Undergraduate Course: Developing Relational Concepts (PSYL10119)
Course Outline
| School | School of Philosophy, Psychology and Language Sciences |
College | College of Humanities and Social Science |
| Course type | Standard |
Availability | Available to all students |
| Credit level (Normal year taken) | SCQF Level 10 (Year 4 Undergraduate) |
Credits | 10 |
| Home subject area | Psychology |
Other subject area | None |
| Course website |
None |
Taught in Gaelic? | No |
| Course description | The ability to reason relationally - based on the roles that an object plays, rather than the literal features of that object - is fundamental to some of our most interesting and unique cognitive capabilities (e.g., mathe,atics, humour, science). In fact, the ability to think rela-tionally has been posited as the fundamental difference between human and non-human animal cognition (Penn et al., 2008).
Predictably, children do not appear to start out with the ability to reason using (or seemingly even to represent) relations. Rather, the ability develops on a seemingly domain by domain basis. This course will focus on the development of relational cognition. We will explore theories, empirical data, and neurophysiological results that seek to explain how the ability to reason relationally develops.
Each week's session will comprise a lecture as well as group discussions based on the course readings.
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Information for Visiting Students
| Pre-requisites | Degree major in Psychology and passes in psychology courses at least to the equivalent of junior honours level in Edinburgh.
Prior agreement with the 4th year Honours Course Organiser |
| Displayed in Visiting Students Prospectus? | Yes |
Course Delivery Information
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| Delivery period: 2014/15 Block 2 (Sem 1), Available to all students (SV1)
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Learn enabled: Yes |
Quota: None |
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Web Timetable |
Web Timetable |
| Course Start Date |
20/10/2014 |
| Breakdown of Learning and Teaching activities (Further Info) |
Total Hours:
100
(
Lecture Hours 10,
Programme Level Learning and Teaching Hours 2,
Directed Learning and Independent Learning Hours
88 )
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| Additional Notes |
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| Breakdown of Assessment Methods (Further Info) |
Written Exam
0 %,
Coursework
100 %,
Practical Exam
0 %
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| No Exam Information |
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| Delivery period: 2014/15 Block 2 (Sem 1), Part-year visiting students only (VV1)
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Learn enabled: No |
Quota: None |
|
Web Timetable |
Web Timetable |
| Course Start Date |
20/10/2014 |
| Breakdown of Learning and Teaching activities (Further Info) |
Total Hours:
100
(
Lecture Hours 10,
Programme Level Learning and Teaching Hours 2,
Directed Learning and Independent Learning Hours
88 )
|
| Additional Notes |
|
| Breakdown of Assessment Methods (Further Info) |
Written Exam
0 %,
Coursework
100 %,
Practical Exam
0 %
|
| No Exam Information |
Summary of Intended Learning Outcomes
By the end of the course, students should:
- Understand what relational cognition is.
- Appreciate the centrality of relational cognition in human thinking.
- Understand how the ability to represent and reason using relations changes with development.
- Appreciate the difficulty in accounting for relational cognition and for how relational cognition develops in children.
- Understand the various methodologies (developmental, empirical, neural, computational) that are brought to bear on addressing how relational thinking develops.
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Assessment Information
Coursework essay (70%)
Students will write a 2500-word essay in the style and format of the basis for a grant application. This will present a brief outline of an important issue or open problem raised in the course, and the beginnings of a proposed outline for research to address that issue.
Critical summary of core readings (30%)
Students will write three 1 page reading response summaries. Each response will be about one of the core readings. Students will receive feedback on their first summary from the instructor. They will then provide feedback for one another on the second summary (i.e., each student will be encouraged to provide feedback to one other student's response summary). The final summary will be marked by the course organiser and this mark will contribute 30% to the student's final mark.
Visiting Student Variant Assessment (100%)
Essay (3000 words) set by the course organiser and due 4pm, Thursday 11 December. |
Special Arrangements
| None |
Additional Information
| Academic description |
Not entered |
| Syllabus |
Not entered |
| Transferable skills |
Not entered |
| Reading list |
Andrews, G. & Halford, G.S. (2002). A cognitive complexity metric applied to cognitive devel-opment. Cognitive Psychology, 45, 153-219.
Doumas. L. A. A., Hummel, J. E., & Sandhofer, C. M. (2008). A theory of the discovery and predication of relational concepts. Psychological Review, 115, 1 - 43.
Gentner, D (2003). Why we¿re so smart. In D. Gentner and S. Goldin-Meadow (Eds.), Language in mind: Advances in the study of language and thought (pp.195-235). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Gentner, D., Rattermann, M. J., Markman, A. B., & Kotovsky, L. (1995). Two forces in the de-velopment of relational similarity. In T. J. Simon & G. S. Halford (Eds.), Developing cognitive competence: New approaches to process modeling (pp. 263-313). Hillsdale, NJ: LEA.
Hosenfeld, B., van der Maas, H.L.J., & van den Boom, D. (1997). Indicators of discontinuous change in the development of analogical reasoning. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 64, 367-395.
Morrison, RG, Doumas, LAA, & Richland, LE (2011). A computational account of the devel-opment of analogical reasoning: The importance of inhibitory control in working memory. De-velopmental Science, 14, 516-529.
Rattermann, M. J., & Gentner, D. (1998). More evidence for a relational shift in the development of analogy: Children's performance on a causal-mapping task. Cognitive Development, 13, 453-478.
Richland, L.E., Morrison, R.G., & Holyoak, K.J. (2006). Children¿s development of analogical reasoning: Insights from scene analogy problems. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 94, 249¿273.
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| Study Abroad |
Not entered |
| Study Pattern |
Not entered |
| Keywords | Not entered |
Contacts
| Course organiser | Dr Alex Doumas
Tel: (0131 6)51 1328
Email: Alex.Doumas@ed.ac.uk |
Course secretary | Ms Fiona Graham
Tel: (0131 6)50 3440
Email: F.Graham@ed.ac.uk |
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