- cognitive psychology
- cognitive psychology n a branch of psychology concerned with mental processes (as perception, thinking, learning, and memory) esp. with respect to the internal events occurring between sensory stimulation and the overt expression of behavior compare BEHAVIORISMcognitive psychologist n
* * *
the branch of psychology concerned with all human activities relating to knowledge. More specifically, cognitive psychology is concerned with how knowledge is acquired, stored, correlated, and retrieved, by studying the mental processes underlying attention, concept formation, information processing, memory, and speech (psycholinguistics). Cognitive psychology views the brain as an information-processing system operating on, and storing, the data acquired by the senses. It investigates this function by experiments designed to measure and analyse human performance in carrying out a wide range of mental tasks. The data obtained allows possible models of the underlying mental processes to be constructed. These models do not purport to represent the actual physiological activity of the brain. Nevertheless, as they are refined by testing and criticism, it is hoped that they may approach close to reality and gradually lead to a clearer understanding of how the brain operates.* * *
the branch of psychology that deals with how the human mind receives and interprets impressions and ideas.
Medical dictionary. 2011.