Three Types of Cognitive Processes

Three Types of Cognitive Processes

"Jung described two kinds of cognitive processes--perception and judgment. Sensation and Intuition were the two kinds of perception. Thinking and Feeling were the two kinds of judgment. He said that every mental act consists of using at least one of these four cognitive processes" (Berens, 2013, p. 1). Within these four basic processes there falls many secondary processes, such as the three chosen to examine in this paper: Attention, Intuition, and Imagination, all which play key roles in the successful cognitive development of people.

Cognitive Process of Attention

The first process that will be examined is attention. According to Cognifit (2013) "attention is a cognitive process that lets you selectively focus and concentrate on one aspect of your surrounding and environment while disregarding others" (para. 1). In order for anyone to be able to learn new skills and sharpen old skills is to listen and pay attention to what is going on around them. People need to have the ability to tune out unnecessary noise and distractions and focus solely on a specific set of instructions or information. If people we constantly interrupted, nothing would be properly learned.

Attention is, in fact, a key concept in learning and without it people would be full of bits and pieces of information but no solid knowledge. In the field of psychology, attention can be sub-divided into four further domains. First divided attention allows people the ability to multi-task. Next is selective attention allows the subject to pay attention to select information despite being. Next is sustained attention states that the subject can pay consistent attention despite distracting stimuli, and finally orienting attention which allows the subject to respond to specific outside stimuli (Flack, 2009).

In The Contributions of Memory and Attention Processes to Cognitive Abilities by Sybille Rockstroh and Karl Schweizer conducted two experiments in which "the contributions of memory and attention processes to the cognitive abilities of reasoning and perceptual speed were investigated" (Rockstroh & Schweizer, 2001, p. 30). Experiment one consisted of 220 males between the ages of 18 and 40 years. Each participant was given several tests; short-term memory, long-term memory, continuous attention, attentions switching, and ability scales; in a quiet room with standard lighting. Ultimately the test concluded that the memory tests had longer reaction times than the attention tests. Experiment two 116 males, also between 18 and 40 years of age, were given the same tests as in experiment one along with two additional tests; working memory test and test of covert orientation. The results of this experiment duplicated the first experiment. Based on the results of both test "Obviously, there is a moderate relationship between memory processing and cognitive abilities" (Rockstroh & Schweizer, p. 39).

Cognitive Process of Intuition

Intuition is the thought or feeling happen, without any concrete