What is Cognition?
Cognition is that process of the brain that helps you understand, acknowledge, and comprehend various tits and bits of information. The information is thus stored in your brain by the process including, but not limited to knowing, remembering, judging, and problem solving. In this blog, we are going to know what is cognition, and the types of cognitive process.
Cognitive Psychology
The branch of psychology that deals with the understanding, functioning and analysis of the cognitive part of the brain is known as Cognitive Psychology. So basically, the study of the branch of Cognition part of the brain is known as Cognitive Psychology.
Types of Cognitive Process
The types of Cognitive Processes that exist are:
- Attention: For activities that require persistent thinking and pondering over any subject or object, attention is required. The activity is triggered when a specific stimulus in the brain is hit.
- Language: Understanding based on thinking or listening and then deciding what to respond verbally or orally is done via language. The part of brain that’s responsible for language is the one that helps in communication.
- Learning: The part of the brain that’s constantly gulping down new pieces of information, and storing it comes from the Learning Cognitive Process.
- Memory: Memory is an important aspect of cognitive process that not only stores the information, but makes it readily available throughout our lives.
- Perception: The part of the brain that is working towards forming a sense based on the knowledge and information you have about it.
- Thought: The process of decision making, problem solving, and higher reasoning is all done through Thought Cognitive Process.
So, these are the different types of Cognitive Processes. These Cognitive Processes when functioning together and properly help a human make informed decisions about various aspects of life.
Uses of these types of Cognitive Process
The cognitive processes are ever growing and it is a continuous process. No matter whether you are simply sitting, or reading a newspaper, your cognitive process are working at the very same time. It can be a case that at one point of time, more than two cognitive processes are taking place. It may be difficult for you to practice if you are not well trained (mentally). But, there are some people who have been practicing this via meditation.
- Learning a new habit: To learn a new habit, all the types of cognitive process are utilized. Learning is a process that takes new memories and storing them in our brain by creating instructive materials for us.
- Creating new memories :A lot of moments of our lives are being formed as a memory. Even if we want to remember something in future or not, memories are made and can be made at any moment.
- Making decisions: Decisions are made based on the past memories, situations, information, and comparison of the past and present. This is how the different types of cognitive processes help us make decisions.
How to improve your cognitive processes
The cognitive process depends on various factors like genetics, one’s own views and perception of life, and more. We can’t change or alter out genetics as of now (without severely damaging ourselves). But, there are certain things which we can do to improve our cognitive process.
- Staying healthy: Being healthy is the first and foremost requirement of our body. No matter what we want, or want to do, a healthy body is always required to perform and execute various actions.
- Think critically: You should be open to think critically on various topics, question your choices, preferences, likes, dislikes, and more.
- Be curious: Curiosity is the mother of all inventions. If you stay curious and have an open mind to learn, you will definitely help train your cognitive process better.
So, these are the cognitive processes, and the way they function in the human body. For more information on cognition, the psychologies related to it, and more, do follow VISS.