COG NITM SM

Dr. Yogesh Shanna

Associate professor
Ramgarhia College of Education, Phagwara
received, processed and
Cognitivism is a shift behaviourism that explains how information is
ivism as a separate
stored in the mind. Four factors influenced the development of cognit
discipline in psychology:
i. the development of Gestalt psychology;
ses;
ii. the move from an interest in external behaviours to internal brain proces
111. the inadequacy of behaviourism to explain language acquisition;
iv. the development of computers and an interest in artificial intelligence.

Cognitivism has been defined by various educational psychologists.

active mental process of

Anita Woolfolk - A general approach that views learning as an
acquiring, remembering and using knowledge.
cognition in the mind
Salome Human-Vogel - Cognitivism is a theoretical approach that locates
. and views it as problem solving through computation.
l processes such as
Jordan, Carlile, and Stack - Cognitivism involves the study of menta
were reluctant to study,
sensation, perception, attention, encoding and memory that behaviourists
because cognition occurs inside the 'black box' of the brain.

Cognitivism tries to answer

i. what happens in the Black Box of the behaviourists?

ii. What goes on in the mind of a learner?

t Theory, and Tolma n's

Cognitivism takes its cue from Information Processing Approach, Gestal
Purposive Behaviourism.

INFORMATION PROCESSING APPROACH

teachers take advantage of
What is the process by which information is absorbed, and how can
are questions that have
this process to help students retain critical information and skills? These
been addressed by cognitive learning theorists and that have led to information-processing
theory, a dominant theory of learning and memory since the mid- l 970s.

Sensory Register

The first component of the memory system that incoming information meets is the sensory
register, shown in the Figure below. Sensory registers receive large amounts of information from
each of the senses (sight, hearing, touch, smell, taste) and hold it for a very short time, no more
than a couple of seconds. If nothing happens to information held in a sensory register, it is
rapidly lost.

S • na ory r • g lst.e r ....---- _:,,9;~~~•9 Rao-trlev•I

-- 1-- -:- ,.
F c.r-go>tt"en

.
f
;.
·➔•1'· I
Forgott.en flt~ltiort

Short - Term or Working Memory

Information that a person perceives and pays attention to is transferred to the second memory
system: the short-term memory (Solso, 2001). Short-term memory is a storage system that can
hold a limited amount of information for a few seconds. It is the part of memory in which
information that is currently being thought about is stored. The thoughts we are conscious of
having at any given moment are being held in our short-term memory. When we stop thinking
about something, it disappears from our short-term memory. Another term for short-term
memory is working memory. Information may enter working memory from sensory registers or
from the third basic component of the memory system: long-term memory. Often, both things
happen at the same time.

One way to hold information in working memory is to think about it or say it over and over. This
process of maintaining an item in working memory by repetition is called rehearsal. Without
rehearsal, items will probably not stay in working memory for more than about 30 seconds.
Because working memory has a limited capacity, information can also be lost from it by being
forced out by other information.
 Long - Term Memory
where we keep information for long
Long-term memory is that part of our memory system
a very large-capacity, very long-term
periods of time. Long-term memory is thought to be
never forget information in long-term
memory store. In fact, many theorists believe that we may
information within our memory. For
memory; rather, we might just lose the ability to find the
ry. Theorists divide long-term memory
this reason, some theorists use the term permanent memo
into at least three parts:

Episodic memories of things that have happened;

Semantic memories of facts, concepts and principles;

Procedural knowledge of how to do things.

GESTALT PSYCHOLOGY
ologists developed a view of
In the early decades of the twentieth century, German psych
the behaviorist theories dominating
learning and cognition that was quite different from
Kohler, 1925, 1929, 1947, 1959;
American psychology at the time (e.g., Koftka, 1935;
lt psychology. Gestalt is a German
Wertheimer, 1912, 1959). This perspective is known as Gesta
that people organise their perceptions
word which means pattern or whole. Gestalt theorists hold
emerge from Gestalt psychology:
into coherent wholes. Following are several basic ideas to

Perception is often different from reality

Wertheimer's (1912) description and

The origin of Gestalt psychology is usually attributed to
analysis of an optical illusion known as the phi phenomen
on. The fact that an individual "sees"
to conclude that perception of an
motion when observing stationary objects led Wertheimer
experience is sometimes different from the experience itself.

The whole is more than the sum of its parts

ssfully understood if various aspects of
Gestaltists believed that human experience can't be succe
example, we perceive the illusion of
experience are studied as separate, isolated entities. For
lights are present; we don't perceive
movement in the phi phenomenon only when two or more
motion in a single light.
An organism structures and organizes experience
s "structured whole." Structure isn't
Roughly translated, the German word Gestalt mean
ses structure.
necessarily inherent in a situation; instead, an organism impo

ways
An organism is predisposed to organize experience in certain
s) are predisposed to structure their
Gestaltists suggested that organisms (especially human being
ived according to the four laws of
experiences in similar, predictable ways. Patterns are perce
perception (see Figure 3.2):

figures rather than fragmented or

Proximity - we have a tendency to perceive closed
unconnected objects.

B
A
Proximity

l·i Iii We see A as five colum1ts but we see B as five rows.

rather than sudden changes in direction.

Similarity - we tend to perceive smooth continuous lines

• • • •
••• Similarity
• •• • We see the constellation made up of equally bright stars.
•
so on are generally categorized and
Continuity - similar information, objects, elements and
grouped together.

X
(;ontinulty
We see this as A rather than B.
X A
:) (
B

er.
Closu re - objects close to each other may be grouped togeth
 A Closure
We see this as a triangle although it clearly is not
L~
Learning follows the law ofPragnanz

Gestalt psychologists proposed that learning involves the formation of memory traces. These
memory traces are subject to the law of Pragnanz, so that over time they tend to become simpler,
more concise, and more complete than the actual input.

Problem solving involves restructuring and insight

Wolfgang Kohler (1925) suggested that problem solving involves mentally combining and
recombining various elements of a problem and eventually creating an organizational structure
that solves the problem. In one situation, a chimp named Sultan faced a problem in which fruit
was placed far enough outside his cage that he couldn't reach it. Sultan had had earlier
experiences in which he had used sticks to rake in fruit; in this case, however, the only stick
inside the cage was too short. A longer stick was outside the cage but, like the fruit, was beyond
Sultan's reach. In neither of the situations just described did Sultan engage in the random trial-
and-error learning that Thorndike had described for cats. Instead, it appeared to Kohler that
Sultan thought about possible solutions to the problem, arranging the problem elements in
various ways-that is, restructuring them-until he arrived at a sudden insight as to a problem
solution.

EDWARD TOLMAN'S PURPOSIVE BEHAVIORISM

Edward Chace Tolman valued the importance of objectivity in research and used nonhuman
species (especially rats) as the subjects of his research. Unlike his contemporaries, however,
Tolman included internal mental phenomena in his explanations of how learning occurs.

Learning is an internal rather than external change

Tolman .proposed that learning is an internal process that isn't necessarily reflected in an
organism's behavior. This could be seen in the figure below of Maze performance of rats
 term latent learning for
receiving food, no food, or food beginning on Day I I. Tolman used the
such unobservable learning.

32

24
.•.
Cl)

~
20

16
..•. • .
(Group 2)
··• ···· ·• .... • ... ..·· •.. .. No Food

w
Reward begins
12
:.--.. ... "" (Gr<>l4) 1)
,-..,
8 ... ..._,.... '•--.F ood
- - . - _--,. ...__ Food at
4 (Group 3) Day 11

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17
Days

Behavior is purposive
stressed the goal-directed
Behavior has a purpose, that of goal attainment. Because Tolman
behaviorism.
nature of behavior, his theory oflearning is sometimes called purposive
Sign Learning
of S-R connections but as a
Tolman believed that learning should be viewed not as the formation
g).
process of learning that certain events lead to other events (S-S learnin
Expectations affect behavior
produce certain kinds of
According to Tolman, once an organism learns that certain behaviors
behaviors. Rather than
results, it begins to form expectations about the outcomes of its
tation of reinforcement
reinforcement affecting the response that it follows, the organism's expec
affects the response that it precedes.
Organism develops cognitive maps oftheir environments
to make at each junction
Rats who run a maze appear to learn not only the appropriate responses
to speak. Tolman proposed
but also the general arrangement of the maze -the lay of the land, so
cognitive maps of their
that rats (and presumably many other species as well) develop
situated in relation to one
environments: They learn where different parts of the environment are
another.
 ...

I·
I

l
l
l
!r·
 ~ U)v\.
p.q ._ .
/\kv.~--
L~~~:~~:~tJ~~~8~~~~~~~
)&\e.;
t- " '
~r ~ ~

.. ~ .~.. . ""-4:.~
- .. ~-J'!( "., , ,~ ~ - -~ -- - - -
• - ♦ • "" ~).,_~ ..

[
.. • <;; ~~-~ •• • , ..

l<;37~~=: . .. -,_, :~-~~.:_ . _, ·o1....__..·.....,._

· · _,....
·U ,~f.
..J..L.<.;.:;.. l.LY-IJ,JaO-Lr ....lJ~~

r -~ ,.~ •' ~ - ,,
~- --~ -~ ~· ··kf
[f· .l
·=:~ ~ . •' ,.t

0 ..,· .
. ..<{)... 0 - -

aL• - •
'
~ . • ~ -QXL-," ; w
;l)
rrt .
I
. ~M~ • .¥.1~1,--..-;;-L~::-i{:;lr ~~~3,C_ ;i.jl~~~~~ :;Z;t~2
.d,..1
 '•..

~;i:,:;.l'}r,-ti;..:
'.:•>-~:-..
ra
 >.e/1 ;.:~~t.e,f·.-~. .
-:•-;._:-::.-::;·-::,.t:::..:=:;•---=-- -.-

\ - , u~--
1 ;-;;, j)~:~ :·___(.J;:-jai
l· J'\rtiYju • ·· ;
,~t 1~~·i,.i~(f,,.,;?_~- : ... -\·:.
i

::;t '\ ·' ; ... .· - !) ~ ~ ,;· ·.. , i~:~.-· "ti~f_:::,/i>·-.\.. -\~\

-,'7', --,~;'ft

~ ~ ~i----·~ ~,~ ·:·:.: .~??-~~1~rt.

~ ,'1," .•
t I
J{\,. ,I ,
'-"'".0...,~ --./6
/ ~ ~-~:~:,~:±<~.;:,:~·{ ·'.:··.. ,
'·':'· t~],
\'t~
~

:
-- ~...r..\...U,, ...u._..::;... '

J- <
< -t~,..;;.~·~
:·..::-:----.,..,...,_..,,,.,....,... . .,_,
<•
: J t f ~ ~·; ::, .
~ --;··.-r ~.J:.;::ip.~~ ;t.;, r .•;~}fm%tr,,:;sJ
..lt::.,;.1.-.1,.:J~,~ ~....,.;

.Cu. ~ ---''. :~ .~._-,...,.,.:c.; i,. c.t;\ ~;; £~~ t ~ -~·"£.~

·~u.
.CtJu.i~
·•' .'_:,.,__ a;..(;~~ ,q.;
..J_q· , . : ~ ,:"'..,-:.-. ~ ~ ,', ;-·. ., .. ·r,,.; ,·./';· '>; -; • :' ".,/,4,!;
: ·::--~~-"l-· .. ·_:~ - ~;~:~ ~;:·_._~ , /'- ., _.., .·- .. --;,.-, ~ :· .,
' ...
..-
~ - ....,......-. . ..

-~ , .. .
.{~~- '.: ,;

L .. :~ ·

,f:-:v. ,, .
.l • >:·
.-,~
-. J'
- - ~"" .
- ".
......,,_..
. 0--·.~, 1:: .
-~ ° 7
·- ~·:-G .
 t un derstanding o f the
C o n c lu si o n to le ar n in g an d off
er s a co h er en
p p ro a c h f
g n it iv is m p re se n ts a sc ie n ti fi c a
h in g p ra ct ic es an d suggests a range o
Co ac
p re se n ts th eo re ti ca l su p p o rt for te
e d . It
p ro c e s s e s in v o lv
te g ie s th a t e n c o u ra g e le ar n in g.
st ra
u se fu l te a c h in g