NCERT Solutions for Class 11 Psychology - Thinking Class

Q1: Explain the nature of thinking.
Ans: Thinking may be a complex operation involved in manipulating and analyzing information, either collected through the senses from the environment, or stored in memory from past experiences.
Such manipulation and analysis occur by means of abstracting, reasoning, imagining, problem solving, judging and decision-making. it’s an inside process that may be inferred from overt behaviour.

Q2: What is a concept? Explain the role of concept in the thinking process.
Ans:

Concepts are mental categories for objects and events, which are kind of like one another in one or in additional than a method.

• They will be organised in schema. they’re mental frameworks which represents our knowledge and assumptions about the globe.
• Concepts are building blocks of thinking. they permit us to prepare knowledge in systematic ways.
• Concept formation may be a basic task of thinking i.e., identifying the stimulus properties that are common to a category of objects or ideas, e.g., within the activity, the participant should classify the stimuli either on the idea of colour or shape. It’s very helpful within the thinking process.

Q3: Identify obstacles that one may encounter in problem solving.
Ans: The obstacles that one may encounter in problem solving are as follows:
(i) Mental Set

1. It is a tendency of a person to solve problems by following the previously tried mental operations based upon prior success.
2. It can create a mental rigidity and hinder problem solving since the problem solver does not think of new rules and ideas.
3. It is also related to functional fixedness, whereby people fail to solve a problem because they get fixed or stuck on the usual function of things.

(ii) Lack of Motivation

1. Motivation is a very important condition to solve problems. Sometimes people give up easily while encountering a problem or when they have had met a failure previously.
2. Thus, they become de-motivated and are unable to solve problems.

Q4: How does reasoning help in solving problems?
Ans: 

Reasoning may be a kind of problem solving. it’s goal directed activity and involves ‘inferences.
Reasoning is that the process of gathering and analyzing information to a hit a conclusion.
Types of reasoning:
Inductive Reasoning: Reasoning relies on specific facts and observations. Through this reasoning people analyzing other possible reasons. Scientific reasoning is inductive in nature.
Deductive Reasoning: The logical thinking begins with general solution then draws specific solution.
Analogy: Analogy helps us in identifying and visualizing the salient attributes of an object. 

Q5: Are judgment and decision-making interrelated processes? Explain.
Ans: Judgement and decision-making are interrelated processes. In judgment the conclusions are drawn from opinions or events, based upon evidences. Decision-making requires choosing among the alternatives by evaluating the cost and benefit associated with each alternative. Thus, decision-making and judgment are both based upon conclusions that are arrived at by reasoning.

Q6: Why is divergent thinking important in creative thinking process?
Ans: Divergent thinking is vital in creativity process. Its abilities facilitate generation of a range of ideas which cannot seem to be related. Fluency, flexibility, originality and elaboration are the skills of cerebration.
Fluency: Produces many ideas for a given task or a controversy. The more ideas someone produces, the upper his fluency ability.
Flexibility: Indicates variety in thinking. It’s going to be thinking of various uses of an object, or different interpretation of an image, story or alternative ways of solving an issue 

Q7: How can creative thinking be enhanced?
Ans: Creative thinking can be enhanced by the following ways:
(i) Becoming more aware and sensitive in order to notice and respond to the feelings, sights, sounds and textures around.
(ii) Generating maximum amount of ideas or solutions to a given task, in order to increase the flow of thoughts and choosing the best out of them.
(iii) Using Osborn's 'brainstorming' technique to increase the flexibility of ideas. It involves the idea of thinking freely, without any limitations or pre-conceptions.
(iv) Experience and practice leads to an independent thinking while making judgments.
(v) Engaging in activities that require the use of imagination and original thinking.
(vi) Getting a feedback on the proposed solutions and also thinking of solutions others may offer.
(vii) Giving the ideas a chance to incubate.
(viii) Drawing diagrams for easily understanding the solutions and visualising causes or consequences of all the solutions.
(ix) Resisting the temptation of getting immediate rewards.
(x) Being self-confident, positive and aware of all the defences concerned with the problem.

Q8: Does thinking take place without language? Discuss.
Ans: According to Benjamin Lee Whorf's linguistic relativity hypothesis, the contents of thought are determined by language. Linguistic determinism suggests that the limits and possibilities of thoughts are also determined by language and linguistic categories.
However, according to Jean Piaget, thought precedes and determines language. An example is the imitation of adults by young children that is a manifestation of thought without language. He opines that language is one of the vehicles of thinking and thought is necessary to understand language. A third view by Vyogotsky argues that thought is used without language in non-verbal thinking and language is used without thought when expressing pleasantries. The overlapping of thought and language leads to verbal thought and rational speech.
Therefore, different views have been presented by different scholars, whereby some believe that thinking can take place without language and some believe that it cannot take place without language. However, it is important to note that thinking and language are interrelated processes.

Q9: How is language acquired in human beings?
Ans: Language is acquired among human beings in various following stages:

1. Infants cry, make variety of sounds and learn to babble at six months. These patterns repeat and occur at nine months.
2. Holophrases develop by the age of one year and two-word telegraphic speech occurs at 18-20 months.
3. Behaviourists like B.F. Skinner are of the view that humans learn language by imitation, reinforcement and associating words with objects.Further, children produce sounds that are appropriate to the language of the care-giver and are reinforced leading to approximation of desired responses.
4. The patterns of reinforcement lead to regional differences in pronunciation and phrasing.
5. According to linguist Noam Chomsky, children throughout the world have a critical period for learning language and go through the same stages of language development.
6. Chomsky emphasises on built-in readiness that is present in general among all children and helps in acquiring language without direct teaching.

Old NCERT Solutions

Q1: What are the various barriers to creative thinking?
Ans: The various barriers to creative thinking are:
(i) Habitual - The tendency to be overpowered by habits according to a particular think acts as a barrier to creative thinking. It hinders the generation of thought from a fresh perspective.
(ii) Perceptual - It prevents the formation of novel and original ideas.
(iii) Motivationa - Lack of motivation acts as a barrier for any thought and action.
(iv) Emotional - Emotions like fear of failure, rejection and negativism lead to negative assumptions and result in incapability to think differently.
(v) Cultural - It refers to excessive adherence to traditions, expectations, conformity pressures and stereotypes. Cultural block arises due to the fear of being different, tendency to maintain status quo, social pressure, etc.