Did you know that your mind is capable of predicting your future mood?
The definition of cognitive abilities is a set of mental abilities or faculties that we allows us to process everything that surrounds us and thus be able to form an adequate response in our environment. You already know some mental faculties: intelligence, memory, attention or understanding. However, your mind has many secrets that will surprise you.
If you want to discover the 20 cognitive skills that you did not know you had, keep reading this interesting article on Psychology-Online, in it you will find What are they the abilities of a person, the types cognitive skills and examples of cognitive abilities. Let's advocate all the cognitive processes you can imagine, from the most common to the most surprising in order to develop your full potential.
As we have initially commented, cognitive abilities are those mental faculties that help us understand the world around us and to process the stimuli collected by the senses of sight, smell, touch, taste and hearing. According to many experts, the set of all cognitive abilities makes up intelligence or intellectual capacity.
Let's take an example of cognitive skill: memory. Thanks to this cognitive ability we can retain stimuli (a movie that we see and hear) and then be able to process it or save it in our memories.
The human being has a multitude of skills and mental faculties by which he can know and perceive the world through the senses. These skills can be classified into:
Basic cognitive skills
Cognitive skills o basic cognitive processes are those that work directly on the information collected by the senses, that is, they are the first to process information from abroad, the basic cognitive skills are as follows:
- Memory
- Perception
- Attention
- Understanding
- Language
Higher cognitive abilities
These are the product of the combination of the former. What are the higher cognitive abilities? The following:
- Metacognition
- Motivation
- Emotion
- Learning
- Reasoning
Here is a list of 20 cognitive abilities:
1. Memorization
Memory is that cognitive ability that allows us Store information In order to later understand it or elaborate a structured thought, we differentiate short-term and long-term memory. Both processing are cognitive abilities that operate directly on stimuli. In this article you will find more information about types of human memory.
2. Perception
Perception is the primary cognitive faculty, the most basic since, thanks to it, our brain organizes and processes the information from our senses.
3. Attention
Attention is that cognitive capacity with which we can direct our thinking towards a concrete stimulus or action (for example, when we maintain our attention in class or in a job). In this article we see the attention disorders.
4. Understanding
Understanding is a mental skill that helps us understand what is perceived and generate ideas through the observation of the environment and the phenomena that occur in it. This is one of the most important basic cognitive skills.
5. Language
One of the mental capacities that most differentiates us from other living beings is the complicated language system that we possess. This ability is a system of both vocal and written signs that facilitates the communication process among us.
6. Metacognition
This cognitive ability is also known as the ability to "become aware of our own thoughts or think about what we are thinking." Here you will find the definition and examples of metacognition.
7. Motivation
Motivation is the cognitive ability to direct our energy towards a specific goal. Motivation can be intrinsic or extrinsic.
8. Emotion
Emotion is the cognitive ability to express our feelings through a psychological sensation. In this article you will find the definition and a list of emotions.
9. Learning
In combination with memory and perception, we can generate thoughts that allow us to continue improving and adapting our behavior to the environment around us. Here you can read the interesting Piaget's Learning Theory.
10. Reasoning
It is the cognitive ability that allows us to draw conclusions through perception and understanding
11. Affective prediction
Also know as affective prognosis an amazing cognitive ability with which our brain makes a prediction of our future mood.
12. Lateral thinking
This mental technique is a great help in Problem resolution since it allows us to look for alternatives to what would be the simplest or "logical" solution. For example, a person with developed lateral thinking can see a conflict from different perspectives and solve it in a new and ingenious way.
13. Emotional intelligence
Probably a skill you already knew. However, did you know that there are neurons in our brain that help us understand the emotional states of others? They are known asmirror neurons.
14. Planning
This mental faculty is the one that designs the steps that we are going to take and the decisions that we are going to make in a given space of time.
15. Self-regulation
Closely coupled with planning, this cognitive ability is based on following each planned step and maintaining both motivation and attention in order to achieve the established goal. The self-regulation it also serves to be able manage our emotions and produce an adequate response to each situation.
16. Evaluation
This mental capacity is one that allows us assess any phenomenon, feeling or thought, whether their own or others. We should not confuse evaluation with judgment since the former is not linked to any social or moral factor.
17. Reorganization
We define reorganization as the act of modifying or changing the mistakes made until we reach our goal, an essential cognitive competence to adapt our behavior.
18. Anticipation
It is the cognitive skill that helps us anticipate new learnings. Anticipation foresees the steps we are going to take and can predict the results.
19. Creative ability
Also known as creativity, this cognitive ability is what allows us to reproduce in our own way a feeling, thought and even something that our senses have captured. For example, we bring out our creative ability when we write a poem or paint a picture. Discover here the characteristics of creative and innovative people.
20. Capacity for abstraction
We all know imagination and can define it, but did you know that imagination is only one of the many factors that influence the capacity for abstraction? This cognitive ability is defined as the talent or ability to project in our mind all kinds of ideas, thoughts and concepts that cannot be transported to reality.
If you want to know other types of skills, in this article you will find 30 examples of a person's skills.
This article is merely informative, in Psychology-Online we do not have the power to make a diagnosis or recommend a treatment. We invite you to go to a psychologist to treat your particular case.
If you want to read more articles similar to Cognitive skills: what are they, types, list and examples, we recommend that you enter our category of Cognitive psychology.
Cognitive skills: what are they, types, list and examples
