G Flashcards
One of the two main types of receptor protein that bind the neurotransmitter gamma aminobutyric acid (GABA), the other being the GABAb receptor
- It is located at most synapses of most neurons that use GABA as a neurotransmitter
- The predominant inhibitory receptor in the central nervous system (CNS), it functions as a chloride channel
GABAa Receptor
One of the two main types of receptor protein that bind the neurotransmitter gamma aminobutyric acid (GABA), the other being the GABAa receptor
- GABAb receptors, which are G protein coupled receptors, are less plentiful in the brain than GABAa receptors and their activation results in relatively long lasting neuronal inhibition
GABAb Receptor
A change in the electrical properties (conductance or resistance) of the skin in reaction to stimuli, owing to the activity of sweat glands located in the fingers and palms
- Though strictly an indication of physiological arousal, this is widely considered a reflection of emotional arousal and stress as well
Galvanic Skin Response (GSR)
A failure to recognize the independence of chance events, leading to the mistaken belief that one can predict the outcome of a chance event on the basis of the outcomes of past chance events
Gambler’s Fallacy
A social interaction, transaction, or other organized activity with formal rules
- In psychotherapy, for example, this is a situation in which members of a group take part in some activity designed to elicit emotions, increase self awareness, or stimulate revealing interactions and interrelationships
- In play therapy, these are often used as a projective or observational technique
Game
Either of the female or male reproductive cells that take part in fertilization to produce a zygote
- In humans and other animals, the female gamete is the ovum and the male gamete is the spermatozoon
- These contain the haploid number of chromosomes rather than the diploid number found in body (somatic) cells
Gamete
A branch of mathematics concerned with the analysis of the behavior of decision makers (called players) whose choices affect one another
- This is often used in both theoretical modeling and empirical studies of conflict, cooperation, and competition, and has helped to structure interactive decision making situations in numerous disciplines, including economics, political science, social psychology, and ethics
Game Theory
A major inhibitory neurotransmitter in the mammalian nervous system that is synthesized from the amino acid glutamic acid
Gamma Aminobutyric Acid (GABA)
In electroencephalography, a type of low amplitude brain wave ranging from 31 to 80 Hz (with power peaking near 40 Hz) and associated with higher level cognitive activities, such as memory storage
Gamma Wave
A collection of cell bodies of neurons that lies outside the central nervous system (the basal ganglia, however, are an exception)
- Many invertebrates have only distributed ganglia and no centralized nervous system
Ganglion
A type of intercellular junction consisting of a gap of about 2-4 nm between the plasma membranes of two cells, spanned by protein channels that allow passage of electrical signals
Gap Junction
The hypothesis that the subjective experience of pain is modulated by large nerve fibers in the spinal cord that act as gates, such that pain is not the product of a simple transmission of stimulation from the skin or some internal organ to the brain
- Rather, sensations from noxious stimulation impinging on pain receptors have to pass through these spinal gates to the brain in order to emerge as pain perceptions
- The status of the gates, however, is subject to a variety of influences (eg; drugs, injury, emotions, possibly even instructions coming down from the brain itself), which can operate to shut them, thus inhibiting pain transmission, or cause them to be fully open, thus facilitating transmission
Gate Control Theory
A health care professional, usually a primary care provider associated with a managed care organization, who determines a patient’s access to health care services and whose approval is required for referrals to specialists
Gatekeeper
Any chemical substance whose chronic use leads to the subsequent use of more harmful substances that have significant potential for abuse and dependence
- For example, alcohol, tobacco, and marijuana are often considered a gateway to such drugs as heroin, cocaine, LSD, and PCP
- Introduced in the 1950s, the concept has become the most popular framework for understanding drug use among adolescent populations, guiding prevention efforts and even shaping governmental policy
Gateway Drug
The inhibition or exclusion from attention of certain sensory stimuli when attention is focused on other stimuli
- That is, while attending to specific information in the environment, other information does not reach awareness
Gating
The condition of being male, female, or neuter
- In a human context, the distinction between gender and sex reflects usage of these terms: sex usually refers to the biological aspects of maleness or femaleness, whereas gender implies the psychological, behavioral, social, and cultural aspects of being male or female (ie; masculinity or feminity)
Gender
Any one of a variety of stereotypical beliefs about individuals on the basis of their sex, particularly as related to the differential treatment of females and males
- These biases often are expressed linguistically, as in use of the phrase physicians and their wives (instead of physicians and their spouses, which avoids the implication that physicians must be male) or of the term he when people of both sexes are under discussion
Gender Bias
The understanding that one’s own and other people’s sex is fixed across situations, regardless of superficial changes in appearance or activities
Gender Consistency
A child’s emerging sense of the permeance of being a boy or a girl, an understanding that occurs in a series of stages: gender identity, gender stability, and gender consistency
Gender Constancy
Typical differences between men and women that are specific to a particular culture and influenced by its attitudes and practices
- These emerge in a variety of domains, such as careers, communication, and interpersonal relationships
Gender Differences
Discontent with the physical or social aspects of one’s own sex
Gender Dysphoria
A recognition that one is male or female and the internalization of this knowledge into one’s self concept
- Although the dominant approach in psychology for many years had been to regard this as residing in individuals, the importance of societal structures, cultural expectations, and personal interactions in its development is new recognized as well
- Indeed, significant evidence now exists to support the conceptualization of this as influenced by both environmental and biological factors
Gender Identity
A disorder characterized by clinically significant distress or impairment of functioning due to cross gender identification (ie; a desire to be or actual insistence that one is of the opposite sex) and persistent discomfort arising from the belief that one’s sex or gender is inappropriate to one’s true self
- The disorder is distinguished from simple dissatisfaction or nonconformity with gender roles
Gender Identity Disorder
The pattern of behavior, personality traits, and attitudes that define masculinity or femininity in a particular culture
- It frequently is considered the external manifestation of the internalized gender identity, although the two are not necessarily consistent with one another
Gender Role
The organized set of beliefs and expectations that guides one’s understanding of maleness and femaleness
Gender Schema
The understanding that one’s own or other people’s sex does not change overtime
Gender Stability
A relatively fixed, overly simplified concept of the attitudes and behaviors considered normal and appropriate for a person in a particular culture, based on his or her biological sex
- Research indicates that these stereotypes are prescriptive as well as descriptive
- These often support the social conditioning of gender roles
Gender Stereotype
Expectations about people’s behavior that are based on their biological sex or the process through which children acquire and internalize such expectations
Gender Typing
The basic unit of heredity, responsible for storing genetic information and transmitting it to subsequent generations
- The observable characteristics of an organism (ie; its phenotype) are determined by numerous genes, which contain the instructions necessary for the functioning of the organism’s constituent cells
- Each gene consists of a section of DNA, a large and complex molecule that, in higher organisms, is arranged to form the chromosomes of the cell nucleus
- Instructions are embodied in the chemical composition of the DNA, according to the genetic code
- In classical genetics, a gene is described in terms of the trait that it determines and is investigated largely by virtue of the variations brought about by its different forms, or alleles
- At the molecular level, most genes encode proteins, which carry out the functions of the cell or act to regulate the expression of other genes
Gene
The creation of a schematic representation of the arrangement of genes, genetic markers, or both as they occur in the genetic material of an organism
Gene Mapping
The physiological consequences of severe stress
- The syndrome has three stages: alarm, resistance, and exhaustion
- The first stage, the alarm reaction (or alarm stage), comprises two substages: the shock phase, marked by a decrease in body temperature, blood pressure, and muscle tone and loss of fluid from body tissues; and the countershock phase, during which the sympathetic nervous system is aroused and there is an increase in adrenocortical hormones, triggering a defensive reaction, such as the fight or flight response
- The resistance stage consists of stabilization at the increased physiological levels
- Resources may be depleted, and permanent organ changed produced
- The exhaustion stage is characterized by breakdown of acquired adaptations to a prolonged stressful situation; it is evidenced by such signs as sleep disturbances, irritability, severe loss of concentration, restlessness, trembling that disturbs motor coordination, fatigue, and depressed mood
General Adaptation Syndrome (GAS)
(Symbol: g)
A basic ability that underlies the performance of different varieties of intellectual tasks, in contrast to specific factors, which are alleged each to be unique to a single task
- This represents individuals’ abilities to perceive relationships and to derive conclusions from them
General Factor
Intelligence that is applicable to a very wide variety of tasks
General Intelligence
The accuracy with which results or findings can be transferred to situations or people other than those originally studied
Generalizability
- The process of deriving a concept, judgement, principle, or theory from a limited number of specific cases and applying it more widely, often to an entire class of objects, events, or people
- In conditioning, see stimulus generalization
Generalization
Excessive anxiety and worry about a range of events and activities (eg; finances, health, work) accompanied by such symptoms as restlessness, fatigue, impaired centration, irritability, muscle tension, and disturbed sleep
Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD)
In symbolic interactionism, the aggregation of other people’s viewpoints
- It is distinguished from specific other people and their individual views
Generalized Other
A seizure in which abnormal electrical activity involves the entire brain rather than a specific focal area
- The two most common forms are absence seizures and some tonic clinic seizures
Generalized Seizure
A large class of statistical techniques, including regression analysis, analysis of variance, and correlational analysis, that describe the relationship between a dependent variable and one or more independent variables
- Most statistical techniques employed in the behavioral sciences can be subsumed under this
General Linear Model
A computer program so named because its approach to problem solving using means ends analysis was intended to address many different problems and problem types
General Problem Solver
A computer program so named because its approach to problem solving using means ends analysis was intended to address many different problems and problem types
General Problem Solver
An interdisciplinary conceptual framework that views an entity or phenomenon holistically as a set of elements interacting with one another (ie; as a system), with the ultimate goal being to identify and understand the principles applicable to all systems
- the impact of each element in a system depends on the role played by other elements in the system and order arises from interaction among these elements
- This was designed to move beyond the reductionistic and mechanistic tradition in science and integrate the fragmented approaches and different classes of phenomena studied
General Systems Theory
The differences in values, morals, attitudes, and behavior apparent between younger and older people in society
- The term was first used with reference to the burgeoning youth culture of the late 1960s
Generation Gap
An approach to linguistics whose goal is to account for the infinite set of possible grammatical sentences in a language using a finite set of generative rules
- Unlike earlier inductive approaches that set out to describe and draw inferences about grammar on the basis of a corpus of natural language, the theories of this developed by U.S. linguist Noam Chomsky (1928 - ) in the 1950s and 1960s took for their basic data the intuitions of native speakers about what is and is not grammatical
- In taking this approach, Chomsky revolutionized the whole field of linguistics, effectively redefining it as a branch of cognitive psychology
- Much research in psycholinguistics has since focused on whether the various models suggested by this have psychological reality in the production and reception of language
Generative Grammar
The seventh stage of Erikson’s eight stages of development
- Generativity is the positive goal of middle adulthood, interpreted in terms not only of procreation but also of creativity and fulfilling one’s full parental and social responsibilities toward the next generation, in contrast to a narrow interest in the self, or self absorption
Generativity versus Stagnation
The insertion of segments of healthy DNA into human body cells to correct defective segments responsible for disease development
- A carrier molecule called a vector is used to deliver the therapeutic gene to the patient’s target cells, restoring them to a normal state of producing properly functioning proteins
- Though experimental, current gene therapy holds significant promise as an effective treatment for a variety of pathological conditions, including neurodegenerative disorders
- It is, however, not without its share of problems: (a) difficulties integrating therapeutic DNA into the genome and the rapidly dividing nature of many cells have prevented any long term benefits; (b) avoiding the stimulation of the immune system response to foreign objects; and (c) conditions that arise from mutations in a single gene are the best candidates for gene therapy, yet some of the most commonly occurring disorders (eg; heart disease, high blood pressure, Alzheimer’s disease, arthritis, diabetes) are caused by the combined effects of variations in many genes
- Additionally, there are ethical, legal, and social concerns associated with the practice
Gene Therapy
The instructions in genes that “tell” the cell how to make specific proteins
- The code resides in the sequence of bases occurring as constituents of DNA or RNA
- These bases are represented by the letters A, T, G, and C (which stand for adenine, thymine, guanine, and cytosine, respectively)
- In messenger RNA, uracil (U) replaces thymine
- Each unit of the code consists of three consecutive bases
Genetic Code
An interactive method of educating a prospective parent about genetic risks, benefits and limitations of genetic testing, reproductive risks, and options for surveillance and screening related to diseases with potentially inherited causes
Genetic Counseling
The doctrine that human and nonhuman animal behavior and mental activity are largely (or completely) controlled by the genetic constitution of the individual and that responses to environmental influences are for the most part innately determined
Genetic Determinism
Techniques by which the genetic contents of living cells or viruses can be deliberately altered, either by modifying the existing genes or by introducing novel material (eg; a gene from another species)
- This is undertaken for many different reasons; for example, there have been attempts to modify defective human body cells in the hope of treating certain genetic diseases
- However, considerable public concern focuses on the effects and limits of this
Genetic Engineering
A term used by Swiss child psychologist Jean Piaget (1896 - 1980) to denote his theoretical approach to and experimental study of the development of knowledge
Genetic Epistemology
The study of the development of mental functions in children and their transformation across the lifespan
- In the 19th and early 20th centuries, the term was preferred over the synonymous developmental psychology, although currently the reverse is true
Genetic Psychology
The branch of biology that is concerned with the mechanisms and phenomena of heredity
Genetics
The reproductive organs of the male or female
- The male genitalia include the penis, testes and related structures, prostate gland, seminal vesicles, and bulbourethral glands
- The female genitalia consist of the vagina, uterus, ovaries, fallopian tubes, and related structures
- The external genitalia comprise the vulva in females and the penis and testicles in males
Genitalia
In psychoanalytic theory, the final stage of psychosexual development, ideally reached in puberty, when the Oedipus complex has been fully resolved and erotic interest and activity are focused on intercourse with a sexual partner
Genital Stage
