AAMC Scored Review Flashcards
State-Dependent Memory
A retrieval cue by which memory is aided when a person is in the same state of emotion or intoxication as when encoding took place.
Misinformation Effect
A phenomenon in which memories are altered by misleading information provided at the point of encoding or recall.
Source-Monitoring Error
Involves confusion between semantic and episodic memory: a person remembers the details of an event, but confuses the context under which those details were gained.
Often manifests when a person hears a story of something that happened to someone else, and later recalls the story as having happened to him- or herself.
Spreading of Activation Theory
The unconscious activation of closely linked nodes of a semantic network.
When a concept is activated, the activation spreads to concepts that are semantically or associatively related to it. Thus, people often retrieve unpresented members of a category when tested on their memory for a series of presented concepts from that category.
Classical Conditioning
A type of associative learning that takes advantage of biological, instinctual responses to create associations between 2 unrelated stimuli.
Classical conditioning works, first and foremost, because some stimuli cause an innate or reflexive physiological response.
Any stimulus that brings about such a reflexive response is called an UNCONDITIONED STIMULUS, and the innate or reflexive response is called an UNCONDITIONED RESPONSE.
Many stimuli do not produce a reflexive response and are known as NEUTRAL STIMULI.
Pavlov thereby turned a neutral stimulus into a conditioned stimulus: a normally neutral stimulus that, through association, now causes a reflexive response called a conditioned response.
Classical conditioning, then, is the process of taking advantage of a reflexive, unconditioned stimulus to turn a neutral stimulus into a conditioned stimulus.
This process is also referred to as ACQUISITION.
Information Processing Model
Has 4 key components:
1) Thinking requires sensation, encoding, and storage of stimuli.
2) Stimuli must be analyzed by the brain (rather than responded to automatically) to be useful in decision-making.
3) Decisions made in one situation can be extrapolated and adjusted to help solve new problems (also called situational modification).
4) Problem-solving is dependent not only on the person’s cognitive level, but also on the context and complexity of the problem.
Cognitive Appraisal
Is the subjective evaluation of a situation that induces stress.
This process consists of 2 stages:
> Primary Appraisal - is the initial evaluation of the environment and the associated threat.
> Secondary Appraisal - is directed at evaluating whether the organism can cope with the stress.
Actor-Observer Bias
Is a term in social psychology that refers to a tendency to attribute one’s own actions to external causes, while attributing other people’s behaviors to internal causes.
Essentially, people tend to make different attributions depending upon whether they are the actor or the observer in a situation.
Example: in a situation where a person experiences something negative, the individual will often blame the situation or circumstances. When something negative happens to another person, people will often blame the individual for their personal choices, behaviors, and actions.
General Adaptation Theory
When subjected to stress, the body initially responds via the sympathetic nervous system. The “fight-or-flight” response initiates an increase in heart rate and decrease in digestion, with all available energy being reserved for reacting to the stressful event. The sequence of physiological responses is called the GENERAL ADAPTION SYNDROME and consists of 3 distinct stages.
- ALARM STAGE - activation of sympathetic nervous system, release of ACTH and cortisol, stimulation of adrenal medulla to secrete epinephrine and norepinephrine.
- RESISTANCE STAGE - continuous release of hormones activates sympathetic nervous system.
- EXHAUSTION STAGE - can no longer maintain elevated sympathetic nervous system activity, more susceptible to illness and medical conditions, organ systems deteriorate, death.
Conformity
Is matching one’s attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors to societal norms. Conformity is also known as MAJORITY INFLUENCE.
The pressure to conform can be real or imagined: an actual pressure from others, or a perceived pressure or expectation.
Internalization –> involves changing one’s behavior to fit with a group while also privately agreeing with the ideas of the group.
Identification –> refers to the outward acceptance of others’ ideas without personality taking on these ideas.
Likelihood of conformity differs among cultures. Western Cultures tend to value independent thought and unique ideas and are thus less likely to conform; in Eastern Cultures, group mentality often supersedes the individual. This type of collectivist society tends toward conformity.
Normal Conformity
The desire to fit into a group because of fear of rejection.
Social Facilitation
The tendency of people to perform at a different level based on the fact that others are around.
Egocentricism
Self-centered view of the world in which one is not necessarily able to understand the experience of another person; seen in Piaget’s preoperational stage (7-11 years old).
Gentrification
Is the reinvestment in lower income neighborhoods in urban areas, which results from the influx of more affluent groups.
With the arrival of more affluent residents, housing demand increases and generally results in a decrease of affordable housing for lower income residents
Group Polarization
Refers to the fact that people’s attitudes toward some attitude object become more extreme after interacting with like-minded individuals.
Therefore, a group of risk averse individuals would become more risk averse after interacting with each other, which suggests that their risky behavior scores would be lower.
Erikson’s Theory of Psychosocial Development
Erik Erikson’s stages of personality development are based on a series of crises that derive from conflicts between needs and social demands.
> Trust vs. Mistrust (0-1 year)
Autonomy vs. Shame and Doubt (1-3 years)
Initiative vs. Guilt (3-6 years)
Industry vs. Inferiority (6-12 years)
Identity vs. Role Confusion (12-20 years)
Intimacy vs. Isolation (20-40 years)
Generactivity vs. Stagnation (40-65 years)
Integrity vs. Despair (65 - death)
Assimilation
Refers to when new members adopt the main elements of a culture.
In psychology, the process by which new information is interpreted in terms of existing schemata.
In sociology, the process by which the behavior and culture of a group or an individual begins to merge with that of another group.
Linguistic Relativity Hypothesis
A hypothesis suggesting that one’s perception of reality is largely determined by the content, form, and structure of language; also known as the Whorfian hypothesis.
Social Support
The perception or reality that one is cared for by a social network (friends, family, and other relationships) that provide an individual with various types of assistance, which are associated with improving health or reducing harm.
Divided Attention
The ability to attend to multiple stimuli simultaneously and to perform multiple tasks at the same time.
Automatic Processing
The brain process most closely resembling autopilot, enabling performance of multiple activities at the same time.
Priming
A retrieval cue by which recall is aided by a word or phrase that is semantically related to the desired memory.
Implicit (nondeclarative or procedural) Memory
Memory that does NOT require conscious recall; consists of skills and conditioned behaviors.
Sensory Memory
Visual (iconic) and Auditory (echoic) stimuli briefly stored in memory; fades very quickly unless attention is paid to the information.
