THINKING

By - Mayank Raj
Moderator - Dr. Ravi Mohan Sharma
 Overview

• Introduction

• Historical aspect

• Theories of thinking development

• Neuroscience

• Types of thinking

• Levels of thinking

• Conclusion

• References
 Introduction

• “During most of our waking hours and even when we

are asleep and dreaming, “we are thinking” ; it is hard
not to think
• As you read these words you are thinking and even if
you stop thinking about what you are reading and your
thoughts wander off to something else - perhaps to
what you are going to do tomorrow - you will still be
thinking” - introduction to psychology by Morgan, Weisz
and King
 The Definition of Thinking

• “Cognitive rearrangement of
both information from the
environment and symbols
stored in the long term
memory”

• “Thinking is a mental activity

in its cognitive aspect” - Ross
• Cognition is defined as the mental actions of gaining
knowledge and its comprehension
• Cognition refers to a range of mental processes relating
to the acquisition, storage, manipulation and retrieval of
information
• Cognitive psychology deals with learning, memory,
problem solving and categorisation.
“Overthinking can literally make you insane, and
can cause a mental breakdown”

Mr. Chandrabali Singh

HISTORICAL ASPECT
 Pre historic human thought

• It covers human history before the invention of writing

• The first identified cultures are from the Palaeolithic era

evidenced by cave arts, stone tools etc
• The Aterian culture was engaged in symbolically
constituted material culture, basically ornaments
 The axial age

• Karl Jaspers, a german philosopher came up with a

theory that around 800-300 BCE, we began developing
intellectually due to dwelling into the business of art,
philosophy, science and languages
• This was the when Pluto, Aristotle and Socrates came up
with their theories based on thinking
• Platonism - thinking a spiritual activity. This activity is
understood as a form of silent inner speech in which the
soul talks to itself
• Aristotelianism - the mind is able to think about
something by instantiating the essence of the object of
thought. If you are thinking about trees, the mind
instantiates tree- ness.
 Scientific revolution

• 16th century onwards

• Emergence of modern science - development in physics,

biology, maths, astronomy and chemistry transformed
the views of society about nature
THEORIES OF THINKING
DEVELOPMENT
 Laws of thinking

• Law of contradiction

• Law of excluded middle

• Principle of identity
 Psychoanalytic theory
• Sigmund Freud theorised that the mind was divided into
3 parts : id, ego and super ego
• Id - unconscious source of primitive sexual, dependency
and aggressive impulses ; super ego - subconscious,
setting standards to live by based on societal norms ;
ego - a sense of self, and mediates between realties of
the moment and psychic needs and conflicts
• This theory focused on deciphering how unconscious
mind governs the conscious processes in ways that
interfere with healthy psychological functioning
• Cognitive theory- how and what people think leads to
the arousal of emotions. Certain thoughts and beliefs
leads to disturbed emotions
• Learning theory - how individuals acquire, process,
retain and recall knowledge during the process of
learning
• Considered incomplete
 Cognitive development theory

• Cognitive development : The

theory of Jean Piaget

• In the year 1936, revised in

1950
 Jean Piaget

• He was a Swiss psychologist.

• Created and studied an account of how children and

youth gradually are able to think clinically and logically
and named it staircase model of development
• Piaget believe that learning preceded by the interplay of
assimilation and accommodation
 Staircase model

• Sensorimotor stage

• Preoperational thinking

• Concrete operational thinking

• Formal operational thinking

 Sensorimotor stage
• Brith to Age 2

• Infants think by means of their senses and motor

actions. Infants continually touch, look, listen to,
manipulate and even bite objects
• Object permanence is a major achievement of this stage
- objects exist whether or not they are in sight (around 6
months)
• If not in sight, 18-24 months old infants will search for
them
 Pre-operational stage

• 2 - 7 years

• In this stage children use their ability to represent

objects in a wide variety of activities
• Here children are engaged in imaginative activities and
are thinking at two levels at once - realistic and
imaginative, this dual processing makes it an example
of meta cognition.
 Concrete operational stage
• 7 - 11 years

• As children continue into elementary school, they

become able to represent ideas and events more
flexibly and logically
• The basic principle here is “if nothing is added or taken
way then the amount stays the same”
• It differs from pre-operational stage in two ways -
reversibility, decenter (focus on more than one problem
at a time)
 Formal operational stage

• Age 11 and beyond

• Child becomes able to reason about scienctific and

hypothetical problems
• “What if the world had never discovered oil”?

• Students having the ability to think hypothetically have

an advantage but it does not ensure that the student is
motivated or well behaved, nor does it ensure other
skills, i.e art, sports etc
“The average person has 3000 thoughts per day”

Fun fact 162

NEUROSCIENCE
 Basis of neuroscience

• A neural pathway is the connection formed by axons

that project from neurons to make synapses with other
neurons to enable neuro transmission with the help of
neurotransmitters
• Neurotransmission takes place between synaptses with
the help of action potentia
 Lambic system
• The limbic system is located at the margin of
hypothalamus and cerebral cortex
• Cortical components - hippocampus, insula, cingulate
gyrus, and parahippocampal gyrus
• Sub cortical components - amygdala, olfactory bulb,
hypothalamus, anterior thalamus nuclei and septal
nuclei
• Involved in emotions and behaviours - hunger, memory,
satiety, sexual arousal
 Basal ganglia

• Basal ganglia refers to a collection of grey matter

masses situated deep in the white matter of the
cerebral hemispheres
• Striatum, globus pallidus, subthalamic nucleus,
substantia niagra
• Input - striatum

• Output - globus pallidus

 Neuroplasticity

• Ability of the nervous system to change its activity in

response to intrinsic or extrinsic stimuli by re organising
its functions, structures and connections”
• It is a process that involves adaptive structural and
functional changes to the brain
 Neuro plasticity after injury

• First 48 hours : there is initial damage that cumulates as

cell death with the loss of cortical pathways
• The following weeks : recruitment of support cells
occurs as the cortical pathways shift from inhibitory to
excitatory
• Weeks to months afterwards : The brain continues to
remodel itself via axonal sprouting further re
organisation around the injury
THE THINKING PROCESS
• Symbols used in thinking are often words and
languages, therefore language and thinking are closely
related.
• Along with languages, images are another important
type of symbol used.
• So what makes human thinking better than that of
animals?
 Images and thinking

• People vary remarkably in how much they use images in

their thinking.
• When we use images to think, they are not usually
complete “pictures in the head”
• In general, the images are abstractions of certain
features from previous experiences
 Language and thinking

• For people most of the time, thinking revolves around

use of word symbols and the rules of grammar.
• Some theorists claim that the language can actually
determine the thoughts we are capable of having.
• Because a lot of thinking involves language, an idea
arose in psychology that “thinking was actually a kind of
inner speech” - talking to yourself under your breath.
 Concepts

• A concept is a symbolic construction that represents

some general features of many objects or events
• Concepts are acquired very easily and early in life and
in some way reflect the way in our brain processes and
sorts information
• Example - with a concept of red, u can differentiate
objects into red and non-red
 Problem solving

• Goal directed thinking

• In trying to reach the goal of problem solution, we

mostly use information available to us from long term
memory
 Rules of problem solving

• Rules used in solving problems are concerned with the

changes one has to make in moving from a situation to
the other
• Algorithm

• Heuristics
 Algorithm

• Set of rules which, if followed correctly, will guarantee a

solution to a problem
• However, since we do not have algorithms for most of
our problems we encounter, we must use heuristics
 Heuristics

• Strategies, usually based on our past experience with

problems, likely to lead to a solution but do not
guarantee success
• Sub goals (means and analysis)

• Working backwards
 Heuristic approach

• GBDJFKSKWLDCKSKXCKS

• Word is probably in English

• There are 19 letters in the word

• How many 19 letter words are there in the dictionary?

• Are any letters repeated?

 Decision making

• A kind of problem solving in which we are presented

with several alternatives, among which we must choose
• Example - buying a car

• Heuristics and biases in decision making

TYPES OF THINKING
 Imaginative thinking

• The act or power of forming a mental image of

something not present to the senses or never before
wholly perceived in reality
• Three components : mental imagery, counter factual
thinking, symbolic representation
 Autistic thinking

• Some thinking are highly private and may use symbols

with very personal meanings.
• It mirrors the fulfilment of wishes and strivings

• Bleuber in 1911, directly linked autistic thinking to the

severity of schizophrenia
• Example : fantasizing, day dreaming

• Autistic vs realistic thinking

 Dereistic thinking

• Thinking directed away from reality and not following

ordinary rules of logic
• Irrational but not delusional

• If I hold my nose somebody will die

 Directed thinking

• Solving problems

• Creating something new

• The type of thought we value so much in great human

thinkers
 Concrete thinking

• Literalness of expression and understanding

• “A female patient with schizophrenia came into the

room and promptly took off her shoes” “ I like to keep
my feet on the ground”
 Conceptual or rational thinking

• It does not require the perception of actual objects or

events
• It is superior to perceptual thinking. as it economises
efforts in understanding and helps in discovery and
intervention
• Language plays an important part
 Logical thinking
• It is the cognitive process of drawing conclusions based
on evidence.
• It is a form of controlled thinking in which the thought
process is directed consciously towards the solutions of
a problem
• Also called reasoning, it is the highest form of thinking
to find out causes and predict effects
• Usually an individual tries to solve a problem by
incorporating two or more aspects of his past
experiences
 Logical reasoning classified into :

• Inductive thinking

• Deductive thinking

• Abductive reasoning
 Creative thinking

• It refers to the ability for original thinking, to create or

discover something new
• The ability to integrate various elements of the situation
into a harmonious whole to create something novel
• In other words, cognitive activity directed towards some
creative work
• Creative thinkers are a great boon to the society
 Convergent thinking

• It is a cognitive processing of information around a

common point, an attempt to bring thoughts from
different directions into a union for common conclusion
 Divergent thinking

• Divergent thinking starts from a common point source

and moves outward into a variety of perspectives
• Example : A teacher uses a vehicle as the content to
prompt diverse or unique thinking among students
Divergent vs
convergent
-
 Counterfactual thinking

• It involves non actual situations and events ; i.e what is

contrary to the facts
• “What if” questions

• We evaluate the world around us not only by what

happened but also by what could have happened
• Associated with regrets

• Upward counter factual and downward counterfactual

“Thinking too much about a decision can lead to
analysis paralysis which equates to no decision
being made”

–
LEVELS OF THINKING
 Level 1 : Knowledge

• It involves recall of facts, principles and terms in forms

in which they are learned
• Example : when Ramesh got married to Jyoti, where did
they go for honeymoon?
 Level 2 : Comprehension

• It represents the lowest form of understanding ;

interpretation
• The student knows what is being communicated without
relating it to other material or seeing in its fullest
meaning
• It demonstrates understanding of facts and ideas by
organising, comparing, translating, interpreting, giving
descriptions and stating main ideas
 Level 3 : Application

• It involves the use of abstractions in concrete situation

such as nursing or other specific situations
• It is solving problems by applying acquired , facts,
techniques and rules in a different way
 Level 4 : Analysis

• It is examining and breaking information into parts by

identifying motives or causes ; making inference and
finding evidence to support generalisation
• Examining, differentiating, separating, categorising,
experimenting and deducing
 Level 5 : Synthesis

• Putting parts together or re organising them in a new

way, form or product
• Most difficult mental function
 “Positive thinking can actually help increase your
lifespan, strengthen your immune system and lower
rates of depression”

-LIFE
 Conclusion

• .”People do not like to think, if one thinks, one must

reach conclusions, and conclusions are not always
pleasant”
• We covered Introduction, history of thinking, types of
thinking, levels of thinking, disorders of thought,
examination of thought and references.
 References

• Introduction to psychology by Morgan and King, seventh edition

• Sims’ symptoms in the mind, seventh edition

• Kaplan and Sadock’s synopsis of Psychiatry, SAE 12th edition

• Kaplan and Sadock’s handbook of clinical psychiatry, SAE sixth edition

• Fish’s clinical psychopathology, fourth edition

• Oxford textbook of psychiatry

• open.library.okstate.edu

• www.drjayeshpatidar.blogspot.com

• www.academia.com

• cambridgecognition.com

• National library of medicine

THOUGHTS EMPOWER YOU
Thank you
DISORDERS OF THOUGHT
 Disorders of stream of thought

• Disorders of thought tempo

• Disorders of continuity of thinking

• Obsessions and compulsions

• Thought alienation
 Disorders of thought tempo

• Flight of ideas

• Inhibition or slowing of thinking

• Circumstantiality
 Flight of ideas

• Thoughts follow each other rapidly with no general

direction of thinking with connections between
successive thoughts seem to be due to chance factors
• Typical of mania

• In hypomania, ordered flight of ideas occur

 Inhibition or slowing

• The train of thought is slowed down, and the number of

ideas and mental images are decreased
• Experienced by difficulty in making decisions, lack of
concentration and loss of clarity in thinking
• Lack of attention, so events are poorly registered

• Seen in depression, also in manic stupor

 Circumstantiality

• Over inclusion of irrelevant details

• Thinking proceeds slowly with many unnecessary details

but finally the point is reached
• Seen in learning disability, obsessional personality
traits, schizophrenia and schizoaffectic disorder
 Disorders of continuity of thinking

• Perseveration

• Thought blocking
 Perseveration

• Perseveration occurs when mental operations persist

beyond the point at which they are relevant and thus
prevent progress of thinking.
• Basically repetition of out of context words

• Related to severity of task, so more difficult the

problem, more likely perseveration will occur
• Common in organic disorders
 Thought blocking

• A sudden disruption of thought or a break in the flow of

ideas
• Thought blocking is highly suggestive of schizophrenia

• D/d : over exhaustion, anxious state

 Obsessions and compulsions

• An obsession is a thought that preoccupies an

individual’s mind and dominates his thinking despite the
individual being aware of it
• The sufferer experiences great anxiety and even guilt

• Compulsion is the state of being forced to do something,

despite the individual being aware of it
 Thought alienation
• The patient experiences that his thoughts are under the
control of an outside agency
• In pure thought insertion, the patient knows that the
thoughts are being inserted by an outside force while in
thought deprivation the patient experiences sudden
disappearance of thoughts and are withdrawn from his
mind by an outside agency
• Psychoanalytic interpretation - boundary between the
ego and the outside world has broken down, thus being
an important diagnostic criteria of schizophrenia
 Disorders of content of thinking

• Primary delusions

• Secondary delusions and systematisation

 Primary delusions
• The essence of primary delusional experience is that a new
meaning arises in connection with some other psychological
event
• In the delusional mood the patient has the knowledge that
there is something going on around him that concerns him,
but he does not know what it is
• In a sudden delusional idea, a delusion appears fully formed
in the patient’s mind (autochthonous delusion)
• The delusional perception the attribution of a new meaning
to a normally perceived object
 Secondary delusions

• They arise from some other morbid experience

• There is now considerable acceptance that delusions

can be secondary to depressive moods and
hallucinations and that psychogenic or stress reactions
can give rise to psychotic states with delusions
 Content of delusions

• Delusions of persecution

• Delusions of infidelity

• Delusions of love

• Grandiose delusions

• Delusions of ill health

• Delusions of guilt

• Nihilistic delusions

• Delusion of poverty
FORMAL THOUGHT DISORDERS
 Clang associations

• Thoughts are associated by the sounds of words rather

than by their meaning
• Example - through a song
 Neologism

• The invention of new words or phrases or the use of

conventional words in peculiar or distinctive ways
 Tangentiality

• In response to a question, the patient gives a reply that

is appropriate to the general topic without actually
answering the question
• “Have you had any trouble sleeping lately?” “I usually
sleep in my bed but now I am sleeping on the sofa”
• Circumstantiality

• Flight of ideas

• Perseveration
 Transitory thinking

• Characterised by derailments, substitutions and

omissions. Omission is distinguished from desultory
thinking since in desultoriness, the connection is
loosened but in omission the intention itself is
interrupted and there is a gap
• “The words make sentences, but the sentences do not
make sense”
 Drivelling thinking

• Here the patient has a preliminary outline of a

complicated thought with all its necessary particulars,
but loses prepiminary organisation of the thought so
that all the constituent parts get muddled up
 Desultory thinking

• Speech is grammatically correct but sudden ideas force

their way from time to time. Each one of these ideas is a
simple thought that, if used at the right time, would be
quite appropriate.