Terms - Psychology Flashcards
What’s the difference between psychology and anthropology?
Anthropology studies humanity across time and place, psychology’s early questions focused on the study of the mind and the behaviours that result from what goes on in it.
Analytical psychology
A branch of psychology founded by Carl Jung, based on the idea that balancing a person’s psyche would allow the person to reach his or her full potential.
Archetypes
Universal symbols that tend to reappear over time; includes models of people, behaviours, and personalities.
Cerebrum
The largest and most developed portion of the brain, which is responsible for controlling memory, understanding, and logic.
Classical conditioning
A type of learning where a once neutral stimulus comes to produce a particular response after pairings with a conditioned stimulus.
Client-centred therapy
A humanistic therapy developed by Carl Rogers in which the client plays an active role.
Cognition
The mental processes in the brain associated with thinking, knowing, and remembering.
Collective unconscious
The shared, inherited pool of memories from our ancestors.
Conditioned response
The learned response to a previously neutral stimulus.
Conditioned stimulus
An originally neutral stimulus that comes to trigger a conditioned response after being paired with an unconditional stimulus
Conscious
Information that we are always aware of; our conscious mind performs the thinking when we take in new information.
Correlation
A measure that indicates a relationship between two factors but does not indicate causation; in a positive correlation, one variable goes up precisely as the other goes up; in a negative correlation, one variable goes up precisely as the other goes down
Defense mechanism
The ego’s way of distorting reality to deal with anxiety
Extinction
In operant conditioning, the diminishing of a conditioned response due to a lack of reinforcement.
Fixation
The continued focus on an earlier stage of psychosexual development due to an unresolved conflict at the oral, anal, or phallic stage.
Free association
A method used in psychoanalysis where a patient relaxes and says whatever comes to mind.
Identity crisis
A time in a teenager’s life filled with extreme self/consciousness as he or she attempts to test and integrate various roles.
Logotherapy
A form of psychotherapy that tries to help the patient find the aim and meaning of his or her own life as a human being without accessing the medical aspect of mental health.
Neo-Freudians
Psychologists who modified Freud’s psychoanalytic theory to include social and cultural aspects.
Neuroscientist
A scientist who specializes in the study of the human brain.
Neurotic disorder
A mental disorder involving anxiety and fear.
Operant conditioning
A type of learning that uses rewards and punishment to achieve a desired behaviour.
Personality
An individual’s characteristic pattern of thinking, feeling, and acting.
Psychoanalytic theory
Sigmund Freud’s theory that all human behaviour is influenced by early childhood and that childhood experiences influence the unconscious mind throughout life.
Psychodynamic theory
An approach to therapy that focuses on resolving a patient’s conflicted conscious and unconscious feelings.
Self-actualization
Reaching one’s full potential; occurs only after basic physical and psychological needs are met.
Unconditioned response
The natural response to an unconditioned stimulus.
Unconditioned stimulus
A stimulus that naturally triggers a response.
Unconscious
Information processing in our mind that we are not aware of; according to Freud, it holds our unacceptable thoughts, feelings, and memories; according to Jung, it included patterns of memories, instincts, and experiences common to all.
(The most influential factor of personality)
Id
Present at birth, unconscious energy from basic aggressive and sexual drives.
(Operating from the pleasure principle -> demands immediate gratification)
Superego
Internalized ideals and standard for judgement (develops as child interacts with parents, peers, and society)
Strong superego -> someone virtuous yet guilt-ridden
Weak superego -> gives into urges and imposes without regard for rules