Handbook of Learning and Cognitive Processes (Volume 1)

Book excerpt: From the Foreword: "Is it possible at present to identify a core cluster of theoretical ideas, concepts, and methods with which everyone working in the area of learning and cognition needs to be familiar? Would it be possible to make explicit the relationships that we feel do or must exist among the various subspecialties, ranging from conditioning through perceptual learning and memory to psycholinguistics, and to present these in a sufficiently organized way to help specialists and non-specialists alike in relating particular lines of research to the broader spectrum of activity? These questions were posed to a substantial number of investigators who are currently most active in developing the ideas and doing the research. Their response constitutes this Handbook..." First published in 1975, Volume 1 of this Handbook attempts to present an overview of the field and to introduce the principal theoretical and methodological issues that will persistently recur in the expanded treatments of specific research areas that comprise the later volumes. Deferring to the current Zeitgeist rather than to chronology, they begin with the present state of cognitive psychology, then introduce the comparative approach, and conclude this volume with a rapid, three-chapter review of the evolution of ideas from conditioning to information processing.