Artificial Intelligence and High-Level Cognition

Abstract

Artificial intelligence (AI) and cognitive science (CS) both investigate information processing, but with a different focus: AI aims to build problem solving machines, i.e., systems capable of solving diverse problems in an efficient and effective way while CS analyzes human cognition. Both approaches increase an understanding of the foundations, methods, and strategies that can be employed to perform in a natural or artificial environment. This chapter focuses on high-level cognition, i.e., cognitive processes that are related to reasoning, decision making, and problem solving. After an introduction to the core principles, intersections, and differences between both fields, some central psychological findings are presented. In a next step cognitive theories for high-level cognition are introduced. While the architecture of cognition has an impact too, main approaches for cognitive modeling from cognitive architectures to multinomial processing trees are analyzed. Current challenges conclude the chapter.