Module 1 Flashcards
What is the definition of psychology?
The scientific study of behaviour
What is the definition of behaviour?
An organism’s observable actions and responses to the environment.
What is the definition of science?
An incremental process for knowledge acquisition based on measurement and testing.
What are automatic behaviours?
Behaviours that are outside an organism’s voluntary control.
What are reflexes?
Simple, automatic and near-instantaneous responses to stimuli. Reflexes are controlled by the autonomic nervous system (ANS).
What are instincts?
Innate (wired in) tendencies to demonstrate common patterns of behaviours in response to a stimuli.
Define ‘diving reflex’
A baby will hold it’s breath and slow its breathing where underwater - also known as the mammalian reflex (otters, muskrats, rabbits, etc. have same reflex).
Define ‘rooting reflex’
A reflex in babies, turning the head to face an object stroking the cheek.
Define ‘sucking reflex’
A reflex in babies, sucking on anything that touches the roof of the mouth.
Define ‘palmar grasp reflex’
A reflex in babies, grabbing anything that touches the palm of their hand.
Define ‘moro reflex’
A reflex in babies, in response to loss of support. Involves reaching out arms, pulling them back in and crying.
Define ‘law’
A description of a phenomenon that is consistent and reliable under experimentation.
Define ‘theory’
A testable explanation of a phenomenon that is consistent with all available evidence.
Define ‘hypothesis’
A prediction of provisional explanation of a phenomenon.
What is selection pressure?
A factor that influences the rate of survival or fertility of a population.
Define ‘phenotype’
Observable properties of an organism that arise from the interaction between heritable (genetic) factors and the environment.
What are the principles of evolution?
- Organisms reproduce and increase in number.
- Organisms inherit features from their parents, but also accumulate random variations.
- Features in the environment make some features more or less helpful in surviving and reproduction.
- Organisms that survive and reproduce pass on features via 2.
What are the requirements for evolution?
- Feature must be variable
- Feature must be heritable (encoded in genetics)
- There must be selection pressure
Emotion involves…
- psychological activation
- response to environment
- behaviour
- cognitive appraisal
Commonly referred to as the ‘ABC’ of psychology, emotion contains what components?
- Affective (feelings or experiences)
- Behavioural (responses to the environment)
- Cognitive (thoughts)
Define expressive behaviours
Expressive behaviours signal what emotion we are feeling and are explicit representations of our internal emotional state (e.g. frowning, smiling, eyes widening).
What are instrumental behaviours?
Instrumental behaviours are about ‘doing something about’ the emotion we are feeling.
What is the difference between ‘mood’ and ‘affect’?
Mood refers to a more stable, longer term phenomenon.
Affect refers to an immediate emotion.
What is this diagram showing?
It is showing slow fear.
When you have an emotional reaction after you have thought about what is happening around you. (sensory information - thalamus - cerebral cortex - amygdala)
