Cognitive Psychology

Cognitive psychology is that branch of general psychology which studies the way in which the human mind receives and interprets impressions from the external world. A complete account of the literature and a digest of all the experimental work goes beyond the scope of the present book, which is intended as a textbook for students of psychology. However, the attempt has been made to cite enough data to give reasonable basis for the conclusions presented and at the same time not to neglect important evidence of a contrary character. Because of the student's desire and right to ask of the teacher a definite stand on various problems, such a stand has been taken whenever the evidence allows it and some effort has been made to iron out the conflicts in apparently contradictory lines of experimental evidence. The present textbook faces also metaphysical problems, because the tendency to avoid philosophical issues