Chapter 1

Question 1

psychology

Answer 1

scientific study of mind and behaviour

Question 2

philosophical dualism

Answer 2

the view that mind and body are different things (embraced by Descartes)

Question 3

philosophical materialism

Answer 3

view that all mental phenomena are reducible to physical phenomena (Thomas Hobbes)

Question 4

philosophical realism

Answer 4

view that perceptions of the physical world are produced entirely by information from the sensory organs

Question 5

philosophical idealism

Answer 5

view that perceptions of the physical world are the brain’s interpretation of information from the sensory organs

Question 6

philosophical empiricism

Answer 6

view that all knowledge is acquired through experience

Question 7

philosophical nativism

Answer 7

view that some knowledge is innate rather than acquired

Question 8

reaction time

Answer 8

the amount of a time between the onset of a stimulus and a person’s response to that stimulus

Question 9

structuralism

Answer 9

an approach to psychology that attempted to isolate and analyze the mind’s basic elements

Question 10

introspection

Answer 10

the analysis of subjective experience by trained observers

Question 11

functionalism

Answer 11

an approach to psychology that emphasized the adaptive significance of mental processes

Question 12

natural selction

Answer 12

the process by which the specific attributes that promote an organism’s survival and reproduction become more prevalent in the population over time

Question 13

hysteria

Answer 13

loss of function that has no obvious physical origin

Question 14

unconscious

Answer 14

part of the mind that contains information of which people are not aware

Question 15

psychoanalytic theory

Answer 15

general theory that emphasizes the influence of the unconscious on feelings, thoughts, and behaviours

Question 16

psychoanalysis

Answer 16

therapy that aims to give people insight into the contents of their unconscious minds (Sigmund Freud)

Question 17

behaviourism

Answer 17

an approach to psychology that restricts scientific inquiry to observable behaviour

Question 18

principle of reinforcement

Answer 18

a principle stating that any behaviour that is rewarded will be repeated and any behaviour that isn’t won’t

Question 19

gestalt psychology

Answer 19

an approach to psychology that emphasized the way in which the mind creates perceptual experience

Question 20

developmental psychology

Answer 20

the study of the ways in which psychological phenomena change over the life span

Question 21

social psychology

Answer 21

the study of the causes and consequences of sociality

Question 22

cognitive psychology

Answer 22

the study of human information-processing

Question 23

evolutionary psychology

Answer 23

the study of the ways in which the human mind has been shaped by natural selection

Question 24

cognitive neuroscience

Answer 24

study of the relationship between the brain and the mind (especially in humans)

Question 25

behavioural neuroscience

Answer 25

study of the relationship between the brain and behaviour (especially in non-human animals)

Question 26

cultural psychology

Answer 26

study of how culture influences mental life