The Mental Representation of Visual Information

The Mental Representation of Visual Information PDF Author: Joel Robitaille
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
Despite working in relative independence, the working memory and imagery literatures investigate the mental representation of visual information. Recent reports investigating the neural structure and their associated functional activity responsible for the creation and maintenance of these cognitive representations suggest a significant overlap between these fields of study. Because each field has adopted methodologies that does not allow for a direct comparison of the mental representation described by their respective literatures, it is difficult to determine whether imagery and working memory representations are related. Hence, the current thesis further investigates the properties of the visual representation of visual information to bridge between the imagery and working memory fields. In a first study, I compare the psychophysical properties of simple stimuli commonly used in working memory reports with more complex objects adopted by the imagery field. In the course of three experiments, I demonstrate that the cost of stimulus complexity predominantly affects the quality of the mental representation while still providing evidence of a shared cognitive mechanism driving the formation and maintenance of these representations. In a second study, I evaluate the impact of mental rotation on these mental representations as well as whether the adoption of different paradigms, along with different performance metrics, assess the same cognitive construct. Here again, I show strong evidence in support of a common cognitive mechanism driving the performance across mental manipulation and through assessment methods. Finally, the last study attempted to track the manipulation of these visual representations by applying an encoding model to raw EEG activity. While I show evidence of the orientation-relevant activity during perception, the encoding model does not detect reliable enough activity to allow for tracking the orientation of the stimulus during retention and mental rotation. Together, this thesis provides evidence of a shared cognitive mechanism that drives visual working memory and imagery representation, but tracking these mental representations using EEG activity during manipulation remains unclear.

The Mental Representation of Visual Information

The Mental Representation of Visual Information PDF Author: Joel Robitaille
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 0

Get Book Here

Book Description
Despite working in relative independence, the working memory and imagery literatures investigate the mental representation of visual information. Recent reports investigating the neural structure and their associated functional activity responsible for the creation and maintenance of these cognitive representations suggest a significant overlap between these fields of study. Because each field has adopted methodologies that does not allow for a direct comparison of the mental representation described by their respective literatures, it is difficult to determine whether imagery and working memory representations are related. Hence, the current thesis further investigates the properties of the visual representation of visual information to bridge between the imagery and working memory fields. In a first study, I compare the psychophysical properties of simple stimuli commonly used in working memory reports with more complex objects adopted by the imagery field. In the course of three experiments, I demonstrate that the cost of stimulus complexity predominantly affects the quality of the mental representation while still providing evidence of a shared cognitive mechanism driving the formation and maintenance of these representations. In a second study, I evaluate the impact of mental rotation on these mental representations as well as whether the adoption of different paradigms, along with different performance metrics, assess the same cognitive construct. Here again, I show strong evidence in support of a common cognitive mechanism driving the performance across mental manipulation and through assessment methods. Finally, the last study attempted to track the manipulation of these visual representations by applying an encoding model to raw EEG activity. While I show evidence of the orientation-relevant activity during perception, the encoding model does not detect reliable enough activity to allow for tracking the orientation of the stimulus during retention and mental rotation. Together, this thesis provides evidence of a shared cognitive mechanism that drives visual working memory and imagery representation, but tracking these mental representations using EEG activity during manipulation remains unclear.

Representation in Mind

Representation in Mind PDF Author: Hugh Clapin
Publisher: Elsevier
ISBN: 008054052X
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 271

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Book Description
'Representation in Mind' is the first book in the new series 'Perspectives on Cognitive Science' and includes well known contributors in the areas of philosophy of mind, psychology and cognitive science.The papers in this volume offer new ideas, fresh approaches and new criticisms of old ideas. The papers deal in new ways with fundamental questions concerning the problem of mental representation that one contributor, Robert Cummins, has described as "THE problem in philosophy of mind for some time now". The editors' introductory overview considers the problem for which mental representation has been seen as an answer, sketching an influential framework, outlining some of the issues addressed and then providing an overview of the papers. Issues include: the relation between mental representation and public, non-mental representation; misrepresentation; the role of mental representations in intelligent action; the relation between representation and consciousness; the relation between folk psychology and explanations invoking mental representations

Stretching the Imagination

Stretching the Imagination PDF Author: Cesare Cornoldi
Publisher:
ISBN: 019535673X
Category : Imagery (Psychology)
Languages : en
Pages : 209

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Book Description


The Case for Mental Imagery

The Case for Mental Imagery PDF Author: Stephen M. Kosslyn
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0195179080
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 257

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Book Description
When we try to remember whether we left a window open or closed, do we actually see the window in our mind? If we do, does this mental image play a role in how we think? For almost a century, scientists have debated whether mental images play a functional role in cognition. In The Case for Mental Imagery, Stephen Kosslyn, William Thompson, and Giorgio Ganis present a complete and unified argument that mental images do depict information, and that these depictions do play a functional role in human cognition. They outline a specific theory of how depictive representations are used in information processing, and show how these representations arise from neural processes. To support this theory, they seamlessly weave together conceptual analyses and the many varied empirical findings from cognitive psychology and neuroscience. In doing so, they present the conceptual grounds for positing this type of internal representation and summarize and refute arguments to the contrary. Their argument also serves as a historical review of the imagery debate from its earliest inception to its most recent phases, and provides ample evidence that significant progress has been made in our understanding of mental imagery. In illustrating how scientists think about one of the most difficult problems in psychology and neuroscience, this book goes beyond the debate to explore the nature of cognition and to draw out implications for the study of consciousness. Student and professional researchers in vision science, cognitive psychology, philosophy, and neuroscience will find The Case for Mental Imagery to be an invaluable resource for understanding not only the imagery debate, but also and more broadly, the nature of thought, and how theory and research shape the evolution of scientific debates.

Cognitive Approaches to Human Perception

Cognitive Approaches to Human Perception PDF Author: Soledad Ballesteros
Publisher: Psychology Press
ISBN: 1317782607
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 316

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Book Description
Examining the current state of the research in perception stressing contributions in visual information processing, this volume provides an original and timely account of recent results obtained in this and other related areas of cognitive psychology. The scope of the book is intended to be broad, featuring state-of-the-art contributions from a number of outstanding researchers from different parts of the world -- the United States, Europe, and Australia. The intention is to update areas of considerable theoretical implications and active experimental investigation in this broad field called the "psychology of perception." This volume's main purpose is to highlight, from a cognitive position, a selected number of important theoretical and empirical topics which deal with critical issues in perception and other high level, related cognitive processes such as attention, mental representation, memory, word naming and semantic categorization. The studies reported were designed to answer many far-reaching questions including: * Is the global precedence effect due to low or high level processing? * Can veridical and illusory perception be explained by the same theory? * What is the relationship between attention and perception? * Is perception "direct" or an inferential process? * What mechanisms are involved in picture and word naming and categorization? * How can word and picture processing be modeled? The answers to these questions seek to unite theoretical perspectives on very important areas of cognitive psychology such as attention, perception, representation of visual objects and words, and human memory.

Seeing Objects

Seeing Objects PDF Author: Michela C. Tacca
Publisher:
ISBN: 9783897857094
Category : Visual perception
Languages : en
Pages : 126

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Book Description


Perception beyond Inference

Perception beyond Inference PDF Author: Liliana Albertazzi
Publisher: MIT Press
ISBN: 0262549174
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 463

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Book Description
Proposing a new paradigm for perceptual science that goes beyond standard information theory and digital computation. This book breaks with the conventional model of perception that views vision as a mere inference to an objective reality on the basis of "inverse optics." The authors offer the alternative view that perception is an expressive and awareness-generating process. Perception creates semantic information in such a way as to enable the observer to deal efficaciously with the chaotic and meaningless structure present at the physical boundary between the body and its surroundings. Vision is intentional by its very nature; visual qualities are essential and real, providing an aesthetic and meaningful interface to the structures of physics and the state of the brain. This view brings perception firmly in line with ethology and modern evolutionary biology and suggests new approaches in all disciplines that study, or require an understanding of, the ontology of mind. The book is the joint effort of a multidisciplinary group of authors. Topics covered include the relationships among stimuli, neuronal processes, and visual awareness. After considering the mind-dependent growing of information, the book treats time and dynamics; color, shape, and space; language and perception; perception, art, and design.

The Roles of Representation in Visual Perception

The Roles of Representation in Visual Perception PDF Author: Robert French
Publisher: Springer Nature
ISBN: 3031573536
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 471

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Book Description


Mental Representation and Processing of Geographic Knowledge

Mental Representation and Processing of Geographic Knowledge PDF Author: Thomas Barkowsky
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 3540361944
Category : Computers
Languages : en
Pages : 189

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Book Description
In cognitive science, mental representations of spatial knowledge are metaphorically referred to as cognitive maps. However, investigations in cognitive psychology reveal that the cognitive map metaphor is inadequate and that more suitable conceptions of human spatial knowledge processing are needed. This book addresses mental processing of knowledge about geographic space from an AI point of view by presenting an experimental computational modeling approach. Results about human memory and visual mental imagery from cognitive psychology are combined with AI techniques of spatial and diagrammatic knowledge processing. The author develops the diagrammatic reasoning architecture MIRAGE as a comprehensive conception of human geographic knowledge processing.

Discovering the Brain

Discovering the Brain PDF Author: National Academy of Sciences
Publisher: National Academies Press
ISBN: 0309045290
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 195

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Book Description
The brain ... There is no other part of the human anatomy that is so intriguing. How does it develop and function and why does it sometimes, tragically, degenerate? The answers are complex. In Discovering the Brain, science writer Sandra Ackerman cuts through the complexity to bring this vital topic to the public. The 1990s were declared the "Decade of the Brain" by former President Bush, and the neuroscience community responded with a host of new investigations and conferences. Discovering the Brain is based on the Institute of Medicine conference, Decade of the Brain: Frontiers in Neuroscience and Brain Research. Discovering the Brain is a "field guide" to the brainâ€"an easy-to-read discussion of the brain's physical structure and where functions such as language and music appreciation lie. Ackerman examines: How electrical and chemical signals are conveyed in the brain. The mechanisms by which we see, hear, think, and pay attentionâ€"and how a "gut feeling" actually originates in the brain. Learning and memory retention, including parallels to computer memory and what they might tell us about our own mental capacity. Development of the brain throughout the life span, with a look at the aging brain. Ackerman provides an enlightening chapter on the connection between the brain's physical condition and various mental disorders and notes what progress can realistically be made toward the prevention and treatment of stroke and other ailments. Finally, she explores the potential for major advances during the "Decade of the Brain," with a look at medical imaging techniquesâ€"what various technologies can and cannot tell usâ€"and how the public and private sectors can contribute to continued advances in neuroscience. This highly readable volume will provide the public and policymakersâ€"and many scientists as wellâ€"with a helpful guide to understanding the many discoveries that are sure to be announced throughout the "Decade of the Brain."