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Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur National Programme on Technology Enhanced Learning (NPTEL) Course Title COGNITION, TRANSFORMATION & LIVES Lecture...

Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur National Programme on Technology Enhanced Learning (NPTEL) Course Title COGNITION, TRANSFORMATION & LIVES Lecture - 03 Human Cognition by Dr. Alok Bajpai Psychiatrist, IIT Kanpur So welcome I hope in the last two lectures we have got enough food for thought and would already be thinking on the lines of looking at life in a different perspective and trying to looks slightly deeper when I said you would be thinking so what is thinking, actually if you look at it all life if you boiled on can be block to in your behavior when you talk of behavior and how the self proceeds in the world it actually boils arounds to your cognition emotions your coordination that is intent grossly speaking it has finite definitions also and the your action, action is a result of your thought and emotion and your circumstances and all. So we will not talk about action at these juncture let us pick up the important part which you do it which you are still doing involved I was doing while in this brief pause was thinking, thinking is a part of cognition but what is cognition? Cognition is often used as the synonyms word for thinking but is it just one monomyth a homogenous process of brain which we called cognition or is it composed of something else. (Refer Slide Time: 02:17) Actually cognition has lot of connected processes within it which can be marked as abstraction, judgment and these are things which we do it we live by it. Decision making and how do you reach these are higher level process these are higher process but they use perception the perception is giving a meaning to the all the sensory things which have gone through a sense organ language and this all leads to an higher order of function but why do you want to do it. As we talked in the previous lecture the brain has this habit of taking experiences saving memories pushing you through certain acts all for survival, and how do you survive you survive through the knowledge of the world around you so all this cognition and memory they all work for knowledge gaining new and modifying the old one what is already there like for example if you would have gone to a restaurant in your childhood when you was small and the instructions which the parents gave how to eat and how to behave and all is a knowledge store in a place like restaurant how do you behave, how do you behave in a hospital. Or how to do you behave in a classroom all this is gone into your memory is the experiences and even at that time when the experience was going and you putting your brain into devising new ways of doing it but many years later when you go there alone or with your spouse or with your friends that old knowledge will not continue the same way like you behaving like a 5 year old would have and what your parents told also you would not be doing the same thing that the new knowledge will get into your brain and modify the old one maybe when you become a parent again you are going to repeat the same story to your child. But that is a different ball game altogether even then that the time would not remain the same so it is like you cannot step into the same reward twice the same thing by the time you put your foot into a river take it out put it again water has flown in so does the memory, memory is like and the experiences are like this so cognition involves all this then thinking is the product of it thinking as a product has all this things. (Refer Slide Time: 05:25) What I was just mentioning since this is a type of stuff which you do in your life. You are solving a problem either through algorithms or through heuristic process you are doing abstract thinking when you are creating an art form you creating a story or you creating a painting at that time you are doing abstract thinking the abstract thinking I can give you an example like if you the proverbs the proverb the everything that shines is all that glitters is not gold is you know if somebody can tell you that ok,whatever is this everything there is a thing here which is shining and it is not gold it is a very, very concrete way what you know within your mind gone through the education process gone through the society that it has the abstract meaning, one should not run for everything that seems very very attractive it may not be actually gold the process which you all engineers know much better the surgeons know it fixing equipment and activities of daily living where you need judgment little bit of judgment, that you have to obviously decide about your breakfast you are going to have a hot milk protect your hand from it so all this process is really go into thinking. (Refer Slide Time: 06:46) I think therefore I am Descartes said this and that was the time when it was believe that because I think that is the only thing the world exist show me in my thought, they were contrary views with that you cannot actually think, you do not think you actually get all the senses and then all the senses the all the sensations and the imaginary of the world which gets into the head actually makes your think so your thought is nothing accept for this and then, so on so forth they are very theories to it what is the affect of thinking? The affect of thinking is. (Refer Slide Time: 07:26) Personality do not we say that he is a very thoughtful person and his personalities like this and lot of this things, we assume from behavior which goes on to make your personality after all we relate the thought process for person with the personality he or she exhibits. Relationships whether you going to maintain it, whether you going to destroy it. your beliefs all your belief system all the identities which you have whether you are atheist or agnostic or religious person whether you are Hindu or Muslim you are capitalist or you are a Marxist and you are scientist and it all depends on your belief system. And your belief system determines your behavior which determines your personality and your personality determines which all connected as I said all that is world in all the terms is made of this as a part as I said cognition as one part obviously our action in the action is here and sometimes this beliefs can also land up people in delusions but we will not talk about them here. (Refer Slide Time: 08:50) So we have to look how do you actually become a thinking person how do you develop your cognition. (Refer Slide Time: 08:56) Piaget is one of the physiologist who really gave one of the very comprehensive theories of some of you who would had studied physiology in your courses would know it. I will briefly mention his name he said it is cognitive development (Refer Slide Time: 09:13) right from childhood and he gave the periods of life where people developed different type of cognitive development it is, it happens in chunks it happens in the stages according to Piaget but ultimately it is about gaining knowledge, knowledge from the world of the world and so there has to be so what was developing in knowledge what is a cognitive development got to do with knowledge the logic develops that is the brain the physical the body and the relationship so this is mind this is body and this is here whole relationships. After all everything is in a relationship nothing exist in an isolation this world. Body has it is own knowledge otherwise you would not be surviving how do I move my hand how do I hold this glass and I how do I sip water all this is part of the bodily knowledge ultimately control by the brain but still that pattern of the heavier has to be there after all the a cow one standing on four cannot hold a cup like this she has her own bodily knowledge how to walk and dog has it’s own that is probably spaces a specific. (Refer Slide Time: 10:40) So Piaget went on further is it after all it is about knowledge and the children are active learners as they evolved and as this phases of their growth happens they the brain develops schemes, schemes of incorporating that knowledge through assimilation and accommodation now assimilation or accommodation are two basic process that you take something in and alter that knowledge external thing to fit into you are already existing schemes accommodation is when you change your scheme. To incorporate that knowledge like when you sitting in a crowded train I do not know whether your experience you must have and somebody comes in, he says that Bhai(brother) please accommodate see you actually move create a space that is accommodation you actually change yourself in a very, very physical concrete terms but you cannot ask that person to sit on your lap like assimilation so it takes something in modified it which the brain does and already fits into the already existing scheme accommodation is when you said okay fine. I cannot change this thing let me change my the scheme of things you are on a railway crossing and you say the okay railway crossing is closed you accommodate yourself to it there okay when it will open I will go that is accommodation the schemes change over time they are not as I said a very few thing in the brain which are concrete determine stone type of a scheme it keeps changing it in the knowledge and the scheme into which knowledge is fitted as lot of modification within it so these are the stages. (Refer Slide Time: 12:38) Till two years sensory-motor when the child is trying to whole things to bring food to the mouth torch to warm to lot of experiences preoperational is when the kids starts playing and giving life to the objects around and has the thing the thing everything is living concrete operation is again further the just before teenager and formal operations where so this again is about cause and effect like young children often attribute a cause and effect relationship but as they grow they start developing abstract thinking. Then they know that not everything in the world goes into a cause and effect so this if you look at Piaget theory it was entirely depended on how the mind how the brain evolves as schemes a schemes to interact with the knowledge that comes to the sense organs and through people and develops into a level of thinking he had no role for the social thing and this is what he was (Refer Slide Time: 13:51) criticize for also. Lev Vygotsky brought in the socio-cultural theory. (Refer Slide Time: 13:57) He brought in that it is not only the brain which is evolving and doing all this assimilation it is the culture and the society which is also effecting he said that knowledge whatever knowledge the mind gets in is socially constructed and it is determine by cultures so anybody who is born a certain culture will think accordingly the way that culture has determined so person born in village in India would not think and like a child was a being brought up in New York. Although he may go later and assimilate and accommodate and change a style of thinking but that basic influence of culture will remain and neuroscience when we talk of it will I will discuss this in how this happens and has a biological expression so interactions with more able members of the society zone of proximal development scaffolding now If you put the whole thing together there is an influence of cultural acting with the certain at a certain point of time certain members have these people when they give births to their of springs and has they are bringing the child who is not so able in thinking. And physically or comes into, proximity with more able people like parents so if you and then there is scaffolding is developed like a network. Network which is a lower order which is just about eating, drinking sleep and basic survival and then about learning and about work and about ethic and about that responsibilities that duties the tolerance which you have to develop in the society for people all this if you just look at oneself you will know how you have learned you were not so responsible when you were 2 year old we were taught, we were taught to wear dress and go to school. Do a certain decorum for the school all when we behave with elders and how to give respect to others and how to give place to others at the same time trying to develop your own ambitions your own carrier and forwarding the lot of things but all this were taught to us, we do certain behavior because of our dopamine was pushing, you can connect it all now so you have a certain impulse your brain wants to explore you want to listen to the sound of a glass falling at, every kid trice that. But you cannot do it at home also you cannot do it at restaurant so you do not do it your parents will reprimand or teach next time you go to restaurant you behave properly and you look at your parents for approval whether this are the right behavior parents will endorse it that this is a right behavior now this will get into your scheme and this is how deep structures in brain or forming their network of learning the right behavior which is again express through action with your conscious thought so it all seems connected if you put it in a proper perspective they are theories may differ I am just telling you the broad construct of theories but theories may differ and have contradictions but larger these are goes. (Refer Slide Time: 17:32) So Vygotsky also said that language is the foundation of higher cognitive processes but there may be some people who are thinking in the images, some people may be thinking in musical notes but homosapians differs from lot of other primates in the development of language and language is something which people have try to teach to chimpanzee also with partial success chimpanzee are the our nearest cousins and possibly they also have a template so what is the language this is the private speech which the mind uses That language to construct the knowledge, but there is a spoken speech also which obviously has to follow the societal rules. We can see this in a illness called Autism where children are not using language socially, they have their own private speech they have their own inner speech they may speak out, but that purpose of that language to communicate socially is lost and often they don’t talk or often they are quite and parents are troubled and trying to balance and trying to teach them. But that is the process which everybody has, so as we develop we learn to convert this the knowledge which has been formed in our private language convert it to a spoken language which follows the rules of the society, Vygotsky also was saying that development is a very, very continuous process and it is not a broken to chunks and phases and all. (Refer Slide Time: 19:29) So with this background we go back to a statement which I made that if you go to a book shop you will find lot of self help books, and they what are they telling? They are just telling you that you have a thought and you have action and you will reach success. Most of them are talking about the external success of achievement of power of money of material success some of them are talking about especially with those with the religious background and religious coloring are really talking about your internal changes which you. (Refer Slide Time: 20:06) You heard of Bhagavad Gita we showed at first slide in the first lecture, it was about what? it was about change and Krishna was telling Arjun about a change in cognition, and when I am talking about cognition again as let me remind you, it is not about monolithic thinking it is about abstraction about judgment about the process. So the just is like this if you change your thinking you change your attitude. If you change your attitude, you change your action, this was just a part of the huge discourse which he gave the whole thing is may be is running around 90 minutes if you change your action you change your habit. If you change your habit, you change your personality, if you change a personality you change your destiny, if you change your destiny you change your life. And if you just look it is hierarchical thing which is going on, in fact life is the biggest destiny if there is a destiny the personality runs through this life habits are small actions, again smaller actions leading to habit the whole idea of attitude. So if you put it in the reverse you will see it or eventually if you want to change your life if you want to change this you have to change this but connection between this and this. Hides are very, very important thing whether you can change your thinking and life involuntarily the way it happens by the influence of society or is there a will in it, these are important question the whole discourse if you look at it points out and hides within it a will. This will is the important thing, now we will talk about will in one another future lectures as we move on, but look at it where does this design come from? (Refer Slide Time: 22:35) Where does the idea of consider somebody may just discovered it but after discovering, to put it to some use would have been thought of all these designs how you ride a bicycle is a flight scissors cut specs look at it, discovers your head everything is starts with a thinking eventually. (Refer Slide Time: 22:58) So how do we think, is answering these questions actually how do we see and hear how do we focus our attention, how we remember things, how do we acquire new knowledge, how we communicate, how we reason, how do we solve problems, how do we make decisions. Thinking involves all this actually. (Refer Slide Time: 23:28) So what is happening you the sound goes in it raise process and it is gone into experience this physiology is actually is studying this, the process and experience. (Refer Slide Time: 23:41) So what the models which were explaining this whole cognitive process I will briefly just mention I will not going to the theory of it, Freud we all know Sigmund Freud the originator of psycho analysis talked of the structure of the brain of mind is they some called Id something called Ego they something called super ego Id is the impulsive instinctual self, instinctual self means in same thing which we were talking about like dopamine at that time in earlier 20th and late 19th century dopamine was not known. So obviously he could not give that model but instinctual is the dopamine which pushes you to do impulsive acts exploration it goes out of control obviously leads to crime or physiatrist illnesses super ego is the culture rules, that tell you what is right from wrong and what you should do or you should not do the Freud of those people who thought that man is a beast, and it need societal rules to control it ego is the manager which balances between this and this so the rules are there we have already said in a big fame. Instinct wants to jump here and there so that the instinct does not break this frame the ego place in between, and this is how we talked of if you know defense mechanisms and all which were conversion of this impulsive thought process then he also gave a topographical model which set that Freud may be actually it was the Freudian theory of mind went out of vogue when lot of cognitive physiology came in, but now the neuro science may wise partly proving him correct again unconscious to conscious. We talked about it how your unconscious brain process whatever information goes in through the senses and presents a picture to conscious we will talk about this later so man is a slave of an unconscious mind and the rationalizing animal, he also insisted that childhood experiences make the adult, so what a adult thinks or a adult does has its basis in the childhood experiences. (Refer Slide Time: 26:14) Behaviorism actually toppled Freud and you know the Pavlov and the skinner the focus was the relationship between the observable behavior and the stimulus so what is the learning how do you gain knowledge here, you associate between the stimuli and responses that if a snake comes to you, you have to run away so fight of flight with the natural instinct but your mind makes a decision to run away so it is they said that the learning is all about learning this connection. (Refer Slide Time: 26:50) Pavlov that famous experiment with dog show the food the dog salivates, food and bell salivates then just ring the bell and the dog will salivate. (Refer Slide Time: 27:03) So that went to a certain extreme whether I started talking with all human behavior is just a matter of environmental stimuli as I said the some people believe that human being has nothing it is all about the societal influence a skinner was one of the person who push it forward, and he brought in the concept of that the rewards and punishment, shape or behavior so the dopamine theory again has some basis in this that if your mind gives you reward you will repeat again if there is a punishment. But he was talking about external reward and punishment, but the mind does it from within so what is wrong. (Refer Slide Time: 27:46) Is learning all about forming a stimulus response where does your thought come in. (Refer Slide Time: 27:50) Because this was just take of you, your will and intent if it is the stimulus which decides your response where does the will or intent or thinking come in, it would take of the power of the human mind to change oneself it was obviously so depend on the stimulus and response that you really cannot change yourself what decide your behaviour if we cannot decide what gives you the meaning, this gave raise to cognitive psychology in the last few decades, and this is almost antithesis of behaviorism so on one hand was Freud with his theory of instinctual self the managerial ego and the rules of society. Behaviorism was stimulus and response with where is the thought and cognitive psychology came in with the basis of actually giving power to thinking we will stop at this in this lecture and in the next also we will just continue to take you further in the into cognitive psychology and thank you. Acknowledgement Ministry of Human Resource & Development Prof. Satyaki Roy Co – ordinator, NPTEL IIT Kanpur  NPTEL Team Sanjay pal Ashish Singh Badal Pradhan Tapobrata Das Ram Chandra Dilip Tripathi Manoj Shrivastava Padam Shukla Sanjay Mishra Shubham Rawat Shikha Gupta K.K. Mishra Aradhana Singh Sweta Ashutosh Gairola Dilip Katiyar Sharwan Hari Ram Bhadra Rao Puneet Kumar Bajpai Lalty Dutta Ajay Kanaujia Shivendra Kumar Tiwari an IIT Kanpur Production @copyright reserved