Thinking Concepts:-Forming concepts: a mental grouping of similar objects, events, ideas or people (i.e. different types of chairs)-We form concepts by developing prototypes: mental image or best example of a category (i.e. traditional table chair)-Concepts speed and guide our thinking but don't often make us wiseProblem Solving: strategies and obstacles-trial and error, algorithms, heuristics, insight-certain brain activity associated with sudden flashes of insight: before the Aha moment: frontal lobes were active and then a burst of activity in the right frontallobe-insight strikes suddenly, not slowly-we more actively seek out evidence verifying than refuting our ideas-confirmation bias: tendency to search for info that supports our preconceptions and to ignore or distort contradictory evidence-fixation: inability to see a problem from a fresh perspective-intuition: an effortless, immediate automatic feeling or thoughtThe availability heuristic:-heuristics enable snap judgements-heuristics could lead "smartest ppl into dumbest decisions"-availability heuristics: estimating the likelihood of events based on their availability in their memory (i.e. even small gambling wins produce flashing lights andsounds)-we come to fear extremely rare events-can work in opposite direction too: less fear about global climate change because of the recent "chilly" dayOverconfidence: -frequently more confidence than correct-overconfidence: tendency to be more confident than correct and to overestimate the accuracy of our beliefs and judgements-school projects normally take about twice the amount of time predicted-People who generally are more overconfident, live more happilyBelief Perseverance:-belief perseverance: clinging to one's initial conceptions after the basis on which they were fired has been discredited-often fuels social conflict-remedy: consider the opposite-the more we appreciate why our beliefs might be true, the more tightly we cling to themThe effects of framing:-framing: the way we represent an issue-example: condom is 95% effective vs. failing 5% of the time- can be very persuasiveThe perils and power of intuition:-intuition fuels gut fears and prejudices-"sleeping on it" by distracting your brain and letting it sort out decisions by itself, is actually beneficialOther species sharing out cognitive skills:-even pigeons can sort objects into categories or concepts while apes can differentiate between cats and dogs-Alex the African Grey Parrot-Apes display insight (using short stick to grab a longer stick which will help them reach fruit)-Apes use different things in different ways and different "tools" (up to 39 local customs related to tool use: chimps ways of cultural diversity)-A baboon knows everyone's voices within a 80 baboon troop-Sheep recognize and recall individual faces-many species like apes, elephants, and dolphins show self awareness in mirrorsLanguage:-when we speak, our brain and voice conjure up air pressure waves that we send banging against another's eardrum-language: our spoken, written or signed words and the ways we combine them to communicate meaning-Even while reading a book: infer from author's mind into mine-With language, we all know much more about things we have/will never encounter or experienceLanguage structure:-Phonemes: the smallest distinctive sound unit -chat has 3: ch, a, t -English language has about 40 -Consonant phonemes carry more info than vowel phonemes-Morphemes: the smallest unit that carries meaning; could be a word or part of a word -I, a, bat, pre, etc-grammar: system of rules that enables us to communicate with one another -guide us in deriving meaning in sounds (semantics) and in ordering words into sentences (syntax)-40ish phonemes--> more than 100,000 morphemes--> produce about 616,500 wordsLanguage development:-you use about 150 words in half your language-between 1-18 years old you learn about 60,000 words, which averages about 10 per day-Schoolteachers only taught you about 200 words a year compared to the 3500 words you learned each year in general-natural language: about 3 words a secondReceptive Language:-by 4 months of age, babies can differentiate sounds and read lips-receptive language: the ability to understand what is said to and about them-7 months they are able to segment sounds into individual words-Adeptness of the task above at 7 months, predicts language proficiency between ages of 2-5Productive language:-productive language: ability to produce words-recognition of noun-verb displacement happens before we are able to speak sentences with nouns and verbs-babbling stage: at about 4 months, the stage of speech development in which the infant spontaneously utters various sounds at first unrelated to the householdlanguage-babbling is not an imitation of adult speech-by about 10 month, babbling changes so that an outside person can differentiate which is the household language-Without exposure to other languages, babies lose their abilities to hear and produce sounds from other languages besides their native one-one word stage: from about 1-2 years, children speak in single words-by about 18 months, babies language goes from about a word a week to a word a day-telegraphic speech: child speaks with mostly verbs and nouns: go carStatistical learning:-Not born with a "built in" language-Whatever language we learn, we start speaking in nouns-infants able to distinguish between syllables and words-Babies have built in readiness to learn grammarCritical periods:-childhood has a critical period of language before which the window closes-The later you learn a new language the harder and longer it is to master it-Exposure to language by 2-3 years old is ideal-By age 7, those who have not been exposed to a spoken or signed language generally lose their abilities to master any language-The deaf that learn sign language after age 9 without prior english language knowledge do not do as well-Without the ability of a specific sense, all other available senses are heightenedThe brain and language:-aphasia: impairment of language usually caused by left-hemispheric damage- some can speak but not read or sing but not speak-Different brain regions are for different language functions-Jokes that play on meaning are processes in a different brain area than those that are played on words-In processing language, the brain operates by dividing its mental functions into sub functionsDo other species have language?:-without doubt