Question Spotting Collection

oberazzi @ Flickr

You can find the question spotting stuff using the "question spotting" tag; however, I thought it might be nice to have them all in one place. These were my eight:

Neuropsychiatry
Language, Thought & Modularity of Mind
Language
Consciousness
Evolutionary
Human Factors
Developmental Disorders of Communication
Vision (no longer a course)

Developmental Disorders

undercover_surrealist @ Flickr

GENERAL

Discuss the view that language is domain-general with reference to developmental disorders of communication.

People with learning disabilities can have problems with language. Does this provide evidence for the cognition hypothesis of language development?

Nativists, such as Pinker (1994), believe that humans have an innate predisposition for language. Is this true and why?

INPUT PROBLEMS

A child who has been reared in isolation without verbal input is discovered at the age of 7. What are the prospects for their subsequent language development?

Why are cases of temporary language deprivation of particular interest to those studying the development of language, and what do they show?

How important is early input for the development of language?

What evidence is there for a critical period of language development. What implications does this have?

You are presented with three children who have been deprived of verbal input for 3 years, 6.5 years and 14 years. Discuss how you would prioritise efforts to teach each child language. Justify your answer.

Discuss how otitis media is of interest to developmental psycholinguists.

DS

How far does research into DS support or reject the cognition hypothesis?

What can we learn about language from studies of DS individuals?

Why might there be a language delay in sufferers of DS?

With reference to data from DS individuals, how far would defend or reject a modular view of the mind (with specific focus on language)?

SLI

How do children acquire the past tense of verbs? Discuss with reference to evidence from developmental disorders.

Do Williams Syndrome and Specific Language Impairment constitute a double dissociation? Discuss the theoretical implications of your answer.

How does SLI speak to the issue of innateness of language?

Does SLI provide evidence for a domain specific or domain general problem in language?

Is there a gene for language?

WS

Does the existence of specific developmental disorders provide evidence for the modularity of mind?

Is the acquisition of past tense in Williams syndrome any way support of Pinker’s Words and Rules account?

Brock (2007) has suggested researchers no longer use Williams syndrome as an example of the modularity of language? Why might he have said this?

How intact are the language abilities in Williams syndrome? What theoretical implications does this have?

Does Williams syndrome support the view that language abilities are innate?

Evaluate Williams syndrome in terms of connectionist modelling.

Does language development depend on cognitive development. Discuss with reference to Williams syndrome.

AUTISM

How central is a theory of mind impairment to the psychology of autism?

Evaluate the possible explanations for autism.

Why do individuals with autism have difficulty understanding lies, metaphors and irony?

Do autistics have a domain-specific or domain-general impairment?

Can the triad of problems in autism be explained by ‘mindblindness’?

OUTPUT PROBLEMS

What are the theoretical implications of output disorders? What can they tell us about the view that language is modular?

Evidence from studies on the effect of speech disorders on subsequent language ability indicate that speech production is modular. Discuss.

Evolutionary Questions

margolove @ Flickr

GENERAL

Why do humans reproduce sexually and not asexually?

Why do humans have two genders? What implication does this have on behaviour?

How can evolutionary theory help us to understand human behaviour?

Contrast the EP and HBE approaches in the study of human behaviour and psychology, with emphasis on their strengths and limitations.

"Many of the complexities of human behaviour have their roots in our biology trying to stay fifteen seconds ahead of the parasites." (Sharpfella, 2008). Discuss.

How can traits that reduce viability and survivability be favoured by evolutionary processes?

Good genes models of sexual selection can only explain why males evolve sexually dimorphic traits. Discuss.

Why is parental investment theory of such value to modern evolutionary psychology?

SEXUAL STRATEGIES

Males are polygamous; females are monogamous. Discuss the accuracy of this statement and explain why this might/might not be the case.

What have the solutions to the problems of mate choice produced in terms of different sexual strategies?

There is disagreement as to whether human mating is solely designed for long term mating or for short-term promiscuous mating. Why might contemporary evolutionary psychologists consider this dichotomy incomplete?

Discuss the different mating strategies available to humans and couch them in a theoretical framework.

Why might women typically dislike casual sex?

Humans are designed to operate pluralistic mating strategies. Discuss.

How does balancing genetic quality and parental quality in mate choice manifest itself in human sex differences?

What are the differences in jealousy between the sexes? Why might this be?

Are humans polyandrous?

What can the study of human faces tell us about mating strategies?

Discuss the trade-off between quality of offspring and quantity of offspring.

In what ways are mating strategies context-specific?

RISK

Account for risk proneness in males using theories of sexual selection.

In evolutionary terms, what might homicide as an extreme index of aggression and risk taking tell us?

What risk factors increase the likelihood of homicide? Justify your answer with evolutionary logic.

America and Canada both allow their citizens to have guns and yet the homicide rate in America is significantly more. One of the major differences between the two countries is the income inequality. Discuss from first biological principles why this might be the cause of this gross homicide discrepancy.

INFANTICIDE

Infanticide is an evolutionary adaptation. Discuss.

Who is more likely to kill their offspring: genetic parents or stepparents? Why?

Discuss how evolutionary psychology bears upon infanticide.

KINSHIP, RECIPROCITY AND SHARING

"Bats will help each other out because ultimately this is a selfish act for them. In humans this line of reasoning is simply not consistent with the data. We need a better theory." (Bob, 2008). What, in your justified opinion, is an example of a 'better theory' of human altruism?

How can our genetic relatedness to a person determine whether we will help them altruistically?

Some theorists believe that kin selection (Hamilton, 1964) is not the only reason why altruistic behaviour has evolved. Discuss.

Social exchange reasoning is a domain-specific, cognitive adaptation that allows us to detect cheaters (Cosmides & Tooby, 2005). Discuss.

Are there modules for social exchange?

Are people altruistic to non-relatives? Why?

Are the classical theories enough to account for human altruism?

Will it be necessary to look at group selection to account for some human behaviours?

What is strong reciprocity and is it useful?

Language, Thought, Modularity of Mind

dere-street @ Flickr

Is the perception of red altered by having language?
Does the perception change between speakers of different languages?
Can the perception of red affect the lower level properties of language?

GENERAL

Systems in the brain do not interact. Discuss.

How might language affect our perception of the world?

How might the language we speak affect our perception of the world?
(note the universal effect of language/specific language effects distinction between these questions)

Does language have an effect on thought, does the language spoken change anything and can thought have an effect on language and on vision?

To what extent is the mind modular? Discuss with reference to language and perception.

Are the visual and auditory processing systems informationally encapsualted?

Can thought affect the lower-level properties of language?

The language system is impenetrable. Discuss.

The structure of language affects thought and vice versa. Discuss.

Discuss how language and thought interact.

To what extent is language affected by thought?

"We have default modes of thought laid down by biology. Language, however, has the power to usurp these in line with its own ways of carving up the world, even if they do not differ from the biological defaults" (Clevergirl, 2008). Discuss this statement with reference to a variety of experimental methodologies.

COLOUR

Assess the linguistic relativity hypothesis with regard to colour perception.

‘‘[W]e dissect nature along lines laid down by our native language’’ (Whorf, 1956). To what extent has recent research supported this claim?

Our language affects the way we carve up the colour spectrum. Discuss.

Language affects colour perception. Discuss.

In terms of colour, where do you stand on the universal or relativist debate and why?

How have animal studies been used to speak to the linguistic relativity hypothesis?

Discuss how neuropsychological investigation has brought clarity, if any, to the debate over the universal effects of language.

Critically assess the current state of the linguistic relativity hypothesis.

"Language is a system that does language. It does not interfere with our fundamental understanding of the world" (Arandomer, 2008). Discuss this claim.

SOUND

With reference to evidence from studies on the perception of speech sounds how far can you defend or reject the linguistic relativity hypothesis?

Is the system supporting speech perception modular ?

Speech perception represent an instance of categorical perception. What is the evidence for linguistic influences on these perceptual processes?

MATHS

What can a comparison of human and non-human animals tell us about language’s role in maths?
Is maths dependent on language?

A patient presents with severely impaired language abilities. Based on other research how would you predict his maths performance?

SPACE

How might language affect spatial reasoning?

Critically analyse the linguistic relativity hypothesis with specific reference to the domain of space.

Discuss the evidence that language can shape our thinking of space.

TIME

Assess the linguistic relativity hypothesis with regard to time.

Our language affects the way we think about time. Discuss.

OBJECTS

Assess the linguistic relativity hypothesis with regard to objects.

Our language affects the way we think about objects. Discuss.

MODULARITY

Defend or reject the strong Fodorian modularity of mind hypothesis.

Discuss how thought interacts with lower level processes.

Are vision and language informationally encapsulated?

Information encapsulation is, according to Fodor, “the most important aspect” (Fodor, 1983, p.37) or, more strongly, the sine qua non of modularity (Fodor, 2005). To what extent do systems in the mind conform to this aspect?

Consciousness: questions

thomashawk @ Flickr

General

On the basis of neuropsychological data reject two theories of consciousness.

Discuss three theories of consciousness. Reject two of them and support one.

Discuss a theory of consciousness, explaining how it might account for sleep and waking, anaesthesia and coma data.

Is consciousness localised?

Is consciousness a property of the brain?

What evidence should a theory of consciousness account for? What is the best theory that does this?

Discuss some of the philosophical problems of consciousness.

What are the ‘hard’ and ‘easy’ problems of consciousness? Discuss an attempt to solve the ‘hard’ problem.

Is the study of consciousness a scientific or philosophical endeavour?

The Department for Children, Schools and Families contacts you asking for a 1500 word brief on what to include in a new A-level called 'Consciousness'. Write this brief explaining, with justification, what to include.

Discuss how consciousness might arise out of the activity of nervous brain tissue.

Brain Damage - Cortical

Cortical damage tells us little about the nature of consciousness. Discuss.

What do brain damaged patients tell us about consciousness?

Consciousness is a product of the cortex. Discuss.

What can split-brains tell us about consciousness?

Can a language-based theory of consciousness be supported by cortical brain damage data?

Brain Damage - Subcortical

What can subcortical damage tell us about consciousness?

Discuss the role of subcortical systems in the maintenance of attention and cortical arousal.

A scientific paper reports that damage to a small region of the subcortex leads to an obliteration of consciousness. The authors conclude that they have localised consciousness. Have they?

What role might the thalamus play in consciousness?

What do studies of sub-cortically brain-damaged patients tell us about consciousness?

"Time is as important as space in the neurobiology of consciousness" (Adude, 2008). Discuss.

Attention

Is attention consciousness?

What can the study of attention tell us about consciousness?

Sleep

What can we learn about consciousness from the study of sleep and waking?

What can REM sleep in particular tell us about consciousness?

The time the majority of humans spend unconscious at night is one of the most fertile periods for the understanding of consciousness. Discuss.

How can the neurobiology of sleep be useful in supporting or rejecting theories on the nature of consciousness?

"Freud said dreams were the royal road to the unconscious. Actually, the neurobiology of dreaming (REM) may be the royal road to the understanding of consciousness." (Abloke, 2008). Discuss.

Functionalism

Will machines ever be conscious?

Assess the arguments for and against the claim that the brain is functionally equivalent to a computer.

Criticise functionalism.

Is the problem of consciousness one that can be addressed scientifically?

“If all that matters is the computation, we can ignore the brain’s wiring diagram, and its chemistry, and just worry about the ‘software’ that runs on it” (Dennett, 2001). Critically evaluate this functionalist argument.

Can cognitive psychology provide a complete account of consciousness, or are alternative approaches required?

The film The Matrix takes as an assumption that human consciousness can be represented computationally. Can it?

Why might the "whir of information processing" (Chalmers, 1995) be insufficient for explaining first person experience.

"Consciousness is not borne of algorithm" (Antifunctionalist, 2008). Discuss.

Language (Level 3)

Pink Floyd | Keep Talking | " For millions of years mankind lived just like animals. Then something happened which unleashed the power of our imagination. We learned to talk" Ah, what an opening. The question is: how did we 'learn' to talk and what cognitive tricks let us do it?

GENERAL

Sorry, can't find my general ones.

SPECIFIC

Language and Thought

Are there universal effects of language on thought?

To what extent is linguistic relativity a reality?

A journalist states, "Languages do not determine thought but they can bias it." To what extent is she correct in saying this?

"Perception of colour, sound, and space are free from influence by language" (Anabosultist, 2008). Discuss.

Spoken word recognition

Discuss the problems afforded by the nature of natural speech that must be overcome in order to establish an accurate model of speech perception?

With reference to empirical data, discuss competing theories of how an individual segments speech.

How can humans understand speech with such ease when this ability has never been replicated by computer scientists?

Is speech perception strictly a ‘bottom-up’ process?

How might humans go about understanding spoken utterances? Try to provide evidence from a wide range of methodologies.

Speech is sequential, variable and continuous. How does the language system overcome this?

Sentence and discourse processing

Discuss the evidence relating to garden path- and constraint-based models of sentence processing in terms modularity.

Is sentence processing modular?

How has eye tracking procedures helped researchers build a model of how sentences are processed?

Interactive models of speech processing explains the majority of empirical evidence and as such should lead researchers to abandon modular theories. Discuss.

Bilingualism

Do bilinguals have a separate system governing their second language?

Why might connectionist models be useful to understanding bilingual lexical memory?

How is a bilingual’s lexical memory organised?

How does late bilingualism speak to the issue of critical periods?

Speech production

What can speech errors tell us about speech production?

Speech production according to Garrett (e.g. 1992) is serial and sequential. Assess this claim drawing on speech error analysis.

What have speech errors done for our understanding of speech production?

Which are more instructive: analysis of speech errors or experimental evidence? Illustrate your answer with example from speech production research.

Are semantic and phonological stages separate in speech production?

Discuss how the human cognitive system might achieve speech production.

Neuropsychology

Critically evaluate 19th century neurolinguistic models in the light of more recent evidence.

Discuss the history of neuolinguisitcs. What has changed since the 19th century?

What has neuroimaging contributed to our understanding of language processing in the brain?

Critically discuss to what extent recent developments in neuroimaging have advanced our understanding of psycholinguistic functions.

Evolutionary

Is language innate?

What can non-human language studies tell us about human language?

Is language 'special' or just a biproduct of having a big brain?

Put Jackendoff’s theory of the development of language into a broader evolutionary and linguistic context.

Critically evaluate the debate between nature and nurture in early language acquisition.

Humans are born with a predisposition to acquire language. Discuss.

Language is learnt. Discuss.

Evaluate the evidence for the domain specificity of language.

Human Factors

The Space Shuttle flight deck - probably one of the most complex systems in the world - before Human Factors people got their mits on it.

The Space Shuttle flight deck after a Human Factors makeover.

GENERAL

Discuss why the value of cognitive ergonomics is being increasingly recognised by system designers.

What is user centred design and why should it be used? Illustrate you answer with examples.

All complex systems should have input from Human Factors professionals at all stages of development. Discuss.

How can psychology inform design?

Why is Human Factors engineering important?

The commercial success of Apple products is often attributed to its 'user-centred design'. Discuss with other examples how this might be achieved throughout the product cycle.

"The majority of design is system-centred. This is its downfall." (Madeupman, 2008). Discuss the statement and how the design process can be improved.

You are writing a letter to the Dean of Engineering explaining why all students in her Faculty should have to take courses in cognitive psychology. Using examples, what would you argument be and why?

"The most important component in design: the human". What might Thisdude (2008) mean by this? Illustrate your answer with examples.

SPECIFIC

Knowledge elicitation

What are the problems of knowledge elicitation and how might they be overcome?

Why might it be hard to elicit knowledge from an expert? How might the problems be overcome?
What is an expert and why might it be hard to elicit knowledge from them?

Extracting useful knowledge from experts is impossible. Discuss.

Limits and Capabilities

How can we utilise our knowledge of perception in order to design better systems?

How can an understanding of human capabilities and limitations be used in the design of complex systems? Illustrate your answer with examples.

Discuss how human information processing models have assisted in the design of complex systems.

You are asked to provide an ergonomics brief for a cockpit systems designer. What information would you give him and why?

What factors should a complex system designer take into account if humans are to use the end product?

Input devices

How can the psychological literature assist designers of input devices?

What ways can information get into a system and identify any problems that there may be in doing this.

Critically assess ubiquitous input devices and suggest future directions for better interaction with systems.

QWERTY dominates. Why?

The WIMP interface will not last. Discuss.

How can knowledge of human cognitive abilities constrain the design of input devices?

You are hired by Apple who are interested in a psychologist's perspective for the new MacBook. You are asked to give them a 1500 word brief on 'Improving Input Design'. Write this report.

Output devices

How can the psychological literature assist designers of output devices?

Visual displays while dominant need not be the only way of presenting information to the user. Discuss.

The Ministry of Defence hires you to help them build a new Tactical Operations Centre. They specifically want informed advice on output devices. What recommendations would you make and why?

How can knowledge of human cognitive abilities constrain the design of output devices?

Interaction issues

What issues should a system designer take into account when developing a complex system?

How can systems be made cognitively compatible? Illustrate your answer using examples.

A significant trend in technology is to automate. Discuss the psychological interaction issues that arise out of this trend.

Role of Human Factors

Human Factors is just common sense. Discuss.

What is wrong with the current role Human Factors plays in the life-cycles of many products and systems?

What is the band-aid approach to Human Factors and why is it theoretically dubious?

Where should Human Factors be deployed in the life-cycle or a product or system? Illustrate your answer with some recent examples.

Error

Using examples discuss why human error reduction should be holistic.

Humans make errors. What are the implications of this for the design of systems and products?

Why is human error such a difficult area of study?

In your justified opinion which models of human error can help reduce the risk of incidents and accidents?

How can Human Factors reduce the errors made by humans?

What is the ‘system design-induced error’ (Wiener, 1987) concept? How is it useful to Human Factors?

Why when trying to reduce human error are end-users only ‘half the story’?

The ‘band-aid’ approach to human error is wrong. Discuss.

When humans using systems make their first error, this is actually the second error: the first is designer's. Discuss.

Workload

What is mental workload, how is it measured and why it is important to the design of complex systems?

Humans have limited mental resources. How might we be able to measure the use of these during tasks? What, if any, are the problems of this approach?

In a new cockpit design it is found that pilots are being mentally overloaded. How might this conclusion have been drawn and what suggestions could a psychologist make to the designer?

Critically evaluate current measures of workload.

Why is Human Factors interested in workload?

Evaluation

How would you evaluate a software package from a user-centred design perspective?

Discuss some of the advantages and disadvantages of formative evaluation.

Discuss some of the advantages and limitations of summative evaluation.

Compare and contrast summative and formative evaluation. Illustrate your answer with questions.

When should evaluation take place in the product lifecycle? Justify your answer.

How might a product or system be evaluated from a user-centred design perspective

Neuropsychiatry Questions

laszlo-photo @ Flickr

GENERAL

What is neuropsychiatry and should it take the place of the two sub-disciplines that already exist. Why?

The mind and brain are separate entities. Assess the validity of this statement and indicate any implications your conclusions have for medical science.

Are psychiatric 'illnesses' real?

Why should psychiatry symptoms be evaluated from a neurological perspective?

What is functional illness and why is it no longer a useful construct?

You are writing a letter to the Dean of Medicine, explaining why psychiatry and neurology should be combined both for research and for teaching. What would your argument be?

People with schizophrenia, eating disorders, depression, addition etc are not really ill in the true medical sense. Discuss.

What is wrong with psychiatry and neurology as they are currently?

A leading physician announces that mental illness must be understood by "chemicals, culture and everything in between". What might she mean? Illustrate your answer with clinical examples.

SPECIFIC

Psychosis

Is psychosis something made up by the patient?

What can visual hallucinations tell us about schizophrenia?

Hallucinations are nothing more than creations on the part of the ‘sufferer’ for attention. Discuss this in the light of recent findings.

Psychosis – Somatic Hallucinations

What can we hope to learn from phantom limb syndrome?

How do somatic hallucinations speak to the mind-brain problem?

Schizophrenia is a functional disorder. With reference to somatic hallucinations, assess this statement.

Why are discussions of somatic hallucinations useful to proponents of neuropsychiatry?

Eating disorders

Discuss the pattern of change in the scientific approach toward eating disorders?

How has neuroimaging helped researchers to map the neural correlates of eating disorders? Is it enough to understand it?

Eating disorders are a purely social phenomenon. Discuss.

What is known about the aetiology of eating disorders?

Mood

Is there any evidence suggesting that mood disorders can be caused by brain pathology? If so, why wont this account be complete?

Do depression and mania have an organic basis?

How can the occurrence of depression and mania be affected by brain function?

Are individuals with severe depression just malingerers?

Somatoform disorders

Conversion disorder is ideopathic. Discuss this statement in light of recent neuroscientific findings.

What does Vuilleumier’s (2005) review tell us about conversion disorder?

The DSM-IV claims somatoform disorders are those without an organic basis. Is the DSM-IV correct?

What is body dysmorphic disorder, is it a stand-alone disorder and what ways might one go about treating it?

Why are recent findings on conversion disorder so valuable to the case for neuropsychiatry?

Dissociative disorders

Dissociative disorders are alterations in the subjective nature of consciousness. How does recent research into their nature speak to the mind/brain debate?

Dissociative and somatoform disorders are traditionally as functional disorders. Are they?

Anxiety

Do anxiety disorders only develop because of socio-cultural factors?

Anxiety disorders only have biological causes. Discuss.

What are the biological mechanisms that cause anxiety disorders?

Why might a person have anxiety disorder?

Obsession

Obsessive-compulsive behaviour can be observed as a symptom and personality trait. Discuss.

Are we accurate to infer that damage to the right hemisphere is the cause of OCD?

Discuss the mediatory effects of neurochemicals in OCD. How does this speak to the issue OCD's status as a mental illness?

Religion

Is religion rooted in the brain?

Religion is an evolutionary adaptation with a neural basis. Discuss.

Question Masters: Some help...

rock_alien @ Flickr

You need to become question masters, experts in plucking latent questions out of the academic air. I thought you might like some help. I'll be releasing all the ones I came up with for Level 3. All forthcoming posts on this will be tagged with the label "question spotting".

Question Masters

There are questions everywhere; you just need to find them.

Whether you decide to act as a lone wolf or as group (which I strongly recommend) in the research stages here is a skill that will serve you very well.

After you have finished writing about an area in your revision and while it is still alive in your mind simply write down some specific and general questions that could be asked of you.

This will train your thinking process, making you more sensitive to the arguments drifting about in the academic winds.

And it is crisp, crunchy argument that is crucial, way more important than coughing up a wet lump of unstructured facts you have learnt, which no one wants to deal with. Science is not about facts, it's about theories and how facts can be used in service of those theories. It's about understanding the most with the least, not about collecting the most. Exam questions will mostly get you do this - argue and explain - so try to guess what you might have to argue and explain before it is asked of you.

When you are trying to think about the sort of questions that might be asked look back to the previous exams (I cut out all the questions for a course, glued them onto a A4 page, blew them up on the photocopier and then drew links between similar questions).

Ask yourself, is there anything that keeps cropping up (e.g. Neuropsychiatry, how everything comes down to the brain; DDC, how the disorders can speak to the issue of the innateness of language; Human Factors, how taking into account human abilities and limitations is vital for better design and so on)?

Then there will be conspicuousness by absence; once you have mapped out what has been, you'll find yourself thinking about what hasn't. Kit hasn't asked anything on 'qualia' recently, Jan hasn't posed anything big on workload etc (these are examples not actual cases). Write down these missing areas because they may come up.

Another trick is to do theme extraction across a course. This may sound a bit ominous but you can cheat and scour the course notes for those telling titles or comments that wink at the bigger picture. Often lecturers will cram their first and final lecture with this kind of stuff - be sensitive to it.

For the specific questions you will just need familiarity with an area, which will come from writing your notes and discussing it with each other (note, doing both is the best way to get the question tree blossoming).

Think about questions (and their answers) all the time and come the exam you'll not only be able to identify the questions that suit you best but you will have been thinking about answers to them for months instead of those precious few minutes at the start.