Semester 1 (Units 1-5) Flashcards
Modern definition of psychology
scientific study of the mind and behavior
Psychiatrist vs a clinical psychologist
The difference is that a psychiatrist is a medical doctor, and a clinical psychologist is a doctor who has earned a doctorate in the field of clinical psychology.
Theoretical perspectives of psychology Psychodynamic Cognitive Biological Evolutionary Humanistic Structuralism Functionalism
Psychodynamic : unconscious drives (wishes and fears)
Cognitive : “mental” functions such as memory, perception, attention,
Biological : all thoughts, feeling & behavior ultimately have a biological cause
Evolutionary : cognitive behaviors go through the process of natural selection, how our behaviors evolved over the years
Humanistic : emphasizes looking at the whole individual and stresses concepts (fulfill potential and well being)
Structuralism : breaking down mental processes into the most basic components (introspection - looking inward)
Functionalism : how mental and behavioral process functions - how they allow the organism to adapt, survive, and flourish.
John Watson and behaviorism
view that psych should be objective that studies behavior without reference to mental processes. He created it
Naturalistic observation
watching and recording the natural behavior of many individuals
case study and when its used
- examine a group of people in depth
- can show what can happen
- can be misleading because everyone is different
surveys and wording effects
asking questions to a large population (sample) to gain info about the groups opinions, feelings, and behavioral tendencies.
wording effects :the way a question is framed can have major effects (like framing)
Correlational research and what its used for
when two variables change and depend on each other. Used to find patterns exist between variables
scatterplot and when its used
- graphed cluster of dots that has direction depending if its negative or positive
- used to observe and show relationships between two numeric variables
Operational definition; what it is and why its used
carefully worded statement of exact procedures used in research study, used in order to give direct instructions when recreating the experiment.
Experiments and what they reveal
- research method where variables can be manipulated in order to observe the effect on the processes
- cause and effect
- results from experiment are likely not due to chance*
experimental group vs control group
group to be exposed to treatment
group that does not receive treatment, served as a comparison
use of random assignment vs random sampling
random assignment used in experiments
random sampling : every person has equal chance to be in experiment / control group
use of a placebo
results that are based inly on expectations (ex : drinking coffee just from the though of finishing your coffee)
Use of median vs. use of the mean
mean : used to average
median : used to determine an approximate average
How to calculate the mean, median, and range
mean : add then divide by amount of scores present.
median : middle score where half scores are lower, half are higher (placed in numerical order)
range : difference between lowest and highest scores
Statistical significance and how is it determine
how likely that the obtained result is due to chance
P ≤ .05 (5% chance that its due to chance)
ethical guidelines in research
- obtain informed consent
- no physical / emotional pain
- confidentiality
- debrief (summarize)
deceptions allowed for unbiased info, disclose when done
neurotransmitters
chemical messenger that crosses synaptic gap between neurons
interneurons : location and function
brain and spinal cord
make decision and reflexes
pituitary gland
endocrines most influential gland. under hypothalamus control. regulates growth and controls other endocrine glands
amygdala and thalamus
- Enables fear and aggression
- receives info from senses and sorts it in the cortex’s
brocas area
- allows to produce speech
- L frontal lobe only
- if damaged cannot produce rational speech called aphasia (loss of ability to understand/express speech due to brain damage)
4 brain lobes : location and functions
frontal : behind forehead; speaking, movement, make plans, and judgement
parietal : at top of head; receives sensory input for touch and body position
Temporal : above ears; auditory area, receives info from opposite ear
Occipital : back of head; includes area for receiving info from visual fields
association areas
prefrontal cortex : in F lobes enables judgement, planning, processing, + new memories
motor cortex (frontal) : planning, control, and execution of voluntary movements
sensory cortex : receiving and processing sensory information from across the body
brocas area (frontal) : motor speech area (makes speech)
wernickes area (temporal) : comprehension of speech
visual cortex : processes visual information
purpose of glial cells and their location
glue cells ; they repair, protect, and nourish cells; central nervous system
split brain patients ; what s being cut out and why
cuts fibers in middle because doesnt allow brain hemispheres to talk
brain plasticity
brain change by reorganizing/building new pathways after damage and to adjust to mishap
epigenetics
study of environment influences on gene expression without a dna change
nature vs nurture controversy
relative contributions of genetic inheritance(nature) and environmental factors(nurture) to human development
identical vs fraternal twins
identical twins come from one fertilized egg while fraternal come from two fertilized eggs
natural selection
inherited traits contributing to reproduction and survival will be passed down to future gens
evolutionary explanations for mating preferences (male and female)
women looking for older, stable men who they can build a family with
men looking for younger reproductive females who can birth children
Heritability in general
measure of how well differences in people’s genes account for differences in their traits
REM sleep and its functions
rapid eye movement ; sleep stage where vivid dreams occur, muscles are relaxed but body systems are active
psychoactive substances : categories and examples
depressants : reduce neural activity + slows bodies functions (alcohol + barbiturates)
stimulants : excite neural activity + speed up body functions (caffeine, cocaine, nicotine)
hallucinogens : distort perception and evoke sensory images (marijuana)
tolerance, addiction, and withdrawal
tolerance : requiring to take greater doses in order to experience drug affect.
addiction : craving of drug while knowing the consequences
withdrawal : discomfort + distress that follows discontinuing drug usage
Top-down processing
perception; info process guided by higher level mental processes constructing perceptions by experiences and expectations
absolute threshold
min stimulation needed to detect particular stimulus 50% of times
Difference threshold and webers law
min difference between 2 stimuli required fpr detection 50% of the time (taste testers)
stimuli must differ by %, not a pin point number
selective attention and inattentional blindness
focusing of conscious awareness on particular stimulus (eaves dropping on a conversation in cafeteria)
failing to see visible objects when our attention is directed elsewhere
order of structures that light passes through in the eye and functions of each structure.
Can I Please Learn Reading Faster
cornea : outer, protective layer
Iris : colored muscle around pupil - changes pupil size
Pupil : adjustable opening where light enters
Lens : behind pupil, helps focus light on retina through accommodation
retina : inner surface of eye, contains receptor cells (rods + cones)
Fovea : cones clustered here
Blind Spot : optic nerve leaves the eye, no receptor cells located here
optic nerve : takes neural impulses from eye to brain
accommodation in the lens
lens changes shape to focus near/far objects on retina
young-helmholtz theory vs opponent process theory
retina contains 3 colors (red green blue) 3 opposite pairs (after images) red/green black/white blue/yellow
feature detectors (function and location)
nerve cells in brain that respond to features of stimulus, shape, angle; in retina
parallel processing
Processing many aspects of a problem at once (ex sight, smell, and taste)
order of structures that sound pass through the ear
outer ear ➟ ear canal to eardrum ➟middle ear ➟ inner ear
functions of cochlea
coiled, fluid filled tube in inner ear. when sound waves travel fluid triggers nerve impulses
locating sounds
which ear the sound hits first
types of hearing loss and treatments
sensorineural hearing loss : damage to cochlea’s receptor cells/ auditory nerves, nerve deafness (aging, inborn, loud noise) most common
conduction hearing loss : damage to mechanical system that conducts sound waves to cochlea (eardrum and middle ear bones)
cochlear implant : device for converting sounds into electrical signals and stimulating auditory nerve through cords threaded into cochlea
gestalt principles : proximity, closure, figure - ground
gestalt : organized whole
proximity : nearness
figure ground : objects (figures) that stand out from surroundings (ground)
olfaction sense
smell; bottom of frontal, not processed through thalamus
touch - where is it processed?
sensory neurons, thalamus ➟sensory cortex (parietal cortex)
kinesthesis
change in position of body part interact with vision; in parietal lobe
sea slug experiment and habituation
first time responses are strong after it settles down, adaptation
pavlovs classical conditioning experiment : identify the UCS, UCR, CS, CR
UCS : food
UCR : salivation
CS : tone
CR : salivation
extinction vs spontaneous recovery
diminishing of CR, occurs when US does not follow CS, in OC when response is not reinforced
reappearance after a pause of a gone CR, suppresses but does not eliminate
generalization vs stimulus discrimination
response to stimuli similar to CS
learned ability to distinguish between CS and other irrelevant stimuli
biological limits on learning
you cannot make a human fly
B.F. Skinner and Operant Conditioning
response with consequences (learn and repeat good results and avoid bad ones)
Shaping and how its done
reinforcers guide behavior closer and closer to the desired behavior
Negative reinforcement with examples
increasing behavior by stopping/reducing stimuli. (snooze on alarm, wear seatbelt to stop beep)
Fixed-ration schedule
reinforces response after specified number of times (5 coffee= 5$)
superstitious behavior - impact on behavior
belief in reinforcer + punisher always occurring together (суиверия)
intrinsic vs extrinsic motivation and the over justification effect
desire to perform behavior for its own sake (interest) ➟ excessive rewards can destroy
desire to perform behavior for outside promised rewards/avoid punishment
Internal vs external locus of control
internal : you are in control of your own fate
external : outside forces are in control of your fate
latent learning and cognitive maps
learning that occurs but is not seen until there is a reason to demonstrate it
mental representation of layout of an environment
Learned helplessness and how it can develop
when you try many times and it does not work so you give up trying
Banduras bobo doll experiment and its results
children/people observe and perform the same behavior (cognitive learning)
- social learning theory
- learning prosocial and antisocial behavior
modeling
process of observing and imitating a specific behavior
mirror neurons
- activate when observing others and them performing these actions
- located in frontal lobe
encoding, storage, and rehearsal
- Processing info into memory (getting memory into brain)
- Keep and retain the info
- rehearsing so memory where a person must retrieve info learned earlier (fill in the blank test)
short term memory
Activated memory. Holds few things briefly (ex phone number youre dialing)
automatic processing
Info goes into long term memory without conscious processing
chunking + examples ; mnemonics + examples
- Organizing info into manageable meaningful units
- Memory aids. Use vivid images and organizational devices like first letters of a sentence
echoic vs iconic memory
- Memory associated with sounds and words
- Memory associated with eye sight
deep processing w/ examples
Encoding based on meaning of the words (how words work together to create meaning) (ex : giving a word a meaning)
spacing effect
Practice that takes place over a period of time
priming and examples
Unconscious activation of associations with memory (ex morning in happy mood mourning in bad mood)
serial position effect (primacy and recency effect)
You can recall first (primacy effect) and last (recent effect) items on list (leaderboards)
prototype and examples
Mental images, matches new items to a prototype provides a quick and easy method for sorting items in categories (ex : you consider an office chair and dinner chair as one thing; chair because of the 4 legs)
availability heuristic and examples
Estimating likelihood of events based on their availability in memory (ex plane crash, but crashing in a car is higher)
confirmation bias
Tendency to search for info that supports our perceptions and to ignore evidence against
framing and examples
The way an issue is posed; how an issue is framed can affect decisions and judgements (ex : if you say you argued vs disagreed to a friend, and that affects their judgement)
critical period of language development
younger than age 2-7
telegraphic speech
Early speech where child speaks like telegram (2 word stage)
Uses nouns + verbs (go car)
Whorfs linguistic determinism
language determines the way we think
Sternbergs triarchic theory of intelligence
analytic - book smart
practical - street/life smart
creative - art smart, finding solutions imagination and creating
use of intelligence tests
to assess individuals mental aptitude and compare with others
Heritability of Intelligence
Intelligence is similar between parents and children
