The Adaptive Character of Thought
Published on 11. January 2013
290 pages
978-1-134-74781-8 (ISBN)
Description
This important volume examines the phenomena of cognition from an adaptive perspective. Rather than adhering to the typical practice in cognitive psychology of trying to predict behavior from a model of cognitive mechanisms, this book develops a number of models that successfully predict behavior from the structure of the environment to which cognition is adapted. The methodology -- called rational analysis -- involves specifying the information-processing goals of the system, the structure of the environment, and the computational constraints on the system, allowing predictions about behavior to be made by determining what behavior would be optimal under these assumptions. The Adaptive Character of Thought applies this methodology in great detail to four cognitive phenomena: memory, categorization, causal inference, and problem solving.
Reviews / Votes
"Anderson has made an important methodological contribution by forcefully bringing the rational approach to the attention of cognitive psychologists."-American Journal of Psychology
"This substantive book may give new direction to much research in cognitive science....Perhaps the most encouraging implication of this volume is that by its very departure from traditional approaches to cognitive science, it helps enforce the breadth and, by implication, the potential for adaptability of the discipline."
-Contemporary Psychology
More details
Series
Language
English
Place of publication
London
United Kingdom
Publishing group
Taylor & Francis Ltd
Target group
Professional and scholarly
Product notice
Reflowable
File size
6,28 MB
ISBN-13
978-1-134-74781-8 (9781134747818)
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Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions
John R. Anderson
The Adaptive Character of Thought
Book
11/2015
1st Edition
Psychology Press Ltd
€76.80
Shipment within 10-20 days
John R. Anderson
The Adaptive Character of Thought
Book
06/1990
1st Edition
Psychology Press
€230.27
Shipment within 10-20 days
Person
John R. Anderson
Content
Contents: Part I:Introduction. Preliminaries. Levels of a Cognitive Theory. Current Formulation of the Levels Issues. The New Theoretical Framework. Is Human Cognition Rational? The Rest of This Book. Appendix: Non-Identifiability and Response Time. Part II:Memory. Preliminaries. A Rational Analysis of Human Memory. The History Factor. The Contextual Factor. Relationship of Need and Probability to Probability and Latency of Recall. Combining Information From Cues. Implementation in the ACT Framework. Effects of Subject Strategy. Conclusions. Part III:Categorization. Preliminaries. The Goal of Categorization. The Structure of the Environment. Recapitulation of Goals and Environment. The Optimal Solution. An Iterative Algorithm for Categorization. Application of the Algorithm. Survey of the Experimental Literature. Conclusion. Appendix: The Ideal Algorithm. Part IV:Causal Inference. Preliminaries. Basic Formulation of the Causal Inference Problem. Causal Estimation. Cues for Causal Inference. Integration of Statistical and Temporal Cues. Discrimination. Abstraction of Causal Laws. Implementation in a Production System. Conclusion. Appendix. Part V:Problem Solving. Preliminaries. Making a Choice Among Simple Actions. Combining Steps. Studies of Hill Climbing. Means-Ends Analysis. Instantiation of Indefinite Objects. Conclusions on Rational Analysis of Problem Solving. Implementation in ACT. Appendix: Problem Solving and Clotheslines. Part VI:Retrospective. Preliminaries. Twelve Questions About Rational Analysis.
