Abstraction and The Process of Recognition

This chapter discusses the abstraction and the process of recognition, concerned with the successive stages of processing that are involved in the encoding of simple stimuli and with the record that each stage produces.

Abstract

This chapter discusses the abstraction and the process of recognition. It is concerned with the successive stages of processing that are involved in the encoding of simple stimuli and with the record that each stage produces. These issues lie within the areas of perception and memory, respectively. Because the recognition of stimuli is impossible without stored information, it will also be necessary to consider learning of trace systems applicable to the classification of patterns never before seen. The process of moving from the top to the bottom may be called abstraction. In psychological research, the term abstraction has been used in two different ways. One sense of abstraction involves the selection of certain portions or aspects of an experience. A second sense refers to the classification of a stimulus into a wider or more inclusive superordinate category. The second sense of abstraction has been used primarily with the investigation of object names. This sense of abstraction does not involve selection of any physical aspect of the stimulus, but rather a relationship between a particular stimulus name and another broader category name.