Course Meeting Times
Lectures: 2 sessions / week, 1.5 hours / session
Course Description
9.63 teaches principles of experimental methods in human perception and cognition, including design and statistical analysis. The course combines lectures and hands-on experimental exercises and requires an independent experimental project. Some experience in programming is desirable. To foster improved writing and presentation skills in conducting and critiquing research in cognitive science, students are required to provide reports and give oral presentations of three team experiments. A fourth individually conducted experiment includes a proposal with revision, and concluding written and oral reports.
Course Requirements
Class Format
There is no final exam for this course. The “final” is Paper 3.
The mid-term held in Ses #21 is an open book exam.
Readings
Wolfe, J., et al. Sensation and Perception. Sunderland, MA: Sinauer Associates, 2005. ISBN: 9780878939381.
McBurney, Donald H., and Theresa L. White. Research Methods. 6th ed. Belmont, CA: Thomson/Wadsworth, 2004. ISBN: 9780534524180.
Francis, Greg, et al. CogLab on a CD. 3rd ed. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth, 2003. ISBN: 9780534640675.
Assignments
Paper 1 is a literature review based on about 10 articles (about 2500 words) and Paper 2 is a research report about an experiment which is a single-factor design with controls (about 2500 words). The final paper (Paper 3) is a research article about an experiment with two-factors, with controls (related to Project 2, about 4500 words).
Problem sets consist of 4 CogLab reports (2-3 pages each) and 1 Science newspaper article on your project. CogLabs are short experiments (5 to 15 min.).
All papers are written individually. All research projects are done in groups of 1-3 students.
Attendance
You have two free late days (24 hour periods each) that you may use between Paper 1 and Paper 2 as needed. Please notify us if you are taking late days. After you have used up your late days, you will lose 5% per day on an assignment. If you turn in anything over 3 days late, we do not guarantee that we will be able to grade it. Please be sure to talk to us as soon as possible in any such case; we don’t want to hand out any grades of 0! Paper 3 (final paper) must be turned in on time, no exceptions, so that we can get the grades in on time. CogLab data and reports must be turned in on time, no exceptions. The data is important to your classmates who are presenting and it is vital that you not get behind on turning in these short experiments.
Grading
| ACTIVITIES | POINTS (104 POINTS) |
|---|---|
| Paper 1 (Literature review) | 10 |
| Paper 2 (Experiment 1) | 10 |
| Paper 3 (Final) | 15 |
| 4 CogLab summaries | 20 (5 points per CogLab) |
| Science newspaper article | 5 |
| Oral presentation of literature review (Paper 1) | 4 |
| Oral presentation of experiment 1 (Paper 2) | 4 |
| Oral presentation of experiment 2 (Paper 3) | 4 |
| Oral presentation of CogLab | 4 |
| Mid-term exam (in class) | 20 |
| Participation in class | 8 |
MIT Literature Statement on Plagiarism
Plagiarism—use of another’s intellectual work without acknowledgement—is a serious offense. It is the policy of the Literature Faculty that students who plagiarize will receive an F in the subject, and that the instructor will forward the case to the Committee on Discipline. Full acknowledgement for all information obtained from sources outside the classroom must be clearly stated in all written work submitted. All ideas, arguments, and direct phrasings taken from someone else’s work must be identified and properly footnoted. Quotations from other sources must be clearly marked as distinct from the student’s own work. For further guidance on the proper forms of attribution, consult the style guides available at the Writing and Communication Center and the MIT Web site on Plagiarism.
Calendar
| SES # | TOPICS | KEY DATES |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Introduction and project presentation | |
| 2 | Variables and controls–signal detection theory | |
| 3 | Single subject design and t-test | CogLab 1 (Visual Search) data due |
| 4 |
Factorial design I and interaction CogLab 1 (Visual Search)–oral presentation |
|
| 5 | Factorial design II and ANOVA | CogLab 1 (Visual Search) written report due |
| 6 | How to write a research paper | Literature list of references due |
| 7 | How to write a news article and how to give a talk | |
| 8 |
Project: literature review Oral presentation of articles of project |
|
| 9 | Correlation and advanced data analysis | CogLab 2 (Apparent Motion) data due |
| 10 | Paradigms of perception: psychophysics | Paper 1 due: literature review |
| 11 |
Paradigms of perception: mid to high level perception CogLab 2 (Apparent Motion)–oral presentation |
|
| 12 | Paradigms of attention: selected and divided attention | CogLab 2 (Apparent Motion) written report due |
| 13 | Paradigms of attention: visual search | CogLab 3 (Attentional Blink) data due |
| 14 |
Issue spotters CogLab 3 (Attentional Blink)–oral presentation |
|
| 15 | Advanced paradigms in visual cognition | Paper 1 rewrite due |
| 16 |
Cognitive neuroscience methods Check project statistics in class |
|
| 17 | Project: oral presentation of experiment 2 | |
| 18 | Computational neuroscience methods |
Paper 2 due CogLab 3 (Attentional Blink) report due CogLab 4 (Prototypes) data due Research Report due 5 days after Ses #18 |
| 19 |
Computational vis. cog: visual search CogLab 4 (Prototypes)–oral presentation |
|
| 20 | General review |
CogLab 4 (Prototypes) written report due CogLab 5 (Blind Spot) data due |
| 21 | Mid-term exam | Paper 2 rewrite due 2 days after Ses #21 |
| 22 | Statistics project 3 | A science newspaper short article due |
| 23 | Project: oral presentation of experiment 2 | CogLab 5 (Blind Spot) report due |
| 24 | Special topic | |
| 25 | Discussion of final paper | Paper 3 due |
