lecture notes Flashcards
Rationalism
philosophical standpoint that recognizes reason as the only reliable source of human knowledge
Priori knowledge
knowledge before experience
Empiricism
knowledge comes from experience and observation and formation of associations
Structuralism
systematic understanding of the structure of the mind by identifying the basic building blocks to explain how they give rise to complex cognitive processes
introspection
observation of one’s own consciousness
Wilhelm Wundt
Notable structuralist
Functionalism
Mind is a functional adaptive tool conceptualized to help us adapt to our envirionment. we have a system of mental processes to help us solve porblems
Behaviorism
psychology can be objectively studied through observation of behavior
Classical conditioning
Association of an involuntary response to a stimulus
Operant conditioning is a
association of a voluntary behavior with a consequence (reward or punishment)
Hick’s law
the more information there is to process, the more time it takes to produce a response
Cognitive revolution
1950s movement proposing the mind is a computational system (motivated by rejection of behaviorism)
Choice overload bias
High number or uncertainty of choices taxes information processes
Decision fatigue
State of mental exhaustion that occurs when someone has to take too many decisions
Ecological validity
extent to which experiemtn subjects perceptions and responses can be generalized to real-life settings
Construct validity
how well a test or measurement method measures the concept it was designed to evaluate
Internal validity
Interactionism
mind and body interact to induce events in each other
epiphenomenalism
mental thoughts are caused by physical events
Behavior measurements
Behavioral experiments measure voluntary response, psychophysiological measures involuntary response
behavioral neuroscience
animal models for human behavior predictions
cognitive neuroscience
neuroimaging tools (eeg, fmri)
Structural mri
anatomical structure images
functional mri
images of metabolic activity
Transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS)
used to activate or deactivate parts of the brain. treats depression
mcgurk effect
visual input is dominant over auditory input if you are trying to determine what exactly you heard
optic chiasm
where visual info crosses from one hemisphere to another
