1. Information processing
The Information Processing Approach
Memory
Thinking
Information processing

2. Computer and Human Comparison
The Information-Processing Approach
Computer and Human Comparison

3. Mechanisms of Processing
The Information-Processing Approach
Mechanisms of Processing
Encoding
Automaticity
Strategy Construction
Mechanism by which information gets into memory
Ability to process information with little or no effort
Discovering new procedure for processing information
Metacognition
Cognition about cognition, or “knowing about knowing”

4. Speed of Processing Information
The Information-Processing Approach
Speed of Processing Information
Assessed using reaction time tasks.
Changes in speed processing:
Improves dramatically through childhood and adolescence.
Changes due to both myelination and experience.
Decline begins in middle adulthood; continues into late adulthood.

5. Does Processing Speed Matter?
Linked with competence in thinking.
Efficient strategies can compensate for slower reaction times and speed (mental retardation).
Processing linked to accumulated knowledge and abilities to perform.

6. Infancy to Adulthood _________________________________________________
Attention
Infancy to Adulthood
Newborns can detect contours and fixate.
4-month-olds have selective attention.
Joint attention begins in 7-8 month olds.
Control over selective attention shows:
Preschooler attends to external salient stimuli.
Child of 6 to 7 attentive to relevant information.
Ability to shift attention increases with age; allows for more complex task involvement.
_________________________________________________
Less adept at selective attention.
Older adults (50-80) performed worse in divided attention
conditions than younger groups.

7. Constructing Memories
Memory
Constructing Memories
Schema Theory:
People construct and reconstruct memories; mold to fit information already existing in mind.
Schemas: mental frameworks that organize concepts and information; affects encoding and retrieval
False Memories:
New information such as questions or suggestions can alter memories
Concerns about-
Implanting false memories in eyewitnesses.
Accuracy of eyewitness testimonies at trials.
Children as eyewitnesses:
Age differences in susceptibility.
Interviewing techniques can cause distortions.

8. Infancy Considerable improvement after infancy. Implicit memory:
Memory without conscious recollection; skills and routine done automatically.
Explicit memory:
Conscious memory of facts and experiences; doesn’t appear until after 6 months.
Infantile Amnesia:
Adults recall little or none of first three years.
Due to immaturity of prefrontal lobes in brain.
Considerable improvement after infancy.

9. Imagery and Memory of Verbal Information

10. Working Memory and Processing Speed
Working memory performance peaked at 45 years of age; declined at 57 years of age.
Working memory linked to:
Reading and math achievement
Processing speed
Younger adults have better episodic memory than older adults.
Older adults remember older events better than more recent events; take longer to retrieve semantic information.
Accuracy fades with the aging of a memory.

11. Memory for Spanish as a Function of Age Since Spanish Was Learned

12. Source Memory Source Memory:
Ability to remember where something was learned.
Contexts (Physical/Emotional Setting and Identity of Speaker)
Failures increase with age in adult years; relevancy of information affects ability.
Prospective Memory:
Remembering to do something in the future.
Age-related declines depend on task.
Time-based tasks decline more.
Event-based tasks show less decline.

13. Influences on the Memory of Older Adults
Psychological Factors
Health
Beliefs, Expectations, and Feelings
Education
Training and mnemonics improve memory-
Method of loci: storing mental images
Chunking: put into manageable units

14. Memory, Age, and Time of Day Tested (A.M. or P.M.)

15. Cognitive Neuroscience and Aging
Thinking
Cognitive Neuroscience and Aging
Brain changes influence cognitive functioning:
Neural circuits
Increased use of both hemispheres in processing
Functioning of hippocampus
Larger neural patterns for retrieval with aging

16. What Is Thinking? Manipulating and transforming information in memory.
Reason, reflect, evaluate ideas, solve problems, make decisions
Concepts-Categories that group things together.
Perceptual categorization: as young as 7 mos.
Categorization increases in second year; infants differentiate more.

17. Critical Thinking Few schools teach critical thinking to students:
Grasping deeper meaning of ideas
Involves:
Ask what, how, and why
Examine facts and determine evidence
Recognize one or more explanations exist
Compare various answers, select the best
Evaluate before accepting as truth
Speculate beyond what is known
Few schools teach critical thinking to students:
Students recite, define, describe, state, list
Students not asked to analyze, create, rethink
Encourage by:
Presenting controversial topics for discussion
Motivate students to delve deeper into issues
Teachers should refrain from giving own views

18. Strategies for Critical Thinking
Children teach children
Reciprocal teaching-Small-group discussions
Online computer consultation
Adults as role models
Create culture of learning, negotiating, sharing, and producing (active, not passive)

19. Scientific Thinking Aimed at identifying causal relationships
Children:
emphasize causal mechanisms .
more influenced by happenstance than by overall pattern.
Cling to old theories regardless of evidence.
Have difficulty designing experiments.
Problem solving and children:
Teach strategies and rules to solve problems-
Teacher is model, motivate children.
Use effective strategy instruction.
Encourage alternative strategies and approaches.
Analogical problem solving:
Occurs as early as age 1.

20. Thinking in Adolescence
Critical Thinking
If fundamental skills not developed during childhood, critical-thinking skills unlikely to mature in adolescence.
Decision Making
Older adolescents appear as more competent decision makers than younger adolescents.
Ability does not guarantee every day usage.

21. Thinking in Adulthood Practical problem solving and expertise improve:
Expertise — extensive, highly organized knowledge and understanding of particular domain
Use It or Lose It — practice helps cognitive skills
Cognitive Training — can help some if skills are being lost
Cognitive improvement tied to physical fitness and vitality

22. The Child’s Theory of Mind
Metacognition
The Child’s Theory of Mind
Ages 2 to 3 — begin to understand
Perceptions
Desires
Emotions
Age 5 — realization of false beliefs
Middle and late childhood — mind seen as active constructor of knowledge
Preschoolers have
Inflated opinion of memories
Little appreciation for importance of memory cues
Understanding of memory abilities and skill in evaluating performance on memory tasks improves considerably by years of age

23. Metacognition in Adolescence and Adulthood
Adolescents more likely than children to effectively manage and monitor thinking
Middle age adults have accumulated a great deal of metacognitive knowledge
Older adults tend to overestimate memory problems they experience on daily basis