LANGUAGE

Language is a system of communication using gestures, sounds, or written symbols

that have significance for those who use the language and follow its rules. In
speech, phonemes are the smallest units of sound in a language, and although they
individually have no meaning, they acquire it when combined. For example, the
phonemes k and r alone convey no meaning (other than that they are letters), but
together they sound like car, which is a meaningful sound in the English language.

Semantics. The term semantics refers to the study of meaning in a language. The

smallest unit of meaning in spoken language is called a morpheme, which in many
instances is itself a word. The word overcoat is composed of two
morphemes, over and coat. Language rules govern the combination of morphemes to
create meaning; overcoat, for example, means something different than does coatover.

Sentences. Language rules also dictate syntax, how morphemes are put together to

form sentences, groups of words that make meaningful statements. Pragmatics is the
study of language as used in particular situations, which may affect its meaning.
Consider the statement, “What a wonderful day!” and its various meanings if the sun is
shining, if the rain is pouring down, and if the speaker has just received a traffic ticket.

Acquisition of language. B. F. Skinner believed that language acquisition, an

important development in childhood, occurs because of reinforcement, that is, because
childrens' parents or other caregivers reward them when their initially random sounds
most resemble speech. Linguist Noam Chomsky contested Skinner's approach and
proposed the well‐known, but controversial, theory that children have an innate neural
mechanism called a language acquisition device (LAD) (not yet discovered), which
allows them to master language.

Developmental psychologists have subsequently documented the general process of

language acquisition, which is usually thought to progress through the stages shown in
Table 1.
 PROBLEM SOLVING
Steps in problem solving

 Problem interpretation involves defining a problem and assigning it to a

category. For example, defining the problem of how to pay for a college
education would involve arriving at what the total costs will be including tuition,
books, lab fees, housing, transportation, and so forth, in order to have a clear
idea of the exact dimensions of the problem.
 Evaluation of solutions, the process of deciding on a strategy to solve a
problem, may be accomplished by

 trial and error: guessing or randomly trying an approach

 information retrieval: retrieval of pertinent information from long‐term
memory; for example, recalling what a friend told you about her success in
combining student loans and money earned from a part‐time job to pay her
expenses
 algorithms: the methodical development of a step‐by‐step method to solve
a problem; for example, creating a spreadsheet detailing plans for income‐
producing activities and projected expenses for each year of college
  heuristics: rules of thumb to deal with a problem, sometimes based on
information easily available in memory. For example, you might believe that
since you've often heard that college funds are always available to students
if they're willing to search them out, such funds will necessarily be available
to you. You may, however, be inaccurate in your judgment if the information
you've recalled is inaccurate.

A well‐known heuristic tactic is called means/ends analysis. The process requires the

identification of discrepancies that exist between a current situation and the
achievement of a goal and then making changes that will reduce the differences.
Another tactic is the formation of subgoals, the development of intermediate steps
necessary to solve a problem. In some cases, it helps to work backward from the
solution. This heuristic procedure requires consideration of the goal, conceptualization
of steps necessary to solve the problem, and then accomplishing the steps nearest the
goal first. For example, in planning for college, the student first chooses the college,
then determines what the costs will be, then selects a job or prepares for getting a job
that will allow that amount to be earned or first determines what the college's entrance
requirements are and then plans for all of those to be met, and so forth.

Obstacles to solving problems

 Although arousal (motivation) is necessary for problem solving, high arousal is

detrimental to the process. Relaxation techniques can help to reduce such
arousal and increase problem‐solving efficiency.
 A mental set, a predisposition to approach problems in a certain fashion, can be
helpful or harmful, depending on the set. For example, the set to do all homework
before watching evening TV may be more likely to result in academic
achievement than the reverse set of TV/study.
 Functional fixedness is the tendency to view an object or an activity in only one
way—for example, seeing mathematics as a subject to be feared rather than as
one that simply requires the learning of rules to solve problems and that is
necessary to career development.

Aids in solving problems

 To establish expertise is to establish the knowledge necessary to solve a

problem—for example, by reading the chapter in the psychology text before
attempting to answer the questions at the end of it.
 Insight is the sudden perception of the relationship between the components of
a problem—for example, suddenly thinking of the word that fits the spaces in a
crossword puzzle.

DECISION MAKING
 At least two procedures are used in decision making, choosing between
possible solutions to a problem.

 In the compensatory process, all possible solutions are evaluated based on

certain desirable features, which may overshadow certain undesirable ones.

 In the noncompensatory process, possible solutions are eliminated in a step‐

by‐step process based on how well they meet all criteria—for example, cost,
availability, and longevity.

Risky decisions are those made in the face of considerable uncertainty about the
outcome of the decision. For example, although statistically the odds of winning a lottery
are small, people still make the risky decision to participate. If they calculated the
probability that their lottery ticket would be the winning one, the risk would be clear, but
such decisions often rest on other than logical bases. Deciding to buy or not buy the
lottery ticket can be affected by the way the decision maker frames the choice: “Oh, you
spend only a dollar a week on the lottery, but you may make millions” vs. “For the $52 a
year the lottery costs, I could buy some decent shoes; the chances of winning are only
one in two million anyway.”

IMAGES
Cognitive psychology is devoted to the study of mental processes used
in cognition (thinking, remembering, and using language), which involves
processing, understanding, and communicating information through the use of
images, concepts, language, and problem solving. Images, mental, nonverbal
representations of sensory experiences, affect our thinking and learning,
particularly when dealing with physical skills and certain nonverbal material such
as mathematical formulas. For example, the image we hold of a champion's
superb golf stokes may govern our own attempts to develop similar skills.