SOCIAL COGNITION

Social Cognition



Social Cognition

Introduction

Changes in our environments require us too continuingly to learn new skills and acquire new knowledge therefore it must be said that learning requires an acquisition of new knowledge or new skills, in order for us to cope better in our ever changing environments. Psychologists would agree with the idea that learning creates change, but different psychological perspectives have different views of what is important to learning and what is the best way of studying learning. In this essay it be will discussed and explained using specific research examples of how learning is studied from the cognitive (how information is processed in the mind) and the socialcultural (the use of tools and culture) psychological perspectives, what both of these perspectives specifically mean by learning and how they research their theories to come to their conclusions of how learning is achieved(Karen, Toates, Braisby, 2002, pp.67-78).

Social Cognition

The social cognition learning model asserts that culture is the prime determinant of individual development. Humans are the only species to have created culture, and every human child develops in the context of a culture(Hewstone, Stroebe, 2001, pp.89-91). Therefore, a child's learning development is affected in ways large and small by the culture-including the culture of family environment-in which he or she is enmeshed.

Social cognition has its roots in social psychology which attempts "to understand and explain how the thoughts, feelings, and behavior of individuals are influenced by the actual, imagined, or implied presence of others" (Allport, 1985, p. 3). It studies the individual within a social or cultural context and focuses on how people perceive and interpret information they generate themselves (intrapersonal) and from others (interpersonal) (Stainton-Rogers, 2003, pp.C5).

Both cognitive and socialcultural psychological theories come about with psychologists asking different questions about how learning is achieved; psychological theorists adopt different approaches to learning, for example, cognitive psychologists focus on how the mind processes information using categorization to organize experiences and to make sense of things. Socialcultural psychologists focus more on environmental factors, like social interaction and the use of tools for example computers(Potter, 1996, pp.34-39).

The cognitive perspective begun as a cognitive revolution in the 1960s, which arose not only from dissatisfaction with the behaviourism psychological perspective, but also with the technological advances that have occurred since the 1960s, for example computers. Cognitive psychologists see the mind as having a connection to complex machines for example computers; they see the human mind as a machine metaphor. Their view is that both the human mind and computers function in terms of information processing(Stainton-Rogers, 2003, pp.C5). Cognitive psychologists have studied many different kinds of learning, however, category learning is viewed as giving the best example of what cognitive psychology involves. Category learning is viewed as providing a means by which people can organise their experiences and memory of experiences to learn from based on their prior knowledge(Hewstone, Stroebe, 2001, pp.89-91).

Cognitive psychologists have studied learning by building and testing theories about category learning, gathering information from what people gain during learning and the mechanism that enables ...