Top 100 Terms Part 2 Flashcards
What is prospective memory?
Remembering to perform a task at the original time you intended to do that task
What is social loafing?
When an individual puts forth less effort while working in a group than when they are individual
What is the neuron firing process?
Dendrites receive chemical messages and it helps the neuron fire and the electrical signal makes its way down the axon and the axon terminal and in there is neuro transmitters that are released
What is the importance of myelin?
Creates faster action potential
What is it called when a neuron is firing?
Action potential
What is it called when a neuron is resting?
Resting potential
What is acetylcholine?
Stimulates muscle contraction
What is dopamine?
Seeks out pleasure
What is serotonin?
Regulates our moods
What is endorphins?
Reduces pain
What are display rules?
Cultural rules/norms that distinguish how one should express emotions
What is groupthink?
When individuals in a group censor their beliefs in order to preserve the harmony of the group
What is cognitive dissonance?
Mental strain that results from holding two conflicting beliefs, values, or attitudes
What is a schema?
The different categories that we organize information into in our brains
What is a self-fulfiling prophecy?
Expectation about a situation that impacts an individual’s behavior in such a way that leads to those expectation becoming a reality
What are the big five personality traits?
OCEAN
Openness
Conscientiousness
Extraversion
Agreeableness
Neuroticism
What are cross sectional studies?
Looks at different groups of people at the same time
What are longitudinal studies?
Where a researcher studies the same group of participants year after year after year
What are the downsides of longitudinal studies?
It takes long and thus costs more
What are the downsides of cross sectional studies?
You’re not studying the same group of participants
What are context dependent memories?
Tendency to retrieve memories that correspond to the physical setting we’re in
What are mood congruent memories?
Tendency to retrieve memories that correspond to the mood we’re in
What are state dependent memories?
Tendency to retrieve memories that correspond to the state (sleepy, awake, etc.) we’re in
What is encoding failure (three stage processing model)?
Inputs (inputs hitting senses) -> sensory memory (identifies what inputs are important) -> working memory (5-9 pieces of information are taken) -(encoding)-> long term memory
What is procedural memory?
Muscle memory
What is episodic memory?
Memory of events
What is semantic memory?
Memory of facts
What is mass practice?
Cramming
What is distributed practice?
Spacing out studying for short intervals over a period of time
What is a fixed ratio?
Organism knows when the reinforcement will occur after a number of instances
What is a fixed interval?
Organism knows when the reinforcement will occur after a certain amount of time
What is a variable ratio?
Organism doesn’t know when the reinforcement occurs but they must do the behavior to get it;
Ex: slot machine
What is a variable interval?
Organism doesn’t know when the reinforcement occurs but they do not have to do it to get the reinforcement;
Ex: a surfer waiting for a perfect wave
What is convergent thinking?
Finding one best solution
What is divergent thinking?
Finding creative or multiple solutions
How does vision work?
When light hits the retina, special cells called photoreceptors (rons and cons) turn the light into electrical signals. These electrical signals travel from the retina through the optic nerve to the brain. Then the brain turns the signals into the images you see.
What is the pre-frontal cortex?
For decision-making;
Personality
What is the motor cortex?
Muscle movement
What is the parietal lobe?
Processes numbers;
Processes spatial information
What is the temporal lobe?
Processes hearing
What is social facilitation?
Tendency for one to perform easy or well-learned tasks better in the presence of others
What is social inhibition?
Tendency for one to perform more difficult or less practiced tasks more poorly in the presence of others
What is the Yerkes-Dodson Law?
States that we perform best at a moderate level of arousal
What is positive reinforcement?
Something is given to encourage behavior
What is negative reinforcement?
Something is removed to discourage behavior
What is positive punishment?
Something is added to discourage behavior
What is negative reinforcement?
Something is removed to encourage behavior
What is fluid intelligence?
Ability to solve new problems and reason abstractly
What is crystalized intelligence?
Accumulation of facts, knowledge, and skills over a lifetime
What is deindividuation?
When a group setting causes one to lose their self-awareness and abandon their normal behaviors
What is self-efficacy?
How capable or confident a person feels in their ability to complete a task
What are heuristics?
A rule of thumb strategy for making quick gut decisions
What are representative heuristics?
A rule of thumb strategy used to make quick gut decisions based off of stereotypes of a group
What is the availability heuristic?
A rule of thumb strategy used to make quick decisions based off information that comes to mind easily
What is the opposite of a heuristic?
Algorhythm
What is intrinsic motivation?
Desire to perform a task comes from within the individual
What is extrinsic motivation?
Desire to perform a task comes from an external reward
What is the overjustification effect?
A phenomenon wherein a person becomes less internally motivated after they are rewarded for something they already love to do
What is conformity?
When someone changes their beliefs to align with a group
What is proactive interference?
Old info interfering with new
What is retroactive interference?
New info interfering with old
What was the Bobo Doll Experiment?
Kids who were exposed to aggression were aggressive
What is observational learning?
Where an individual learns how to behave or act by watching others
What is a case study?
Researcher studies a unique case of one individual or a small group of individuals;
Downsides: Not generalizable
What is a survey?
When people self report information;
Upsides: a lot of data, cheap;
Downsides: Might be hard to generalize, social desirability bias and other biases
What is naturalistic observation?
When a researcher records behavior in a naturally occurring setting;
Downside: Describes behavior but does not explain it
What is correlation?
Looks at relationships;
Downside: Does not imply causation
What is a random sample?
Randomly selecting participants for an experiment
Why do researchers use random sample?
Allows them to make generalizations from data
What is an experiment?
Research method in which an experimenter can determine cause and effect through the manipulation of an independent variable
What is a hypothesis?
An educated guess
What is an independent variable?
Variable which is manipulated by the researcher
What is a dependent variable?
What’s being measured in the experiment
What is a confounding variable?
An extraneous variable that affects the variables being studied
What are operational definitions?
A detailed description of the steps, variables, and procedures of the study
What should be addressed in operational definitions?
-Amount
-Time/duration
-Change
Why do researchers use operational definitions?
To make the study replicatable
What is test reliability?
Test replication
What is test validity?
Did the researcher measure what they set out to measure?
What is random assignment?
Randomly assigning the sample into the control group and experimental group
How is random assignment achieved?
Single-blind experiment
Why is random assignment important?
Gives groups equal representation and increases statistical significance
What is a single-blind study?
Participants don’t know if they’re in the control group or not but researcher does
What is a double-blind study?
Neither the researcher nor the participant know who’s in which group
Why are double-blind studies important?
Prevents researcher bias
What is statistical significance?
States that the results of a study did not likely occur by chance
What is a p-value?
Indicator of statistical significance;
Closer to 0, the more statistically significant
What are the ethical guidelines for a study?
-No coercion (allowed to quit)
-Informed consent (warned of risks)
-Minimal harm
-Deception is allowed as long as debriefing is done
-Confidentiality
