Social/Psych Flashcards
What is the function of the amygdala in the brain?
It is linked to fear and aggression when stimulated.
Schachter-Singer theory of emotion
- Event triggers nervous system arrousal
- Arousal leads to cognitive appraisal/reasoning as to why one has this arousal
- This then leads to the emotion experienced
What’s the Lazarus Theory of emotion?
- An event triggers thought.
- The thought triggers both emotion and physiological arrousal.
What is the Cannon Bard theory?
- Some sort of event triggers the simultaneous experience of emotion and physiological arousal.
What’s the James Lange theory of emotion?
- There is first some event.
- This event triggers physiological arousal.
- This arousal then triggers us to interpret this arousal.
- We experience emotion after interpreting this arousal.
Type I Error
- Known as a false positive
- In this scenario, the null hypothesis is correct - that there is no relationship between two variables
- Incorrect rejection of a null hypothesis
Type II Error
- This is “false negative”
- The null hypothesis is false, but it fails to be rejected
Culture
This is defined as the beliefs, behaviors, and traditions of a group of people.
Culture can be based around shared gender or ethnicity.
Ethnocentrism
Judging another culture based on the customs and norms of one’s own culture.
Cultural relativism
The idea that a person’s beliefs or activities should be based on that person’s culture, rather than being judged against the criteria of another culture.
What is linguistic relativism/the Sapir Whorf hypothesis?
The idea that one’s native language affects how one thinks/perceives the world.
Human cognition is affected by our native language.
Example: Inuit have several ways to say “snow,” and this affects how they view snow/the world.
Fovea
A small indentation in the retina, in the back of the eye with a high concentration of cones (the cells in the eye that perceive color and work best in high light).
Society
Large group of people who engage in persistent social interaction, and have shared political authority/cultural expectations.
This refers to the structural/organizational aspect of the social group.
Social capital
Economic resources that one gains by being part of a network of relationships or groups.
Cultural capital
The social assets a person has that promote social mobility within their society. These include: intellect, dress, speech.
For example, this could be someone dressing nicely, or speaking English well.
Material culture
Physical objects that people use to define their culture. These include: universities, schools, cities, neighborhoods, churches, mosques, offices, factories, utensils, implements.
This can be thought of as culture’s “physical aspect.”
Ex: Fork versus chopsticks
Symbolic culture
This refers to nonmaterial culture, or the symbols that people within a culture use. This can be gestures, languages, sanctions, norms, values.
More
Cultural norms that are considered essential to a particular society, Violating them entails serious consequences.
Folkway
Cultural norms that aren’t strictly enforced.
Example: someone walking down the street barefoot
-Jessica using a paper to blow her nose
Conflict theory
- Theory based on Karl Marx’s ideas
- Focuses on inequalities of different groups within society, and focuses on power differentials
- Conflict is seen as an engine of change in society - the theory focuses mainly on change within a society and tension, not stability or consensus
Social constructionism
How society constructs abstract concepts and principles - specifically beliefs and values.
Things won’t have a value until we assign it a value - for example: money (pieces of paper), nations (lines on a map), books (scribbles on pages).
Symbolic interactionism
Similar to social constructionism, but applied on a small scale level. This examines how we use symbols to interact/communicate with each other. Specifically, it focuses on the communication aspect - how individuals and groups make meaning through communication/interactions.
Functionalism
Examines society from a broad scale perspective - looks at a society as a whole. It focuses on how society is made of interconnected parts work together to strike a balance. The focus is on equilibrium/balance, and the society’s harmony and stability.
Manifest function
From functionalism, these are the intended consequences for specific parts of society. An example is that education is meant to impart skills and knowledge to train people to work.
Latent function
From functionalism, these are unintended, hidden consequences of different parts of society. Colleges have a manifest function of preparing people for the workplace, but people can also find their partners in the environment.
Dependency ratio
This is a measure of the ratio of “dependents” (people who are unable to work, such as those under 14 or over 65) and the amount of people able to work (people between 15-64)
It is based on age
Life course approach
It examines individuals’ lives, and how that interacts with the social, historical, and economic contexts they are in throughout their lives. This looks at how earlier events may affect their development and precipitate later events in life, such as health outcomes.
Age stratification
Refers to the hierarchical ranking of age groups within a society.
Source monitoring error
When someone forgets where they learned something from, and misattribute it to a different source of info.
What does interference refer to in relation to memory?
This means that learning new information can hinder one from recalling long-term memories. The long-term memories are still intact, but they are just more difficult to retrieve because of the new info.
Horizontal mobility
A person moving between positions at the same social level; that is, there is no change in social/economic status or occupational status.
Meritocracy
A system with extreme social mobility; idea that people attain their position through their ability/achievements.
Absolute poverty
Condition of acute deprivate of basic needs, such as food, water, or shelter. This is a set standard - such as when people quote the figure of making less than $1.25 per day - this is defined as absolute poverty.
It applies across countries - absolute poverty would be the same in the US, Liberia, Lithuania.
Relative poverty
People whose incomes are low within their particular society. For instance, in the US, they might make $60 a day, which is significantly higher than other countries, but for this particular society, it is significantly lower than the median income.
Social disorganization theory
The theory that the conditions of a neighborhood affect the likelihood that a person who lives there will be involved in crime.
Exchange mobility
Within the US, the idea that each social class contains a certain/static number of people.
Obsessive-compulsive disorder
Anxiety disorder characterized by the following:
- Obsessions like uncontrollable, intrusive beliefs, thoughts, ideas
- negative emotions like anxiety and guilt
- Compulsions like repetitive and ritualistic behaviors or actions (repetitive hand-washing)
Post-traumatic stress disorder
Anxiety that develops after traumatic experiences, with symptoms like:
- Reliving the event
- Avoidance of situations/things related to trauma
- Hyperarousal - heightened physical arousal/increased stress
- Changes in thoughts/feelings - feeling sad, numb
Schizophrenia
Psychological disorder with symptoms like:
- Hallucinations - see/hear things that aren’t there
- Delusions - have false beliefs
- Disorganized/confused
- Flat affect
- Isolate themselves
Dissociative Disorder
Psychiatric disorder with the following traits:
- Experience of detachment or feeling outside of one’s own body
- Breakdown in sense of self, memory
Anxiety disorder
Psychological disorders that are the following:
- Generalized anxiety disorder
- Panic disorders
- Phobia
- Obsessive compulsive disorder
- Post traumatic stress disorder
Generalized anxiety disorder
Type of anxiety disorder
- Excessive, uncontrollable worry that interferes with daily life
- Can include physical symptoms like fatigue, headaches, nausea
- Much more common in women
Schema
This is a pattern of thought that organizes categories of information and their relationships to each other. Each person has a different schema - different ways that they categorize information and different ways they link the different pieces of information.
What is modeling, in psychology?
This is related to observational learning - specifically, the fact that the teacher can teach the learner by showing some behavior without verbal explanation, and the learner can learn the behavior through imitation.
Looking glass self
This is the concept that people develop an understanding of themselves through the way that others view them.
