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psych 2 final

Terms

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What is an operational definition?
a definition that describes the actions or operations that will be made to measure or control a variable
What is a case study?
an in-depth investigation of an individual subject
What is naturalistic observation?
a descriptive research method in which the researcher engages in careful, usually prolonged, observation of behavior without intervening directly with the subjects
What is an experiment?
a research method in which the investigator manipulates a variable under carefully controlled conditions and observes whether any changes occur in a second variable as a result
What is an independent variable? What is a dependent variable?
in an experiment: a condition or event that an experimenter varies in order to see its impact on another variable; the variable that is thought to be affected by the manipulation of the independent variable
What is experimenter bias? How can it be prevented?
a phenomenon that occurs when a researcher's expectations or preferences about the outcome of a study influence the results obtained; by a double-blind procedure (a research strategy in which neither subjects nor experimenters know which subjects are in the experimental or control group)
What is a confounding of variables?
a condition that exists whenever two variables are linked together in a way that makes it difficult to sort out their independent effects
What are neurons? What are glial cells?
major 2 parts of the nervous system: individual cells in the nervous system that receive, integrate, and transmit information; cells found throughout the nervous system that provide structural support, nourishment, and insulation for neurons
What is an axon? A dendrite? A synapse?
a long, thin fiber that transmits signals away from the neuron cell body to other neurons, or to muscles or glands; branchlike part of of a neuron that is specialized to receive information; a junction where information is transmitted from one neuron to the next
What are the 4 lobes of the brain, and where are they located?
parietal (top), occipital (back), temporal (ear), frontal (front)
What is social desirablility bias?
a tendency to give socially approved answers to questions about oneself
What are neurotransmitters?
chemicals that transmit information from one neuron to another
What is a hypothesis? A theory?
a tentative statement about the relationship between two or more variables; a system of interrelated ideas that is used to explain a set of observations
When you have a 50-100-150 watt lightbulb, the perceived difference from 50 to 100 watts is _______ than the perceived difference from 100 to 150 watts.
greater
Where would there be damage if you couldn't see the right half of your visual world?
the left visual cortex
What is opponent-process theory? Trichromatic theory?
the theory that color perception depends on receptors that make antagonistic responses to three pairs of colors; the theory of color vision holding that the human eye has three types of receptors with differing sensitivities to different wavelengths
What is auditory localization? What are the 2 things it depends on?
locating the source of a sound in space; the difference in loudness between the two ears and the timing difference between the two ears
What is absolute threshold?
the minimum amount of stimulation that an organism can detect for a specific type of sensory input
What is classical conditioning? Operant conditioning?
a type of learning in which a neutral stimulus acquires the ability to evoke a response that was originally evoked by another stimulus; a form of learning in which voluntary responses come to be controlled by their consequences
What is top-down processing? Bottom-up processing?
in form perception: a progression from the whole to the elements; progression from individual elements to the whole
What is spontaneous recovery?
the reappearance of an extinguished response after a period of nonexposure to the conditioned stimulus
What is an unconditioned response? A conditioned response? An unconditioned stimulus? A conditioned stimulus? A neutral stimulus?
an unlearned reaction to an unconditioned stimulus that occurs without previous conditioning; a learned reaction to a conditioned stimulus that occurs because of previous conditioning; a stimulus that evokes an unconditioned response without previous conditioning; a previously neutral stimulus that has, through conditioning, acquired the capacity to evoke a conditioned response; doesn't originally evoke the response
What is shaping?
the reinforcement of closer and closer approximations of a desired response
What is positive reinforcement? Negative reinforcement? Punishment?
reinforcement that occurs when a response is strengthened because it is followed by the presentation of a rewarding stimulus; the strengthening of a response because it is followed by the removal of an aversive (unpleasant) stimulus; an event that follows a response that weakens or suppresses the tendency to make that response
What is a flashbulb memory?
unusually vivid and detailed recollections of momentous events
What is functional fixedness?
the tendency to perceive an item only in terms of its most common use
What is retrieval?
recovering information from memory stores
What is prospective memory?
the ability to remember to perform actions in the future
What is mental set?
persisting in using problem-solving strategies that have worked in the past
What is a phoneme? A morpheme?
the smallest unit of sound in a spoken language; the smallest unit of meaning in a language
What does it mean that language is generative?
there are a limited number of symbols that can be combined in an infinite number of ways
What is episodic memory? Semantic memory?
chronological, or temporally dated, recollections of personal experiences; general knowledge that is not tied to the time when the information was learned
When does most forgetting occur?
very rapidly after learning something
How is memory best viewed?
as a reconstruction of events or materials
What is a representativeness heuristic?
basing the estimated probability of an event on how similar it is to the typical prototype of that event
What is encoding?
forming a memory code
What is the serial-position effect?
the fact that subjects show better recall for items at the beginning (primacy effect) and end (recency effect) of a list than for items in the middle
What is the capacity of short-term memory?
5-9 units of information
What is an availability heuristic?
basing the estimated probability of an event on the ease with which relevant instances come to mind
How do adults divide sounds?
they divide a continuously changing sequence of sounds into categories
Can infants distinguish among all sounds despite the language spoken at home?
yes
Can children mis-add endings to words even after getting it correct before?
yes
What is the way we categorically perceive speech based on?
the language we speak
What are schemas? Weapon focus? Memory reconstruction? Leading questions?
an organized cluster of knowledge about a particular object or sequence of events; not knowing what the person looked like because of focusing on the weapon; memories change over time; questions used on an eyewitness that can change their memories of what happened
What is set-point? Settling-point?
the idea that the body monitors fat-cell levels to keep them (and weight) fairly stable; the idea that weight tends to drift around a level at which the constellation of factors that determine food consumption and energy expenditure achieve an equilibrium
What is the Coolidge effect?
Coolidge wanted more hens, Mrs. Coolidge wanted more times
What is an EEG?
a device that monitors the electrical activity of the brain over time by means of recording electrodes attached to the surface of the scalp
What is a circadian rhythm?
the 24-hour biological cycles found in humans and many other species
What is REM sleep?
a deep stage of sleep marked by rapid eye movements, high-frequency brain waves, and dreaming
What is insomnia?
chronic problems in getting adequate sleep
What is narcolepsy?
a disease marked by sudden and irresistable onsets of sleep during normal waking periods
What is sleep apnea?
a sleep disorder characterized by frequent reflexive gasping for air that awakens a person and disrupts sleep
What are night terrors? Nightmares?
abrupt awakenings from NREM sleep accompanied by intense autonomic arousal and feelings of panic; anxiety-arousing dreams that lead to awakening, usually from REM sleep
What is a representative sample?
a sample of the population that is representative of the entire population, instead of just one part of the population
What is a biased sample?
a sample that is not representative of the population
What type of tests use cause-effect relationships?
experiments
What are the divisions of the nervous system?
the central nervous system and the peripheral nervous system
What are the divisions of the CNS?
brain and spinal cord
What are the divisions of the PNS?
the somatic nervous system and the autonomic nervous system
What part of color and light is wavelength closest to?
hue
What is proximity? Similarity?
things that are near one another seem to belong together; people tend to group stimuli that are similar

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