Contemporary Issues

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Contemporary Issues

• The Cognitive Approach

Aidan Sammons
www.psychlotron.org.uk
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Contemporary Issues

• Students should be able toexplain one
  contemporary issue or debate using terminology or
  ideas drawn from the cognitive approach.
• Edexcel AS Psychology Specification

• Identify key concepts from the approach
• Be able to explain them
• Be able to apply them to real world situations or
  problems

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Cognitive Concepts

• Information processing
• Schema driven processing
• Reconstructive memory
• False memory syndrome

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Information Processing
Output
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Input Processes
Computer
Mind

• Keyboard
• Mouse
• Scanner
• Camera
• Microphone

• Vision
• Hearing
• Touch
• Smell
• Taste

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Output Processes
Computer
Mind

• Screen
• Projector
• Printer
• Loudspeaker

• Behaviour
• Speech

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Human Information Processing
Behaviour
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Cognitive Processes
Perception interpreting incoming sensory
information
Attention selecting information for further
processing
Thinking sorting, combining, modifying
information
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The Importance of Memory

• Not just a store for information
• Influences what is selected
• How it is interpreted
• Actively involved in all aspects of cognition

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Limits of the Computer Metaphor
Computer
Mind

• Processes information passively
• Nonsense in, nonsense out

• Processes information actively
• Tries to make sense of information
• Nonsense in, sense out

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Computer Information Processing
BANG!
Can you wreck a nice beach?
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Human Information Processing
Yes. I can recognise speech.
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Schema Driven Processing

• Knowledge is organised into schemas
• Schemas allow us to make sense of information
• Making sense of information can distort it

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Schema Driven Processing
Bartlett (1932)
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Reconstructive Memories

• Schemas are used to reconstruct memories
• We attempt to recall things so they make as much
  sense as possible
• Biases, errors and alterations in schemas can
  result in distortions of memory

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Reconstructive Errors

• Loftus conducted research in which people were
  deliberately misinformed about what they had seen
• She showed that it was possible to alter peoples
  memories

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Key Cognitive Ideas

• The mind is compared to a computer, with inputs,
  processes and outputs
• Unlike a computer, the mind is both active and
  selective in the way it processes information
• Schemas are used to interpret experiences and
  reconstruct memories
• Alterations and biases in schemas can affect the
  accuracy of memory

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Alien Abduction

• The Truth Is In There

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Alien Abduction Experiences

• Abduction occurs at night
• Abductee is conscious but immobilised
• Aliens carry out medical investigation
• Elements of sexual molestation

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Three Possibilities

• Abductees have really been kidnapped by aliens.
• Abductees are lying.
• Abductees believe themselves to have been
  kidnapped by aliens when they actually havent.

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Occams Razor
When two competing theories purport to explain
the same phenomenon, in the absence of evidence,
prefer the simpler one
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McNally (2003)

• Tested abductees physiological responses to
  hearing about trauma.
• Increased heart rate, sweating etc.
• Same responses as combat veterans, car crash
  survivors victims of violent crime.
• Abductees are genuinely traumatised.

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Abductee Stories

• Abductees have probably not been kidnapped by
  aliens
• They do not appear to be lying
• Therefore, it is possible that they have
  constructed false memories of alien abduction

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Creating False Memories

• Requires a person to believe that something
  happened, when it did not.
• This understanding becomes part of that persons
  schematic understanding.
• As a result, they may spontaneously recall a
  memory that is actually false.

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Roediger McDermott (1995)

• EXAM
• QUIZ
• GRADE
• STUDY
• SCHOOL
• QUESTION
• SCORE
• PASS
• FAIL

• Participants studied the wordlist on the right
• They were later asked to recall the words
• Many recalled that the word TEST was on the list

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Loftus Pickrell (1995)

• PPs relatives interviewed to help construct a
  plausible story about getting lost on a shopping
  trip
• PPs interviewed (twice) and asked to recall
  additional information about the event

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Loftus Pickrell (1995)

• With repeated discussion, the memory was
  accepted as true by some of the PPs
• 7 out of 24 accepted the memory and were able to
  recall additional information

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Loftus Pickrell (1995)

• These results show that people will create false
  recalls of childhood experiences in response to
  misleading information and the social demands
  inherent in repeated interviews.
• (Loftus and Pickrell, 1995)

• Some PPs accepted that the account was plausible
• The input of relatives made it more believable
• Once it was accepted as real, a memory was
  constructed out of schemas

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Loftus (2001 2003)

• Questioned Russian witnesses to terrorist
  bombings in 1999
• Suggested they had seen a wounded animal
• 6 months later, 12.5 recalled considerable
  detail about the animal

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Loftus (2001)

• PPs shown fake advert of Bugs Bunny at Disneyland
• Asked if they remembered meeting Bugs on
  childhood visits to Disneyland
• 35 reported doing so
• Impossible, because Bugs Bunny is a Warner Bros
  character

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Characteristics of Abductees

• Pre-existing New Age beliefs (astral
  projection, tarot cards etc.)
• Score highly on measures of fantasy/absorption
• Episodes of sleep paralysis

McNally (2003)
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Sleep Paralysis

• Occurs on waking from REM sleep
• Body remains paralysed after waking
• 30 of population experience it at some time
• 5 of people also experience hypnopopic
  hallucinations
• They continue dreaming, despite being awake

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Alien Abduction Memories
Construction of alien abduction memory
McNally (2003)
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Alien Abduction Memories

• The person experiences sleep paralysis
• They also experience hypnopopic hallucinations
• They are motivated to make sense of a frightening
  experience
• To do so, they draw on schematic ideas of alien
  abductions

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Alien Abduction Memories
Or are they?

• Contact with other abductees reinforces their
  belief in the experience and encourages the
  development of detail in the memory
• In some cases, therapists facilitate this
  process.
• The resulting memory is real enough to cause
  trauma, even though it does not correspond to
  real events.
• Alien abduction experiences are an example of
  false memory syndrome