Integrating cognitive psychology, neurology and neuroimaging

In the last decade, there has been a dramatic increase in research effectively integrating cognitive psychology, functional neuroimaging, and behavioral neurology. This new work is typically conducting basic research into aspects of the human mind and brain. The present review features as examples of such integrations two series of studies by the author and his colleagues. One series, employing object recognition, mental motor imagery, and mental rotation paradigms, clarifies the nature of a cognitive process, imagined spatial transformations used in shape recognition. Among other implications, it suggests that when recognizing a hand's handedness, imagining one's body movement depends on cerebrally lateralized sensory-motor structures and deciding upon handedness depends on exact match shape confirmation. The other series, using cutaneous, tactile, and auditory pitch discrimination paradigms, elucidates the function of a brain structure, the cerebellum. It suggests that the cerebellum has non-motor sensory support functions upon which optimally fine sensory discriminations depend. In addition, six key issues for this integrative approach are reviewed. These include arguments for the value and greater use of: rigorous quantitative meta-analyses of neuroimaging studies; stereotactic coordinate-based data, as opposed to surface landmark-based data; standardized vocabularies capturing the elementary component operations of cognitive and behavioral tasks; functional hypotheses about brain areas that are consistent with underlying microcircuitry; an awareness that not all brain areas implicated by neuroimaging or neurology are necessarily directly involved in the associated cognitive or behavioral task; and systematic approaches to integrations of this kind.     

On applying cognitive psychology

Recent attempts to assess the practical impact of scientific research prompted my own reflections on over 40 years worth of combining basic and applied cognitive psychology. Examples are drawn principally from the study of memory disorders, but also include applications to the assessment of attention, reading, and intelligence. The most striking conclusion concerns the many years it typically takes to go from an initial study, to the final practical outcome. Although the complexity and sheer timescale involved make external evaluation problematic, the combination of practical satisfaction and theoretical stimulation make the attempt to combine basic and applied research very rewarding.     

Memory metaphors in cognitive psychology

In describing memory phenomena in natural language, a spatial metaphor is typically employed. Memories are considered to be objects that are stored in a mind space, and the process of retrieval is conceived as a search for these objects. It is argued that this metaphor has been carried over into many of the popular theories of memory in cognitive psychology and that seemingly diverse theories employ the same underlying set of assumptions. A survey of the analogies that have been used to explain memory is presented and alternatives to the dominant spatial storage and search assumptions are discussed. The spatial metaphor is evaluated, and the role of analogical explanation in psychology is briefly considered. One result of the increasing number of analogical models is the proliferation of hypothetical mental constructs that are only loosely connected to behavioral measures. nt|mis|A number of members of Ebbinghaus Empire at the University of Toronto contributed analogies that are listed in Table 1 and commented on the views expressed here.     

Prominent publications in cognitive psychology

This article identifies the 50 publications in cognitive psychology that were most frequently cited in the professional literature between 1979 and early 1982. The characteristics of these publications are discussed, and comparisons are made with other relevant findings.     

Computer use in cognitive psychology

Some influences of computers on theory and methodology in cognitive research are discussed. Theoretical constructs that cognitive science has borrowed from computer science include processing algorithms, processing rates, information organization, and information selection. The application of these constructs to human information processing is considered, with illustrations from memory and reading research. Further, the role of computers in research methodology is evaluated, on the basis of a comparison of 1962 and 1992 journal articles. Attributes considered include the nature of stimulus control, item content and physical features, cognitive task demands, information feedback to subjects, and assessment of individual differences in cognitive strategies. These methodological attributes are illustrated by memory and reading paradigms for which computer technology is critical. Computer science has enriched theory and data in cognitive science, but the comparison of journal articles from 1962 and 1992 suggests that many psychologists are not taking full advantage of these possibilities.     

Simulation systems for cognitive psychology

Three views of the function of computer simulation in cognitive psychology are analyzed. The strong view that computer simulations will produce more rigorously specified theories is seen to be overstating the case. Two more pragmatic views are supported. One looks at computer method as a means of exploring or validating psychological theories. The other looks to computer simulation as a source of useful concepts. Several recent simulation efforts are presented as illustrations of these latter views. After establishing some perspective on the uses of simulation, the discussion turns to psychological simulation languages and to aspects of programming environments that facilitate simulation work. A new simulation language, PRISM, is described. PRISM’s design is intended as a response to some of the issues raised in this paper.     

The reductionist ideal in cognitive psychology

I offer support for the view that physicalist theories of cognition don't reduce to neurophysiological theories. On my view, the mind-brain relationship is to be explained in terms of evolutionary forces, some of which tug in the direction of a reductionistic mind-brain relationship, and some of which which tug in the opposite direction. This theory of forces makes possible an anti-reductionist account of the cognitive mind-brain relationship which avoids psychophysical anomalism. This theory thus also responds to the complaint which arguably lies behind the Churchlands' strongest criticisms of anti-reductionism — namely the complaint that anti-reductionists fail to supply principled explanations for the character of the mind-brain relationship. While lending support to anti-reductionism, the view defended here also insures a permanent place for mind-brain reduction as an explanatory ideal analogous to Newtonian inertial motion or Aristotelian natural motion.I wish to thank the Synthese referees for their comments and suggestions. I also wish to thank Steve Bowen, Elise Brenner, and Arthur Fine for helpful discussions and Joseph Owens for his comments on a version of this paper read at the Central Division Meetings of the American Philosophical Association held in Cincinnati in April 1988.     

Tolman's cognitive analyses: predecessors of current approaches in psychology.

Hindsight is always helpful. I hope that I have provided some appreciation of why the experiment by Tolman et al. (1946) is a classic and deserves to be included in this series. Evaluating the extent to which this particular experiment actually influenced the development of all of the endeavors described above is difficult, and I leave it to those individuals who have an interest in the history of science to draw the appropriate conclusions. Even without direct causality, the continued relevance of this experiment is striking. We might all wish that we have sufficient foresight to investigate significant problems in such a way that our own contributions are still considered important almost 50 years after we make them.