PSYC 213 Lecture Notes - Lecture 3: Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation, Electroencephalography, Roger Wolcott Sperry

• School: McGill University
• Department: Psychology
• Course: PSYC 213
• Professor: Signy Sheldon

Document Summary

Cognitive neuroscience linking mental actions to the brain. The brain as an organ of the mind. Cognitive neuroscience: the field of psychology that aims to discover the brain mechanisms that give rise to human mental functions. An ambitious goal that requires multiple research approaches. Many different views for the relationship between the brain and behavior. A common view of neuroscientists is that the brain is composed of modules. These modules are each designed to perform a very limited number of tasks and cannot do anything else. Modularity of mind hypothesis: made popular by fodor in 1983. Different mental functions are serves by specific mental organs that are dedicated to those particular purposes (modules are domain specific: they are fast and work in a mandatory manner. These mental organs are associated with different fixed" brain structures or systems. Goes against the view that the brain functions as a general-purpose information- processing device: there is a functional specialization in the brain.