind, which can be re-creations of past experiences such as vivid memories with imagined changes, or they can be completely invented and possibly fantastic scenes. Imagination helps make knowledge applicable in solving problems and is fundamental to integrating experience and the learning process. A basic training for imagination is listening to storytelling (narrative), in which the exactness of the chosen words is the fundamental factor to "evoke worlds".
Imagination, however, is not considered to be exclusively a cognitive activity because it is also linked to the body and place, particularly that it also involves setting up relationships with materials and people, precluding the sense that imagination is locked away in the head.
Imagination can also be expressed through stories such as fairy tales or fantasies. Children often use such narratives and pretend play in order to exercise their imaginations. When children develop fantasy they play at two levels: first, they use role playing to act out what they have developed with their imagination, and at the second level they play again with their make-believe situation by acting as if what they have developed is an actual reality.
The notion of a "mind's eye" goes back at least to Cicero's reference to mentis oculi during his discussion of the orator's appropriate use of simile.
In this discussion, Cicero observed that allusions to "the Syrtis of his patrimony" and "the Charybdis of his possessions" involved similes that were "too far-fetched"; and he advised the orator to, instead, just speak of "the rock" and "the gulf" (respectively) — on the grounds that "the eyes of the mind are more easily directed to those objects which we have seen, than to those which we have only heard".
The concept first appeared in English in Chaucer's (c.1387) Man of Law's Tale in his Canterbury Tales, where he tells us that one of the three men dwelling in a castle was blind, and could only see with "the eyes of his mind"; namely, those eyes "with which all men see after they have become blind".
The condition of not being able to internally visualize (the lack of a ”mind’s eye”) is called aphantasia.
The common use of the term is for the process of forming new images in the mind that have not been previously experienced with the help of what has been seen, heard, or felt before, or at least only partially or in different combinations. This could also be involved with thinking out possible or impossible outcomes of something or someone in life's abundant situations and experiences. Some typical examples follow:
Imagination, not being limited to the acquisition of exact knowledge by the requirements of practical necessity is largely free from objective restraints. The ability to imagine one's self in another person's place is very important to social relations and understanding. Albert Einstein said, "Imagination ... is more important than knowledge. Knowledge is limited. Imagination encircles the world."
The same limitations beset imagination in the field of scientific hypothesis. Progress in scientific research is due largely to provisional explanations which are developed by imagination, but such hypotheses must be framed in relation to previously ascertained facts and in accordance with the principles of the particular science.
Regarding the volunteer effort, imagination can be classified as:
Psychologists have studied imaginative thought, not only in its exotic form of creativity and artistic expression but also in its mundane form of everyday imagination. Ruth M.J. Byrne has proposed that everyday imaginative thoughts about counterfactual alternatives to reality may be based on the same cognitive processes on which rational thoughts are also based. Children can engage in the creation of imaginative alternatives to reality from their very early years. Cultural psychology is currently elaborating a view of imagination as a higher mental function involved in a number of everyday activities both at the individual and collective level that enables people to manipulate complex meanings of both linguistic and iconic forms in the process of experiencing.
The phenomenology of imagination is discussed In "The Imaginary: A Phenomenological Psychology of the Imagination" (), also published under the title "The Psychology of the Imagination", a 1940 book by Jean-Paul Sartre, in which he propounds his concept of the imagination and discusses what the existence of imagination shows about the nature of human consciousness.
The imagination is also active in our perception of photographic images in order to make them appear real.
Piaget posited that perceptions depend on the world view of a person. The world view is the result of arranging perceptions into existing imagery by imagination. Piaget cites the example of a child saying that the moon is following her when she walks around the village at night. Like this, perceptions are integrated into the world view to make sense. Imagination is needed to make sense of perceptions.
A study using fMRI while subjects were asked to imagine precise visual figures, to mentally disassemble them, or mentally blend them, showed activity in the occipital, frontoparietal, posterior parietal, precuneus, and dorsolateral prefrontal regions of the subject's brains.
Three philosophers for whom imagination is a central concept are Kendall Walton, John Sallis and Richard Kearney. See in particular:
In education, computational thinking (CT) is a set of problem-solving methods that involve expressing problems and their solutions in ways that a computer could also execute. It involves the mental skills and practices for designing computations that get computers to do jobs for people, and explaining and interpreting the world as a complex of information processes. Those ideas range from "basic CT for beginners" to "advanced CT for experts", and CT includes both "CT-in-the-small" (related to how to design small programs and algorithms by single people) and "CT-in-the-large" (related to how to design multi-version programs consisting of millions of lines of code written in team effort, ported to numerous platforms, and compatible with a range of different system setups).
The history of computational thinking dates back at least to the 1950s but most ideas are much older. Computational thinking involves ideas like abstraction, data representation, and logically organizing data, which are also prevalent in other kinds of thinking, such as scientific thinking, engineering thinking, systems thinking, design thinking, model-based thinking, and the like. Neither the idea nor the term are recent: Preceded by terms like algorithmizing, procedural thinking, algorithmic thinking, and computational literacy by computing pioneers like Alan Perlis and Donald Knuth, the term "computational thinking" was first used by Seymour Papert in 1980 and again in 1996. Computational thinking can be used to algorithmically solve complicated problems of scale, and is often used to realize large improvements in efficiency.
For the first ten years computational thinking was a US-centered movement, and still today that early focus is seen in the field's research. The field's most cited articles and most cited people were active in the early US CT wave, and the field's most active researcher networks are US-based. Dominated by US and European researchers, it is unclear to what extent can the field's predominantly Western body of research literature cater to the needs of students in other cultural groups.
The characteristics that define computational thinking are decomposition, pattern recognition / data representation, generalization/abstraction, and algorithms. By decomposing a problem, identifying the variables involved using data representation, and creating algorithms, a generic solution results. The generic solution is a generalization or abstraction that can be used to solve a multitude of variations of the initial problem.
Another characterization of computational thinking is the "three As" iterative process based on three stages:
The four Cs of 21st century learning are communication, critical thinking, collaboration, and creativity. The fifth C could be computational thinking which entails the capability to resolve problems algorithmically and logically. It includes tools that produce models and visualise data. Grover describes how computational thinking is applicable across subjects beyond science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) which include the social sciences and language arts. Students can engage in activities where they identify patterns in grammar as well as sentence structure and use models for studying relationships.
Similar to Seymour Papert, Alan Perlis, and Marvin Minsky before, Jeannette Wing envisioned computational thinking becoming an essential part of every child's education. However, integrating computational thinking into the K–12 curriculum and computer science education has faced several challenges including the agreement on the definition of computational thinking, how to assess children's development in it, and how to distinguish it from other similar "thinking" like systems thinking, design thinking, and engineering thinking. Currently, computational thinking is broadly defined as a set of cognitive skills and problem solving processes that include (but are not limited to) the following characteristics (but there are arguments that few, if any, of them belong to computing specifically, instead of being principles in many fields of science and engineering)
Current integration computational thinking into the K–12 curriculum comes in two forms: in computer science classes directly or through the use and measure of computational thinking techniques in other subjects. Teachers in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) focused classrooms that include computational thinking, allow students to practice problem-solving skills such as trial and error. Valerie Barr and Chris Stephenson describe computational thinking patterns across disciplines in a 2011 ACM Inroads article However Conrad Wolfram has argued that computational thinking should be taught as a distinct subject.
There are online institutions that provide a curriculum, and other related resources, to build and strengthen pre-college students with computational thinking, analysis and problem-solving.
A textbook `From Computing to Computational Thinking' by Paul S. Wang has been used, at the high school and college levels, to introduce the topic to non-computer science students through understanding of computing and applying concepts as a way of thinking in
other areas including in everyday life. The textbook, written in English, has been translated into other languages and used in many parts of the world. The textbook also introduced a new word `computize', a verb defined as `to apply computational thinking to analize and solve problems.'
Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh has a Center for Computational Thinking. The Center's major activity is conducting PROBEs or PROBlem-oriented Explorations. These PROBEs are experiments that apply novel computing concepts to problems to show the value of computational thinking. A PROBE experiment is generally a collaboration between a computer scientist and an expert in the field to be studied. The experiment typically runs for a year. In general, a PROBE will seek to find a solution for a broadly applicable problem and avoid narrowly focused issues. Some examples of PROBE experiments are optimal kidney transplant logistics and how to create drugs that do not breed drug-resistant viruses.
Cognitive holding power is a concept measured by John C. Stevenson in 1994 using a questionnaire, the Cognitive Holding Power Questionnaire (CHPQ). This tool is assesses first- or second-order cognitive processing preferences.
Studies using holding power have suggest improvements to mathematical education.
Cognitive styles analysis (CSA) was developed by Richard J. Riding and is the most frequently used computerized measure of cognitive styles. Although CSA is not well known in North American institutions, it is quite popular among European universities and organizations.
Unlike many other cognitive style measures, CSA has been the subject of much empirical investigation. Three experiments reported by showed the reliability of CSA to be low. Considering the theoretical strength of CSA, and unsuccessful earlier attempts to create a more reliable parallel form of it , a revised version was made to improve its validity and reliability.
In psychology and cognitive neuroscience, pattern recognition describes cognitive process that matches information from a stimulus with information retrieved from memory.
Pattern recognition is not only crucial to humans, but to other animals as well. Even koalas, who possess less-developed thinking abilities, use pattern recognition to find and consume eucalyptus leaves. The human brain has developed more, but holds similarities to the brains of birds and lower mammals. The development of neural networks in the outer layer of the brain in humans has allowed for better processing of visual and auditory patterns. Spatial positioning in the environment, remembering findings, and detecting hazards and resources to increase chances of survival are examples of the application of pattern recognition for humans and animals.
There are six main theories of pattern recognition: template matching, prototype-matching, feature analysis, recognition-by-components theory, bottom-up and top-down processing, and Fourier analysis. The application of these theories in everyday life is not mutually exclusive. Pattern recognition allows us to read words, understand language, recognize friends, and even appreciate music. Each of the theories applies to various activities and domains where pattern recognition is observed. Facial, music and language recognition, and seriation are a few of such domains. Facial recognition and seriation occur through encoding visual patterns, while music and language recognition use the encoding of auditory patterns.
Template and feature analysis approaches to recognition of objects (and situations) have been merged / reconciled / overtaken by multiple discrimination theory. This states that the amounts in a test stimulus of each salient feature of a template are recognized in any perceptual judgment as being at a distance in the universal unit of 50% discrimination (the objective performance 'JND') from the amount of that feature in the template.
The RBC principles of visual object recognition can be applied to auditory language recognition as well. In place of geons, language researchers propose that spoken language can be broken down into basic components called phonemes. For example, there are 44 phonemes in the English language.
In psychologist Jean Piaget's theory of cognitive development, the third stage is called the Concrete Operational State. It is during this stage that the abstract principle of thinking called "seriation" is naturally developed in a child. Seriation is the ability to arrange items in a logical order along a quantitative dimension such as length, weight, age, etc. It is a general cognitive skill which is not fully mastered until after the nursery years . To seriate means to understand that objects can be ordered along a dimension, and to effectively do so, the child needs to be able to answer the question "What comes next?" Seriation skills also help to develop problem-solving skills, which are useful in recognizing and completing patterning tasks.
To help build up math skills in children, teachers and parents can help them learn seriation and patterning. Young children who understand seriation can put numbers in order from lowest to highest. Eventually, they will come to understand that 6 is higher than 5, and 20 is higher than 10. Similarly, having children copy patterns or create patterns of their own, like ABAB patterns, is a great way to help them recognize order and prepare for later math skills, such as multiplication. Child care providers can begin exposing children to patterns at a very young age by having them make groups and count the total number of objects.
Recognizing faces is one of the most common forms of pattern recognition. Humans are extremely effective at remembering faces, but this ease and automaticity belies a very challenging problem. All faces are physically similar. Faces have two eyes, one mouth, and one nose all in predictable locations, yet humans can recognize a face from several different angles and in various lighting conditions.
Neuroscientists posit that recognizing faces takes place in three phases. The first phase starts with visually focusing on the physical features. The facial recognition system then needs to reconstruct the identity of the person from previous experiences. This provides us with the signal that this might be a person we know. The final phase of recognition completes when the face elicits the name of the person.
Although humans are great at recognizing faces under normal viewing angles, upside-down faces are tremendously difficult to recognize. This demonstrates not only the challenges of facial recognition but also how humans have specialized procedures and capacities for recognizing faces under normal upright viewing conditions.
Scientists agree that there is a certain area in the brain specifically devoted to processing faces. This structure is called the fusiform gyrus, and brain imaging studies have shown that it becomes highly active when a subject is viewing a face.
Several case studies have reported that patients with lesions or tissue damage localized to this area have tremendous difficulty recognizing faces, even their own. Although most of this research is circumstantial, a study at Stanford University provided conclusive evidence for the fusiform gyrus' role in facial recognition. In a unique case study, researchers were able to send direct signals to a patient's fusiform gyrus. The patient reported that the faces of the doctors and nurses changed and morphed in front of him during this electrical stimulation. Researchers agree this demonstrates a convincing causal link between this neural structure and the human ability to recognize faces.
Recent research reveals that infant language acquisition is linked to cognitive pattern recognition. Unlike classical nativist and behavioral theories of language development, scientists now believe that language is a learned skill. Studies at the Hebrew University and the University of Sydney both show a strong correlation between the ability to identify visual patterns and to learn a new language. Children with high shape recognition showed better grammar knowledge, even when controlling for the effects of intelligence and memory capacity. This is supported by the theory that language learning is based on statistical learning, the process by which infants perceive common combinations of sounds and words in language and use them to inform future speech production.
The first step in infant language acquisition is to decipher between the most basic sound units of their native language. This includes every consonant, every short and long vowel sound, and any additional letter combinations like "th" and "ph" in English. These units, called phonemes, are detected through exposure and pattern recognition. Infants use their "innate feature detector" capabilities to distinguish between the sounds of words. They split them into phonemes through a mechanism of categorical perception. Then they extract statistical information by recognizing which combinations of sounds are most likely to occur together, like "qu" or "h" plus a vowel. In this way, their ability to learn words is based directly on the accuracy of their earlier phonetic patterning.
The transition from phonemic differentiation into higher-order word production is only the first step in the hierarchical acquisition of language. Pattern recognition is furthermore utilized in the detection of prosody cues, the stress and intonation patterns among words. Then it is applied to sentence structure and the understanding of typical clause boundaries. This entire process is reflected in reading as well. First, a child recognizes patterns of individual letters, then words, then groups of words together, then paragraphs, and finally entire chapters in books. Learning to read and learning to speak a language are based on the "stepwise refinement of patterns" in perceptual pattern recognition.
Music provides deep and emotional experiences for the listener. These experiences become contents in long-term memory, and every time we hear the same tunes, those contents are activated. Recognizing the content by the pattern of the music affects our emotion. The mechanism that forms the pattern recognition of music and the experience has been studied by multiple researchers. The sensation felt when listening to our favorite music is evident by the dilation of the pupils, the increase in pulse and blood pressure, the streaming of blood to the leg muscles, and the activation of the cerebellum, the brain region associated with physical movement.
The medial prefrontal cortex – one of the last areas affected by Alzheimer’s disease – is the region activated by music.
MIT researchers conducted a study to examine this notion. The results showed six neural clusters in the auditory cortex responding to the sounds. Four were triggered when hearing standard acoustic features, one specifically responded to speech, and the last exclusively responded to music. Researchers who studied the correlation between temporal evolution of timbral, tonal and rhythmic features of music, came to the conclusion that music engages the brain regions connected to motor actions, emotions and creativity. The research indicates that the whole brain "lights up" when listening to music. This amount of activity boosts memory preservation, hence pattern recognition.
Recognizing patterns of music is different for a musician and a listener. Although a musician may play the same notes every time, the details of the frequency will always be different. The listener will recognize the musical pattern and their types despite the variations. These musical types are conceptual and learned, meaning they might vary culturally. While listeners are involved with recognizing (implicit) musical material, musicians are involved with recalling them (explicit).
A UCLA study found that when watching or hearing music being played, neurons associated with the muscles needed for playing the instrument fire. Mirror neurons light up when musicians and non-musicians listen to a piece.
In a study at University of California, Davis mapped the brain of participants while they listened to music. The results showed links between brain regions to autobiographical memories and emotions activated by familiar music. This study can explain the strong response of patients with Alzheimer’s disease to music. This research can help such patients with pattern recognition-enhancing tasks.
The human tendency to see patterns that do not actually exist is called apophenia. Examples include the Man in the Moon, faces or figures in shadows, in clouds, and in patterns with no deliberate design, such as the swirls on a baked confection, and the perception of causal relationships between events which are, in fact, unrelated. Apophenia figures prominently in conspiracy theories, gambling, misinterpretation of statistics and scientific data, and some kinds of religious and paranormal experiences. Misperception of patterns in random data is called pareidolia.
Introspection is the examination of one's own conscious thoughts and feelings. In psychology, the process of introspection relies on the observation of one's mental state, while in a spiritual context it may refer to the examination of one's soul. Introspection is closely related to human self-reflection and self-discovery and is contrasted with external observation.
Introspection generally provides a privileged access to one's own mental states, not mediated by other sources of knowledge, so that individual experience of the mind is unique. Introspection can determine any number of mental states including: sensory, bodily, cognitive, emotional and so forth.
Introspection has been a subject of philosophical discussion for thousands of years. The philosopher Plato asked, "…why should we not calmly and patiently review our own thoughts, and thoroughly examine and see what these appearances in us really are?" While introspection is applicable to many facets of philosophical thought it is perhaps best known for its role in epistemology; in this context introspection is often compared with perception, reason, memory, and testimony as a source of knowledge.
Partly as a result of Titchener's misrepresentation, the use of introspection diminished after his death and the subsequent decline of structuralism. Later psychological movements, such as functionalism and behaviorism, rejected introspection for its lack of scientific reliability among other factors. Functionalism originally arose in direct opposition to structuralism, opposing its narrow focus on the elements of consciousness and emphasizing the purpose of consciousness and other psychological behavior. Behaviorism's objection to introspection focused much more on its unreliability and subjectivity which conflicted with behaviorism's focus on measurable behavior.
The more recently established cognitive psychology movement has to some extent accepted introspection's usefulness in the study of psychological phenomena, though generally only in experiments pertaining to internal thought conducted under experimental conditions. For example, in the "think aloud protocol", investigators cue participants to speak their thoughts aloud in order to study an active thought process without forcing an individual to comment on the process itself.
Indeed, it is questionable how confident researchers can be in their own introspections.
Another question in regards to the veracious accountability of introspection is if researchers lack the confidence in their own introspections and those of their participants, then how can it gain legitimacy? Three strategies are accountable: identifying behaviors that establish credibility, finding common ground that enables mutual understanding, and developing a trust that allows one to know when to give the benefit of the doubt.
That is to say, that words are only meaningful if validated by one's actions; When people report strategies, feelings or beliefs, their behaviors must correspond with these statements if they are to be believed.
One experiment tried to give their subjects access to others' introspections. They made audio recordings of subjects who had been told to say whatever came into their heads as they answered a question about their own bias. Although subjects persuaded themselves they were unlikely to be biased, their introspective reports did not sway the assessments of observers. When subjects were explicitly told to avoid relying on introspection, their assessments of their own bias became more realistic.
In Eastern Christianity some concepts addressing human needs, such as sober introspection "(nepsis"), require watchfulness of the human heart and the conflicts of the human "nous", heart or mind. Noetic understanding can not be achieved by rational or discursive thought (i.e. systemization).
Jains practise "pratikraman" (Sanskrit "introspection"), a process of repentance of wrongdoings during their daily life, and remind themselves to refrain from doing so again. Devout Jains often do Pratikraman at least twice a day.
Introspection is encouraged in schools such as Advaita Vedanta; in order for one to know their own true nature, they need to reflect and introspect on their true nature—which is what meditation is. Especially, Swami Chinmayananda emphasised the role of introspection in five stages, outlined in his book "Self Unfoldment."
Introspection (also referred to as Rufus dialogue, interior monologue, self-talk) is the fiction-writing mode used to convey a character's thoughts. As explained by Renni Browne and Dave King, "One of the great gifts of literature is that it allows for the expression of unexpressed thoughts…"
According to Nancy Kress, a character's thoughts can greatly enhance a story: deepening characterization, increasing tension, and widening the scope of a story. As outlined by Jack M. Bickham, thought plays a critical role in both scene and sequel.

Subsets and Splits

No community queries yet

The top public SQL queries from the community will appear here once available.