Midterm 1 Lectures 1-6 Flashcards
Is psychology visceral?
Yes, we feel emotional, take in sensations, and produce behaviours such as thoughts and actions
What is psychology?
The study of behaviour, thought and experience, and how they can be affected by physical, mental, social and environmental factors
What are the goals of psychology?
- to understand how different brain strucutre work together to produce our behaviour
- to understand how nature (genetics) and nurture (our upbringing and environment) interact to make us who we are
- to understand how previous experiences influence how we think and act
- to understand how groups- family, culture and crowds- affect the individual
- to understand how feeling of control can influence our happiness and health
- to understand how each of these factors can influence our well-being and could contribute to psychological disorders
What is the scientific method?
A person who carefully follows a system of observing, predicting, and testing is conducting science whether the subject matter is chemicals, physiology, human memory, or social interactions
The scienfitic method is a way of thinking/accpeting the universe how do they apporach it?
In a systematic way (methods guess, test etc)
What is the scientific method approach?
way of learning about the world through collecting obbservations, devloping theories to explain them, and using theories to make predictions (make hypothesis and contstuct tho
Why is a hypothesis useful?
Is a TESTABLE prediction about processes that can be observed and measured
What does a hypothesis need?
- Can be supported or rejected
- TESTABLE
- It cannot be proven becasue a future experiment can show that it is wrong or limited in some way
- Support or rejection occurs after those test it
- To be tested it must be falsifiable
What does falsifiable mean?
The hypothesis is precise enough that it can be proven false
What is pseudoscience?
An idea that is presented as science but does not utilize basic principles of scientific thinking or procedure
What is a theory?
An explanation for a broad range of observations that also generates a new hypothesis and integrates numerous findings into a coherant whole
What is a narrative that connects observations?
Theories
What are some common misconceptions of scientific theories?
- Theories are not the same as opinions or beliefs
A theory can help scientists develop testable hypotheses, opinions do not need to be testable or even logical
What is a characteristic of a good theory?
Can explain previous research and can lead to even more testable hypotheses
The quality of a theory is…
Not related to the number of people who beleive it to be true
What levels can occur with behaviour?
The activity of cells in different parts of the brain, thought processes such as language and memory, sociocultural processes that shape daily life for millions of people
What is the biopsychosical model?
means of explaining behaviour as a product of biological, psychological, and sociocultural factors
What are examples of biological, psychological, and social factors in the biopsychosocial model?
Biological:
- Brain structures and chemicals
- Hormones
- External substances (drugs)
Psychological:
- Memories
- Emotions
- Personalities
- How the previous factors shape the way we think about and respond to different people and situations
Social:
- Family
- Peers
- Ethnicity
What is scientific literacy?
the ability to understand, analyze and apply scientific info
What does being scientific literate mean?
Means that you will be able to read and interpret new terminology, or know where to go to find out more
What makes one not scientifically literate?
Memorizing terms as you dont know where to go from there or how to apply
Why is generalization important?
Shows us that the studies conducted in universities and hospitals can provide insight into behaviours that extend far beyond the confines of the lab
What is critical thinking?
Involves excercising curiosity and skepticism when evaluating claims of others, and with our own assumptions and beliefs (critical to think and evaluate)
What does critical thinking mean?
Not being negative or critical, but means you intentionally examine knowledge, beliefs and the means by which conclusions were obtained
What are skills to develop critical thinking?
- Be curious
- Examine the nature and source of the evidence; not all research is quality
- Examine assumptions and biases; this includes your own assumptions
- Avoid overly emotional thinking. Emotions can tell us what we value, but they are not always helpful when it comes to making critical decisions
- Tolerate ambiguity (being open to more then one viewpoint). Most complex issues do not have clear-cut-answers
- Consider alternative viewpoints and alternative interpretations of the evidence
What is the principle of parsimony? (parsely simple choose that)
The simplest of all competing explanations of a phenomenon should be the one we accept
What 2 beliefs does science stem off of?
Empiricism and determinism
What is empiricism? (e with e)
A philisophical tenet that knowledge comes through experience
What is determinism?
Beliefs that all events are governed by lawful, cause-and-effect relationships
What is an example of determinism?
You smell cookies (cause), and showing signs of hunger (effect)
What did ancient egyptians do in terms of insight into behaviour?
doctors noticed that damage to different brain areas led to vastly different impairments
- this was the first recording of bio to behaviour
What did hippocrates do?
Developed the first personality classification scheme
What did the Greeks believe?
That four humours and fluids flowed throughout the body and influenced health and personality
- Blood
- Yellow bile
- Black bile
- Phlegm
What are Galen’s four temperaments?
- Sanguine (blood): a tendency to be impulsive, pleasure-seeking, and charismatic
- Choleric (yellow bile): tendency to be ambitious, energetic and a bit agressive
- Melancholic (black bile): tendency to be independent, perfectionistic, anf a bit introverted
- Phlegmatic (phlegm): tendency to be quiet, relaxed, and content with life
What was the end of the 5th century called?
The dark ages
When did psychology become scientific?
The late 1800s
What is Zeitgeist? (like Zelga fortune tellers)
General set of beliefs of a particular culutre at a specific time in history
What prevented zeitgeist?
Prevented psychological science from emerging in the 1600s
What is dualism?
The idea that there are properties of humans that are not material
- Idea that one can view human behaviour as being the result of predictable physical laws
What is materialism?
The belief that humans, and other living beings are made of just physical matter
Who was Gustav Fechner? (fetch to move)
- Interested in the natural world of moving objects and energy
- Turned his knowledge to a psychological question about how the physical and mental worlds interact
- He founded PSYCHOPHYSICS
- He made formulas to calculate the chanfe in weight then applied formula to change brightness, loudness and other perceptual experiences
What is psychophysics?
Field of study that explores how physical energy such as light and sound and their intensity relate to psychological experience
Who was Charles Darwin?
- Noticed that animal groups isolated from another often differed by only minor variations in physical features
- Theory of evolution by natural selection
- Genetically inherited traits that contribute to survival and reproductive success are likely to fluorish
- Darwin also explained human behaviour
- Certain behaviours have helped our ancestors survive and reproduce
- Memory, emotions, forming social bonds, etc
What is clinical psychology?
Field of psychology that concentrates on the diagnosis and treatment of the psychological disorder
What does localization of brain function mean? (localized parts)
Idea that certain parts of the brain control speicifc mental abiltiies and personality characteristics
What is phrenology?
- Believe that the brain consists of 27 organs that correspond to mental triats and disposition that could be detected by examining the surface of the skull
- Different traits and abilities were distributed across different regions of the brain
- If a person had a specific trait that part of the brain would be larger
- Larger brain areas would cause bumps on the head
What did Franz Mesmer believe? (m and m)
- Prolonged exposure to magnets could redirect the flow of metallic fluids in the body which cures diesease and insanity
- Named the phenomenon hypnosis
- Placebo effects
Who was Sigmund Freud?
- Used hypnonsis to treat patients
- Cured several patients of hysterical paralysis a condition in which the individual loses feeling and control in a specific body part despite the lack of neurologcal damage or disease
- He developed the psychoanalysis technique
What is psychoanalysis?
A psychoanalytical approach that attemps to explain how behaviour and personlity are influenced by unconsnscious processes
What do conscious experiences include?
Include perceptions, thoughts, a sense of self and the sense that we are in control
What do unconscious experiences include?
Contain forgotten episodes from early childhood as well as urged to fulfill self-serving sexual and agressive impulses, when in hypnonsis has more control and direct access into the individuals unconscious mind
What did Freud emphasize?
How childhood experiences influences our behaviour as adults
What becomes statistical methods for measuring human traits?
Economics, sociology, and anthropology
What did Galton state? (Galton different name like Dalton)
- He studied the individual differences between people
- Great achievement tended to run in families
- Genetics explain physical and psychological differences in populations
- Developed emincence: combo or ability, morality and achievement
- Closer the relative the more similar the traits
What is a nature and nurture relationship?
The inquiry into how hereditary (nature) and environment (nurture) influence behaviour and mental processes
What did Galton believe in in regards to nature vs nurture?
Nature side
What is another word for good genes
Eugenics
What did Wilhelm Wundt do? (strong name for…)
- He established psychology as an independent scientific field
- Established the first lab dedicated to studying human behaviour
- Conducted experiments on how people sense and perceive
What is structuralism? (how structures act together)
An attempt to analyze the conscious experience by breaking it down into basic elements and to understand how these elements work together
Who was Edward Titchener? (science chem)
- Used the same method of introspection to deivse an organized map of the structure of human consciousness
- Chose elements as an analogy to the periodic table in the physical sciences
- Believed that mental experiences were made up of a limited number of sensations which were analogues to the elements in physics and chemistry
Who was William James?
- Published the Principles of Psychology in 1890 (first textbook in psychology)
- Combined knowledge of physiology and interest in philosophy of mental activity
- Influenced by Darwin’s evolutionary principles
- Examined behaviour in context of how our thoughts and actions help us adapt to our environment; led to develop functionalism
What is functionalism?
The study of the purpose and function of behaviour and conscious experience
What are functionalists beliefs?
To fully understand ones behaviour, one must try to figure out what purpose it may have served over the course of our evolution
Who was Edwin Twitmyer and what did he accomplish? (twitch like moving)
- Interested in reflexes
- created contraption of a rubber mallet
What is behaviourism? (how one acts)
- Approach that dominated the first half of the 20th century studying only observable behaviour, with little to no reference to mental events or insights as possible influences on behaviour
Who is Ivan Pavlov and what did he contribute?
- Won nobel prize for research on digestive system noticed that dogs in his lab began to salivate when the tech entered the room and turned on the device that distributed meat powder (food)
- Salivation showed that the dogs learned an association between the technician and machine noises
- Led to research mechanisms on learning
Who was John B. Watson (B and B) and what did he create?
- Behaviourism was championed
- Believed that all behaviour could be explained through conditioning
- Believed in power of experience and could morph a personality if you morphed the environment
- Explored the connection between scientific research (collecting data and testing theories) and application (using psychology to solve real world problems and improve lives)
Who was Edward Thorndike? (thorn behaviours changed based on positive satisfaction)
- Shown that frequency of different behaviours could be changed based on whether or not that behaviour led to positive consequences or “satisfaction”
B.F Skinner? (skin avoid actions…)
- Radical behaviour, the foundation was how the organism responded to rewards and punishments
- Repeat actions that are rewarded
- Avoid actions that lead to punishment
What did Watson state?
That behavioural psychology recongizes no line between man and brute
Who is Norman Triplett? (showed triplets and with 3 act differently)
- Conducted one of the first formal experiments
- Observed that cyclidts ride faster in the presence of other people when riding alone
- Published the first social psychology research in 1898
- Published a few psychology textbook in 1908
What did the events in Nazi-controlled Germany before and during World War II contribute to?
Development of this new persepctive in psych, helped to explain the role that social factors play in human behaviour
What is social psychology?
Study of how the influence of other people on our behaviour
Personality psychology is?
The study of how different personality characteristics can influence how we think and act, some people are talkative and outgoing and some are quiet
What is the difference between social and personality psychology
Social: effect on external factors
Personality: effect of interal traits
Who was Kurt Lewin?
- Described the difference between social and personality psychology
- Suggested that behaviour is a function of the individual and the environment
- Behaviours could be predicted and explained through understanding how an individual with a specific set of traits would respond in context that involed a set of conditions
What did Europeans focus on in the early 1900s?
Formed the basis of cognitive perspective
Who was Hermann Ebbinghaus
Collected reams of data on remembering and forgetting
Who was Frederick Bartlett?
Found that memory was not like a photograph, cultural knowledge and previous expeirence shape what elements of an event or storyline are judged to be important enough to remember
What is Gestalt Psych? (gest whole part not one)
An apporach emphasizing that psychologists need to focus on the whole of perception and epxerience rather than its parts
What did Noam Chomsky propose?
That grammar and vocabular were far too complex to be explained in terms: the alternative was to propose abstract mental processes
Who was Ulrich Neisser? (rich bc cogntive brain =money)
Congnitive psychology
What is cognitive psychology?
A modern psychological perspective that focuses on processes such as memory, thinking, language
What is humanistic psychology?
Focuses on the unique aspects of each individual human, each person’s freedom to act, their rational thought, and the belief that humans are fundamentally different from other animals
Who is Carl Rogers? (roger successful and grow to full potential successful tennis player)
- Focused on the positive aspects of humanity and the factors that lead to a productive and fulfilling life
- Believed that humans strive to develop a sense of self and are motivated to personally grow and fulfill their potential
Who was Donald Hebb? What was his law? (bb brain)
- Examined how cells in brain stimulate another cell, metabolic and physical changed occur to stregthen this relationship
- Cells that fire together wire together
Law:
- Memory is related to activity occuring at the cellular level
- Reinforced the notion that behaviour can be studied at a number of levels ranging from neurons to the entire brain
Who is Wilder Penfield? (used a pen to make a map of brain)
- Founded relationship between the brain and everyday behaviours
- Developed a surigcal procuedre to help patients with epilepsy
- Created precise maps of the sensory and motor (movement) cortices in the brain
- How work showed that people’s subjective experiences can be represented in the brain
Who is Anna Freud and Karen Horney?
- Contributed to understanding of personality
- Sex differences in power were due to rampant sexism in politics, business world, academia and the home
- Examined important issues such as women’s health, violence towards women and experiences unique to females
Who is Shelly Taylor? (shelly muston examined stress)
- Examined sex differences in response to stress
- Found that white males in general produce a “fight or flight” response to stress, females are more likely to seek out social supports, a tendency called the “tend and befriend” response
What is the cross culture psychology?
Field that draws comparisons about individual and group behavior among cultures
What does culutre psychology help with?
- Helps to understand the role of society in shaping behaviour, beliefs anf values
- Compare the responses of North American research participants to those of individuals in non-Western countries such as China or Japan
- Allows us to examine how people respond when being pulled in different directions by family history and the culture of their current country
What does fmri help with?
Allow us to detect activity through entire brain
- Used to understand the neural mechanism for cognitive behaviours such as memory, emotion and decision making
- Known as cognitive neuroscience
What does positive psychology help with?
Helps people see good in their life by promting self-acceptance and improving social relationships with others
Five characteristics of quality scientific research
- It is based on measurements that are objective, valid and reliable
- It can be generlaized
- It uses techniques that reduce bias
- It is made public
- It can be replicated
What is objective measurement?
The measure of an entity or behaviour that, within an allowed margin or error, is consistent across instruments and observers
eg. weight in pounds or kg
What is a variable?
The object, concept, or event being controlled
What are operational definitions? (operations measures)
Are statements that describe the procedures (or operations) and specific measures that are used to record observations ex. depression can be defined as a “score of 20 or higher on the Beck Depression Inventory”
What is validity?
Refers to the degree to which an instrument or procedure measures what it claims to measure
What is reliability?
Measure demonstrates reliability when it provides consistent and stable answers across multiple observations and points in time
What are important components of scientific research?
Validity and reliability
What is test-retest reliability?
Examines whether scores on a given measure of behaviour are consistent across test sections
What does alternate form reliability mean? (other)
Form examines whether different forms of the same test produce the sane results
What does inter-rater reliability mean?
Rates arrive at a similar conclusion
What does generalizability mean?
Refers to the degree to which one set or results can be applied to other situations, individuals or events ex. more people invest in a program works better than you invest instead of one person suggesting; the more generlaized the results the more likely you are to produce it (more people general population)
What is a sample?
A select group of population members
Random sample?
A sampling technique in which every individual of a population has an equal chance of being included; IDEAL METHOD!!!!
Conveince sample?
Samples of people who are most readily available ex. intro pysch students
What does ecological validity mean?
Results of a lab can be applied or repeated in the natural environment
What is one thing not to do with research?
DO NOT over generalize
What is researcher bias?
several types of bias can be unintentionally introduced by researchers ex. experimenter may treat participants in different experimental conditions differently, thus making it impossible to know if any differences were due to experimental manipulation being tested or instead because of experimenters behaviour
What are subject biases?
When they introduce their own biases; trying to give what they think ther researchers are looking for
What is the Hawthorne effect? (observed like a hawk)
A behaviour that occurs as a result of being observed ex. in factory changing the conditoins did not make them work harder, the supervisors watching them did
What is social desirability?
Participants may respond in ways that increase the chances that they will be viewed favourably by the experimenter and/or other participants; change their response to try and “please” the interviewer etc. what they think they are looking for
What do people do to avoid social desirability and scued results?
Researchers use computers that allow people to respond with anonymity, reducing the desire to appear likeable
What is the placebo effect?
a measurable and experiences improvement in health or behaviour that cannot be attributuable to a medication or treatment (make people think they are better, like a control group, my placebo pills)
What are demand characteristics (demand them to act a certain way)
Inadvertent cues given off by the experimenter or the experimental context that give info about how participants are expected to behave
What are techniques that reduce bias?
- Anonymity: each response are recorded without any name or other personal info that could link a particular person with a result
- Placebos: important element is that participant nor experimenter knows the exact treatment for any individual
- Double blind study: a study in which neither the participant nor experimenter know the exact treamtnet for any individual
How does one share the results of a study?
Academic journals resemble magazines, journal articles represent primary research or reviews of multiple studies on a single topic
What are 5 Characteristics of Poor Research?
- Produces untestable hypothesis
- It relies in anecotes and personal experiences
- It includes a biased selection of data
- It makes appeals to authroity rather than facts
- It makes appeals to common sense
What does a hypothesis need to make it testible?
Needs to be FALSIFIABLE
What does falsifiable mean?
Hypothesis is preicse enough that it could be proven false
What is anecdotal evidence? (personal)
An individuals story or testimony about an observation or event that is used to make a claim as evidence for ex. this website cuased somone to lose weight, but multiple factors can be attributed to that
What does appeal to authority mean?
The belief that an “experts” claim even when no supporting data or scientific evidence is present eg. theresa tam says to get vaccines and wear masks
What does applealing to common sense mean?
One believing that a claim that sounds true but lacks evidence eg. the world was the stationary center of the unvierse
What is research design?
A set of methods that allows for a hypothesis to be tested
Research design influence how investigstors?
- Organize the stimuli used to test the hypotehssis
- Make observstions and measurements
- Evaluate results
What are variables?
A variable is a property or object, organism, event, or something else that can take on different values. How frequently you laugh is a variable that could be measured and and analyzed
What is an operational definition?
Details that define exactly how the variable with be controlled or measured for a specific study. For sense of humour, this definition might be “the score on the Coping Humour Scale”
What is data?
When scientists collect observations about the variables of interest, the info they record is called data
What is qualitative research?
Involves examining an issue or behaviour without preforming numerical measurments of the variables
- Tkaes rhe form of interviews in which participants describe their thoughts and feelings about events or experiences
Quantitative Research is?
Examining a behaviour or issue using numerical measurements and/or stats majority of psychological studies are quantitative in nature
Case studies are?
An in-depth report about the details of a specific case
What do case studies allow clincians to learn?
- Allow clinicians and researhcers to present more details about an individual than would be possible in a research report involving a number of people
- Used for our understanding of the brain and its ability to repair istelf
- Ex. saw how anxiety was cured and the time and point where the treatment helped
What is naturalisitic observation?
Form of research where they observe people or animals in their natural settings
- Helps tp get more accurate results (if someone was watching you, you might change your behaviours)
What does self-reporting mean?
reponses are provided direclty by the people who are being studied, usually through face to face interviews, phone surveys etc
What is corelational research?
Measuring the degree of association between two or more variables ex. what is the average education level of canadians over he age of 30? what is the average income of canadians over the age of 30?
What is an example of a positive correlation?
A sense of humour is associated with good health (does not mean that humour is responsible for good health)
What is a third variable problem?
The possibility that a third, unmeasured variable is responsible for a well-estalbished correlation between two variables for ex, the negative correlation between sleep and irritability, could account for stress, depression, diet and workload could casue increased irritability and lost sleep
What are illusory correlations? (illusion)
relationships that only exist in the mind, rather than in reality eg, opposties attract; studies show that people are more likely to be with one who are similar to them
What does random assingment mean?
A technique for dividing samples into two or more groups in which participants are equally likely to be placed in any condition of the experiment
- Allows us to assume two groups will be equal
Counfounding variable? (found new info)
A variable outside of the researcher’s control that might affect or provide an alternative explanation for the results-could enter the picture
What is an independant variable?
The variable that the experimenter manipulates
What is the dependent variable
The observation of measurement that is recorded during the experiment and compare across all groups
Experimental group?
Group that recieves treatment
Control group?
Group that does not recieve the treatment, serves as a baseline
What is between-subject design?
Experimental design in which we compare the prefromance of participants who are in different groups
What is the Quasi-Experimental Method? (quasi is chosen)
Technique in which two or more groups that are compared are selected based on predtermined characteristics rather than random assignments ex. chose those in hopsitals for a study cant use people who are not in hospitals
What is the REB (research ethics board)
committee of researchers and officials at an institution charged with the protection of human research participants
What is the instituional review board (IRB’s)?
Help to ensure that researchers abide by ethical rules and how 1) the committee weighs potential risks to the volunteer against the possible benefits of research and 2) the volunteers agree to participate in research
What does informed consent mean?
A potential volunteer must be informed (know the purpose, tasks, and risks involved in the study) and give consent (agree to participate based on the info provided) without pressure
What must one have to be truly informed of the study:
- The topic of study
- The nature of any stimuli to which they will be exposed (eg images, sound, smells)
- The nature of any tasks they will complete (eg tests, puzzles)
- The duration of the study
- Any potential physical, psychological, or social risks
- Steps that the researchers take to minimize those risks
What id deception?
Misleading or only partially informing participants of the true topic or hypothesis under investigation
What does it mean for one to have full consent?
- Have the freedom to choose: individuals should not be at risk for financial loss, physical harm, or damage to their reputation if they choose not to participate
- Equal oppurtunities: volunteers should have choices. For example, if volunteers have intro psychology students seeking credit, they must have non-research alternatives available to them for credit should they choose not to participate
- The right to withdraw
- The right to withold responses
What is anonymity?
Data collected during research cannot be connected to individual participants
What is confidentiality?
Researchers cannot share specific data or observations that can relate to an individual, second all records must be kept secure
What are characteristics that animals need to be utilized for lab testing
- Must share the same physiological and behavioural features of the disease and appear in humans
- Both the animal model and the “real” disorder must involve similar brain strucutres
- The tests used to measure behaviours must be valid
What is decriptive stats?
A set of techniques used to organize, summarize, and intepret data
What is frequency?
The number of observations that fall within a certain category or range of scores eg. histograms are a simple way to present data and are great for giving researchers and students with an inital idea of what the data looks like
What is normal distribution?
Sometimes called a bell curve, a symmtetrical distrubution with values clustered around a central, mean value
What is skewed distribution?
An asymmetrical distribution with a large cluster of scores on one side and a long “tail” on the other
Central tendency?
A measure of the central point of a distribution
Mean
Average set of numbers (used most)
Median
Midpoint
Mode
Value that occurs the most (used least)
Variability
The degree to which scores are disepered in a distribution in other words, some scores spread oit while others are more clustered
Low variability
Means most scores are similar
What can variability be caused by?
measurement errors, imperfect measurements tools, differences between participants in the study
Standard deviation
measure of variability around the mean
What does large standard deviation mean?
Means lots of variability in the data and that those values are spread out from the mean, it allows people to see different scores relate to the mean and to each other
What is a hypothesis test?
A method of evaluating whether differences among groups are meaningful
What is statistical significance?
Concept that implies that the means of groups are farther apart than you would expect them to be by random chance alone
What is a null hypothesis? (not realistic)
assumes that any differences between groups (or conditions) are due to chance
Experimental hypothesis
Assumes that any differences are due to a variable controlled by the experimenter
What is the probability of results being due to chance
Known as a “p-value”, they exist but are compicated and are problematic (most likely do not need to know lower p-values have great significance and higher not significant)
2 problems with significance testing…
- If a fluke can occur 5% of the time, the more tests you preform the more likely you are to have one due to chance
- As you increase the number of participants, it becomes easier to find significant effects
What are effect sizes?
Tells the researcher whether the difference is statistically small or large, allow one to adjust how much they beleive their hypothesis is true
What is influenced by our genes?
- Physical traits such as eye colour
- Behaviour
Where is our genetic code found?
In nucleus
How is our genetic material organized?
- Genetic material is organized into genes
- Genes are responsible for guiding the process of creating proteins that make up our physical structure
What do nucelotides help with?
Represent the instructions or code used to create proteins
Genotype
the genetic makeup of an organism
Phenotype
physical traits and behavioural characteristics that show genetic variation, like eye colour
How do phenotypes develop?
Nucleotide sequencing as well as interactions within the environment
What are chromosomes
structures in the cellular nucleus that are lined with all the genes an individual inherits
Homozygous
If two genes on a pair of chromsomes are the same
Heterozygous
If two genes at a given location on a pair of chromosomes differ
What is behavioural genomics?
study of DNA and the ways in which specific genes are related to behaviour
Human Genome Project
Effort to idenfity the components of the entire human genome
Even though single genes have been identified for risk factors for different diseases, a combo of them or what else…
Environmental factors
Is it true that only one gene can affect one trait
NOT TRUE
Behavioural genetics
the study of how genes and the environment influence behaviour
Monozygotic twins
Come from a single ovum (egg), which makes them genetically identical (almost 100% genetic similarity)
Dizygotic twins: (fraternal twins)
come from two separate eggs fertilized by two different sperm cells that share the same womb; these twins have approx 50% if their genes in common
Longitudal studies (long)
Studies that follow the same individuals for many years
Heritability
A statistic, expressed as a number between zero and one, that represents the degree to which genetic differences among individuals contribute to individual differences in a behaviour or trait found in a population
What does a heritability of 0 and 1 mean?
Heritability of 0 means that genes do not contribute to individual differences in a trait, whereas a heritability of 1.0 indicates that genes account for all individuals’ differences in a trait
Gene expression
occurs when the info in our genes is used to produce proteins (or other gene products, such as ribosomal RNA)
Some genes are expressed and some and some switch on/off
If some genes fail to be activated (or expressed) properly, people may be at a greater risk for developing brain-related disorders
Ex. Those with autism had less gene expression in several regions of their brain, the decrease in gene expression was linked to problems with language, decision making and understanding other people emotions
Epigenetics
this study of changes in gene expression that occur as a result of experience and that do not alter the genetic code
Gene expression can be influenced by the environment is an example of
Social part of the biopsychosocial model of behaviour
CRISPR-Cas9 (CRISPR)
a technique that allows genetic material to be removed, added, or altered in specific locations of the genome
Charles Darwin’s Discoveries
- He identified fossils from several extinct species; this discovery showed that not all species were able to survive in this environment, but some species did have characteristics that allowed them to flourish
- He noticed small differences between the same species of birds on different islands
Charles Darwin Natural Selection
the process by which favorable traits become increaisngly common in a population of interbreeding individuals, while traits that are unfavorable become less common
Evolution
the change in the frequency of genes occuring in an interbreeding population over generations
Evolutionary Psychology
attempts to explain human behaviours based on the beneficial function(s) they may have served in our species’ evolutionary history
Hunter-Gatherer theory
which links performance on specific tasks to the different roles performed by males and females over the course of our evolutionary history
Neurons
one of the major types of cells found in the nervous system, which are responsible for sending and receiving messages throughout the body
What is the purpose of the neuron
to “fire” to receive input from one group of neurons and to then influence the activity of other neurons
- Will lead to some form of behaviour
Cell body (also known as a “soma”)
Is a part of the neuron that contains the nucelus that houses the cells genetic mateiral
Dendrites
small branches radiating from the cell body that receive messages from other cells and transmit those messages towards the rest of the cell
Axon hillock
impulses from other cells that travel across the neuron to the base of the cell body
Axon
the electric impulses will travel from the axon hillock along a tail-like structure that protrudes from the cell body; it transports info in the form of electrochemical reactions from the cell body to the end of the neuron
Axon terminal
when the activity reaches the end of the axon; they are bulb like extensions filled with vesticles; they contain neurotransmitters (the chemicals that function as messengers allowing neurons to communicate with each other)
Sensory neurons
receive info from the bodily senses and bring it toward the brain often via the spinal cord
Motor neurons
carry messages away from the brain and spinal cord and toward muscles to control their flexion and extension
Neurogenesis
the formation of new neurons; in a limited number of brain regions, particualrly in the hippocampus, a region critical for learning and memory
