Signs, Codes, Spaces, and Arts


Book Description

This book delves into the concepts of general and spatial semiotics, discussing the differences and interactions between semiotic means of diverse types and levels. It introduces an integrative model (“the sign prism”) which unites many famous schemes of sign connection. It considers the human as a being included in a self-created semiosphere of signs and interacting with a sphere of natural signals and indexes available also to animals. The majority of the text is devoted to spatial semiotics, and its distinctions from temporal ways of sign connection. Its specific categories and particular visual-spatial codes are considered here as the peculiar means of communication and thinking. An essential feature of the book is the application of the author’s concepts of spatial semiotics to research of structures and the historical changes of visual arts.




Cognitive Psychology In and Out of the Laboratory


Book Description

Cognitive Psychology In and Out of the Laboratory provides a student-centered approach for undergraduate courses in cognitive psychology. Kathleen Galotti's accessible writing style and use of colorful real-life examples bring the full relevance of cognitive psychology into focus for students, and equips them to understand how theoretical principles apply to real-world problems and the complex functions of the human brain. The text features special coverage of the development of cognition from infancy through adolescence, and extensive coverage of gender, individual differences, and cross-cultural approaches to cognition.




Cognitive Psychology In and Out of the Laboratory


Book Description

Sternberg's text balances accessible writing, practical applications and research scholarship, including biologically oriented information. It explores the basics of cognitive psychology through its coverage of cognitive neuroscience.







Style and Creativity in Design


Book Description

This book looks at causative reasons behind creative acts and stylistic expressions. It explores how creativity is initiated by design cognition and explains relationships between style and creativity. The book establishes a new cognitive theory of style and creativity in design and provides designers with insights into their own cognitive processes and styles of thinking, supporting a better understanding of the qualities present in their own design. An explanation of the nature of design cognition begins this work, with a look at how design knowledge is formulated, developed, structured and utilized, and how this utilization triggers style and creativity. The author goes on to review historical studies of style, considering a series of psychological experiments relating to the operational definition, degree, measurement, and creation of style. The work conceptually summarizes the recognition of individual style in products, as well as the creation of such styles as a process before reviewing studies on creativity from various disciplines, presenting case studies and reviewing works by master architects. Readers will discover how creativity is initiated by design cognition. A summary of the correlations between creativity and style, expressed as a conceptual formula describing the cognitive phenomenon of style and creativity concludes the work. The ideas presented here are applicable to all design fields, allowing designers to comprehend and improve their design processes to produce creative, stylistically unique products.







Word Knowledge and Word Usage


Book Description

Word storage and processing define a multi-factorial domain of scientific inquiry whose thorough investigation goes well beyond the boundaries of traditional disciplinary taxonomies, to require synergic integration of a wide range of methods, techniques and empirical and experimental findings. The present book intends to approach a few central issues concerning the organization, structure and functioning of the Mental Lexicon, by asking domain experts to look at common, central topics from complementary standpoints, and discuss the advantages of developing converging perspectives. The book will explore the connections between computational and algorithmic models of the mental lexicon, word frequency distributions and information theoretical measures of word families, statistical correlations across psycho-linguistic and cognitive evidence, principles of machine learning and integrative brain models of word storage and processing. Main goal of the book will be to map out the landscape of future research in this area, to foster the development of interdisciplinary curricula and help single-domain specialists understand and address issues and questions as they are raised in other disciplines.