Models and theories of brain function in cognition within a framework of behavioral cognitive psychology

Abstract

The present article presents a nonexhaustive collection of contemporary models and theories on brain function and discusses these models and theories within a framework of explanatory formulations in behavioral cognitive psychology. Such a mission was accomplished by evaluating the cognitive implications in the explanatory formulations with respect to established laws/principles and models/theories of behavioral cognitive psychology. The article also points to problem areas of behavioral cognitive psychology for which the explanatory formulations have solutions to offer. The article shows that the cinematographic hypothesis, the new visual model, the synergetic model, and the theory of whole-brain-work emphasize various aspects of perception. The formulations on P300 theory emphasize attention and also working memory. The theory on cognits is a comprehensive account of memory. Characteristic to all of these explanatory formulations and also to that on the complexity and its evolution and that on neurocognitive networks is the emphasis on selective distribution, integration to the point of supersynergy, and dynamicity. Such a viewpoint was not only applied to the operations of the brain but also of cognition. With such a conceptualization, the explanatory formulations could account for cognitive processes other than the ones emphasized. A common aspect in a majority of the formulations is the utilization of the oscillatory activity as the valid activity of the brain. The article points out that a frontier in cognitive psychophysiology would be the study of the genetics of brain oscillations.