AP Psychology Review
A comprehensive review of terminology for AP Psychology. Definitions are for triggering other information. (Pulled from other lists.)
Terms
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- cognitive dissonance theory
- this says that we will suffer discomfort and act to change the situation when our thoughts and actions seem to be inconsistent
- TAT
- a projective test in which subjects look at and tell a story about ambiguous pictures
- representativeness heuristic
- this cognitive short cut enables one to generalization based on how closely a stimulus matches a typical member of a class; given a picture of a man in a tweed jacket with a textbook, is this man a professor or a truck driver?
- sensory neurons
- nervous system cells that receive information from the environment
- identity vs. role confusion
- Erikson's stage during which teenagers and young adults search for and become their true selves
- correlation coefficient
- a positive one near 1.0 indicates two variable are positively related; a negative number indicates a negative relationship; zero indicates no relationship
- collectivist
- this adjective describes cultures in which the individual is less important than the group
- need for achievement
- desire for accomplishment, mastery of people, ideas, things, desire for reaching a high standard
- endorphins
- neurotransmitters that give one a feeling of well-being, euphoria or eliminate pain
- mode
- the most commonly occurring term in a batch of data
- dyslexia
- a learning disability that results in difficulty reading and writing
- NREM
- refers to sleep during which there is no rapid eye movement
- extinction
- in classical conditioning, the process of eliminating the previously acquired association of the conditioned stimulus and conditioned response
- experiment
- form of scientific investigation in which one variable is tested to determine its effect on another
- evolutionary
- perspective that stresses the value of behavior in Darwinian terms
- plasticity
- the ability of the brain to adapt to damage by reorganizing functions
- individualist
- culture in which the individual is valued more highly than the group
- action potential
- the electrical process by which information is transmitted the length of an axon
- preconscious
- in Freud's theory, the level of consciousness in which thoughts and feelings are not conscious but are readily retrieveable to consciousness
- pituitary
- gland that is the master gland of the endocrine system
- amygdala
- limbic system component associated with emotion, particularly fear and anger
- bipolar cells
- eye neurons that receive information from the retinal cells and distribute information to the ganglion cells
- general adaptation syndrome
- Seyle's concept that the body responds to stress with alarm, resistance and exhaustion
- object permanence
- recognition that things continue to exist even though hidden from sight; infants generally gain this after 3 to 7 months of age
- informed consent
- agreement to participate in psychology research, after being appraised of the dangers and benefits of the research
- sympathetic
- part of the nervous system that controls the "flight or fight" response
- paranoid
- a type of schizophrenia characterized by prominent delusions that are persecutory or grandiose
- endocrine system
- the slow messenger system of the body; produces hormones that affect many bodily functions
- permissive
- describes a parenting style that is characterized by the parent making few demands on the child
- projective
- term describes a personality test in which ambiguous stimuli trigger revelation of inner feelings, thoughts
- activation synthesis
- the idea that dreams are the result of the cerebral cortex interpreting and organizing random flashes of brain activity, originating in the lower brain structures, especially the pons
- self-concept
- one's idea and evaluation of oneself; this contributes to one's sense of identity
- social facilitation
- a phenomenon in which we perform simple or well-learned tasks better when in the presence of others
- short-term
- type of memory that holds a few items briefly before they are lost
- retrieval
- the process of recovering information stored in memory
- socio-cultural
- a perspective on psychology that emphasizes effects on behavior and thinking of one's culture and the people around one
- fluid
- term describes a type of intelligence used to cope with novel situations and problems
- chaining
- using operant conditioning to teach a complex response by linking together less complex skills
- big 5 personality factors
- openness to new experience, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, neuroticism
- normal distribution
- describes a symmetrical, bell shaped curve that shows the distribution of many physical and psychological attributes
- corpus callosum
- the fibers that connect the right and left hemispheres, enabling them to communicate
- imprinting
- evidence of critical period in some animals; they follow the first moving thing they see after hatching
- Cannon-Baird
- theory of emotion that says that a stimulus causes simultaneously psyiological arousal and the subjective experience of an emotion
- interneurons
- cells in the spinal cord through which reflexes travel without going to the brain
- defense mechanisms
- Freud's processes by which individuals express uncomfortable emotions in disguised ways
- attachment
- theory developed by Harlow; types include secure and insecure
- formal operations
- One of Piaget's stages; includes the ability to use abstract thinking
- sexual response
- its four stages are excitement, plateau, orgasm and resolution
- drive reduction
- theory that claims that behavior is driven by a desire to lessen drives resulting from needs that disrupt homeostasis
- conduction
- one type of hearing impairment caused by mechanical problems in the ear structures
- cognitive
- perspective on psychology that stresses the importance of mental activities associated with thinking, remembering, etc
- functionalism
- William James's school of thought that stressed the adaptive and survival value of behaviors
- denial
- a defense mechanism in which unpleasant thought or desires are ignored or excluded from consciousness
- neurotransmitter
- a chemical that is released by a neuron for the purpose of carrying information across the gaps (synapses) between neurons
- bystander effect
- the tendency to not offer help when needed if others are present who do not offer help
- affective disorders
- psychological disturbances of mood
- crystallized
- term describes a type of intelligence which applies cultural knowledge to solving problems
- circadian rhythm
- the daily biological rhythms that occur in a 24-hour period
- attitude
- a relatively enduring evaluation of a person or thing; Asch demonstrated that this doesn't always match one's behavior
- learned helplessness
- lack of motivation to avoid unpleasant stimuli after one has failed before to escape similar stimuli
- delta waves
- largest brain waves, associated with deep, dreamless sleep
- concrete operations
- Piaget's stage in which children learn such concepts as conservation and mathematical transformations; about 7 - 11 years of age
- neuroscience
- perspective on psychology that emphasizes the study of the brain and its effects on behavior
- hippocampus
- limbic system component associated with memory
- applied research
- scientific investigations intended to solve practical problems
- difference threshold
- also called the jnd; smallest distinction between two stimuli that can consistently be detected
- Rorschach test
- a projective test that uses inkblots as the ambiguous stimulus
- shaping
- an operant conditioning technique in which reinforces guide behavior to closer and closer approximations of the desired behavior
- self-efficacy
- one's ability to act effectively to bring about desired results; from Bandura
- hallucinogen
- a substance capable of producing a sensory effect in the absence of real external sensory stimuli
- hindsight bias
- the tendency, after an event occurs, to overestimate the likelihood that an event could have been predicted
- false consensus
- a belief that others share the same opinion about something, when actually most don't
- incentive
- an external stimulus that tends to encourage behavior
- binocular cues
- retinal disparity and convergence which enable people to determine depth using both eyes
- hierarchy of needs
- Maslow's theory of the most important motivations people have
- Central Nervous System
- consists of the brain and the spinal cord
- narcolepsy
- a disorder characterized by sudden sleep attacks, often at inopportune times
- frequency
- theory of hearing which states that the rate of nerve impulses traveling up the auditory nerve matches the tone's frequency
- operational definition
- a description of an experimental variable in such a way that the variable can be measured and the procedure can be replicated
- personality
- a consistent pattern of thinking, acting, feeling
- dissociative identity disorder
- also called multiple personality disorder
- hunger
- it is regulated by the lateral hypothalamus and the ventromedial hypothalamus
- Electra complex
- counterpart to the Oedipus complex for females
- dreams
- occur most often during REM sleep; may be caused by activation-synthesis, or may be a way of cementing memories
- independent
- type of variable manipulated by the experimenter
- spontaneous recovery
- in classical conditioning the re-occurence of conditioning after it had appeared to be extinct
- phallic
- name for Freud's stage which features the Oedipus stage
- latent learning
- a change in behavior due to experience acquired without conscious effort, s, for example, a student using a quote in an exam essay that the student had never tried to memorize, though had encountered it in studying
- antagonist
- drug which blocks the activity of neurotransmitters
- consummate love
- includes passion, intimacy and commitment
- repression
- defense mechanism in which painful memories are excluded from consciousness
- motivation
- a need or desire that energizes and directs behavior
- positive psychology
- field of study which concentrates on good psychological traits such as contentment and joy; it also studies character traits such as wisdom, integrity and altruism
- psychoanalysis
- Freud's therapeutic technique
- absolute threshold
- intensity level at which one can detect a stimulus 50% of the time
- self-esteem
- the more positive one's estimation of one's qualities and characteristics, the higher this is
- genital stage
- Freud's stage of psychosexual development when adult sexuality is prominent
- median
- the middle one of a set of numbers
- optic nerve
- the axons of the ganglion cells form this
- reaction formation
- defense mechanism in which unacceptable impulses are transformed into their opposite
- random
- term that describes assignment in which all subjects have an equal chance of being assigned to the control group or to the experimental group
- introversion
- a personality trait that signifies that one finds energy from internal sources rather than external ones
- occipital
- this lobe contains the primary vision processing function
- hemispheres
- we have two, right and left, and some brain functions seem to centered in one or the other
- axon
- extension of the neuron which carries, via an action potential, information that will be sent on to other neurons, muscles or glands
- outgroup
- generally, any group that one does not belong to
- feature detection
- the ability of the brain to identify specific components of visual stimuli such as corners or edges
- groupthink
- tendency for group members to think alike with certainty of correctness, biased perceptions of outgroup members, and generally defective decision-making processes
- IQ
- the average is 100; there are many definitions of this attribute, including multiple and crystallized
- parietal
- lobe that contains the sensory cortex
- glial cell
- this acts as a support system for neurons
- double blind
- this term describes an experiment in which neither the subjects nor the experimenter knows whether a subject is a member of the experimental group or the control group
- phoneme
- in language, smallest distinctive sound unit
- theory
- this organizes data and is used to make predictions
- projection
- defense mechanism in which one disguises one's won unacceptable impulses by attributing them to others
- higher-order
- term describes conditioning in which the CS for one experiment becomes the UCS in another experiment so that another neutral stimulus can be made to elicit the original UCR
- acquisition
- a process in classical conditioning by which the association of a neutral stimulus with a natural stimulus is first established
- deindividuation
- when an individual seems to lose himself or herself in the group's identity
- adrenal gland
- source of the hormone norepinephrine which affects arousal
- iconic
- term that describes the memory of images
- schizophrenia
- disorder characterized by hallucinations and delusions
- norm
- an understood rule for social behavior
- availability heuristic
- this cognitive shortcut features the idea that events which are vividly in memory seem to be more common
- lucid
- describes a dream in which the dreamer is aware that he or she is dreaming and is able to influence the progress of the dream narrative
- placebo effect
- phenomenon that some people get better even though they receive not medication but an inert substance which should have no medical effect
- alcohol
- the most frequently used and abused CNS depressant in most cultures; its use affects mood, judgment, cognition
- rationalization
- "The only reason I flunked the test is because our teacher is no good."
- catharsis
- release of aggressive energy through activity or fantasy
- lithium
- in psychopharmacology, this is used to control bipolar symptoms
- obsessive-compulsive disorder
- an anxiety disorder characterized by repetitive obsessions and compulsions
- longitudinal
- describes research that measures a trait in a particular group of subjects over a long period of time
- fundamental attribution error
- tendency to attribute others' behavior to their dispositions and our own behaviors to our situations
- bulimia
- eating disorder characterized by excessive eating followed by purging
- omission training
- a procedure in which reinforcement occurs when a specific behavior does not occur in a fixed period of time
- discrimination
- treating members of different races, religions, ethnic groups differently; usually associated with prejudice
- internal locus of control
- people with this tned to respond to internal states and desires; they tend to see their successes as the result of their own efforts
- unconditioned stimulus
- in conditioning it elicits the UCR
- instinct
- a complex pattern of behavior that is fixed across a species
- convergent thinking
- a type of critical thinking in which one evaluates existing possible solutions to a problem to choose the best one
- external locus of control
- this term describes what you have if your behaviors are driven mainly by outside forces
- interposition
- monocular visual cue in which two objects are in the same line of vision and one patially conceals the other, indicating that the first object concealed is further away
- eidetic
- describes a type of visual memory that is retained for a long time; photographic
- safety
- the second rung of Maslow's hierarchy; refers to need for freedom from danger
- latent
- Freud's stage of psychosexual development occuring from about age 6 to puberty during which little happens in psychosexual terms
- echoic
- term that describes memory of sounds
- reticular formation
- a network of cells in the brainstem that filters sensory information and is involved in arousal and alertness
- clinical
- this type of psychologist studies, assesses and treats those with psychological disorders
- temporal
- the lobe that controls audition
- Parkinson's disease
- this ailment, whose symptoms includes tremors and later difficulty walking, is caused by inability to produce dopamine
- superego
- the part of the personality in Freud's theory that is responsible for making moral choices
- representative
- this kind of sample accurately reproduces the characteristics of the population a researcher is studying
- reciprocal determinism
- Bandura's idea that though our environment affects us, we also affect our environment
- anorexia (nervosa)
- an eating disorder in which one starves oneself even though significantly underweight
- mania
- high state of arousal, often accompanied by poor judgment
- emotion theories
- James-Lange, Cannon-Baird and Singer-Schachter are three
- kinethesis
- sense of balance and of one's physical position
- mental age
- developed by Binet; equal to one's chronological age times the percentage score on an IQ test
- CAT scan
- a method of creating static images of the brain through computerized axial tomography
- anvil
- the middle of the three ossicles
- night terrors
- also called sleep terror disorder, these include the characteristic of waking abruptly in a state of panic, usually in children, less often in adults
- pons
- part of the brain, works with the cerebellum in coordinating voluntary movement; neural stimulation studied in activation synthesis theory may originate here
- social exchange
- a theory that suggests that our behavior is based on maximizing benefits and minimizing costs
- social learning
- a theory that suggests we learn social behaviors by watching and imitating others
- scapegoat
- this theory says that having suffered negative experience, an individual might blame an innocent person or group for the experience and subsequently mistreat the person or group
- selective attention
- this term describes the situation when you are focused on certain stimuli in the environment while other stimuli are excluded
- metacognition
- thinking about thinking
- auditory canal
- the area that sound waves pass through to reach the eardrum
- reinforcer
- in operant conditioning any event that strengthens the behavior it follows
- preoperational
- Piaget's second stage of cognitive development, when egocentrism declines
- egocentrism
- in a toddler, the belief that others perceive the world in the same way that he or she does
- PTSD
- initials representing a disorder in which one relives painfully stressful events
- sleep spindles
- short bursts of brain waves detected in stage 2 sleep
- color blindness
- a variety of disorders marked by inability to distinguish some or all colors
- autonomic nervous system
- division of the nervous system that control the glands and organs; its divisions arouse or calm
- catatonic
- a form of schizophrenia in which the patient has muscle immobility and does not move
- lens
- a curved, transparent element of the vision system that provides focus
- functional fixedness
- the tendency to think about things only in terms of their usual uses; can be a hindrance to creative thinking
- correlation
- the degree of relationship between two variables
- retrograde amnesia
- loss of memory for events that occurred before the onset of amnesia; eg a soldier's forgetting events immediately before a shell burst nearby, injuring him
- synaptic gap
- space between the axon terminal of one neuron and the receptors of the next neuron
- monocular
- terms that means "one eyed", used to indicate the sort of of environmental cues to depth perception that only require one eye, for example, interposition
- memory
- functions associated with this include encoding, storage and retrieval
- psychodynamic
- term describes the perspective on psychology in which inner feeling and unconscious tensions are emphasized
- self-actualization
- the highest of Malow's needs; "the full use of talent"
- thalamus
- the sensory switchboard
- placebo
- an inert substance given to the control group in an experiment
- neutral
- describes a stimulus in classical conditioning that would normally not elicit the response intended, such as the tone in Pavlov's experiments before it was associated with the food
- embryo
- early stage of human development, when cells have begun to differentiate
- all-or-nothing
- description of the action of neurons when firing
- retroactive interference
- when new learning disrupts the recall of previously-learned information
- intimacy vs isolation
- Erikson's stage in which individuals form deeply personal relationships, marry, begin families
- dissociative identity disorder
- previously called multiple personality disorder; disorder where personality is segmented into 3+ identities; often controversial; often accompanied by sever trauma at a young age
- Oedipus complex
- in Freud's theory, the conflict which results in a boy gaining a superego and beginning to emulate his father
- schema
- a collection of basic knowledge about a category of information; serves as a means of organization and interpretation of that information
- mere exposure effect
- this phenomenon causes one to prefer a stimulus as a consequence of repeated exposures to that stimulus, particularly is there is no adverse result of the exposure
- consciousness
- one's awareness of one's environment and oneself.
- MMPI
- the initials of a long, detailed personality inventory; Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory
- obesity
- condition of having excess body fat resulting in being greatly overweight
- electroconvulsive therapy
- a treatment in which low level electric current is passed through the brain
- conditioning
- generally, learning in which certain experiences make certain behaviors more or less likely; there are two forms of this
- behavioral
- perspective on psychology that sees psychology as an objective science without reference to mental states
- sublimation
- a defense mechanism in which unacceptable energies are directed into socially admirable outlets, such as art
- neural network
- refers to interconnected neuron cells
- James-Lange
- theory of emotion in which physiological arousal precedes the emotion
- SSRI
- class of drugs used to relieve anxiety by limiting reuptake of a neurotransmitter
- prejudice
- a negative attitude formed toward an individual or group without sufficient experience with the person or group
- Intelligence
- the ability to learn from experience, to use information, to understand things
- extrinsic
- term that describes motivations that drive behavior in order to gain rewards from outside forces
- bipolar disorder
- mood disorder in one experiences both manic and depressed episodes
- artificial intelligence
- a subdiscipline of computer science that attempts to simulate human thinking
- long term potentiation
- a possible source of the formation of memories; improvement in a neuron's ability to transmit caused by repeated stimulations
- inferiority complex
- Adler's conception of a basic feeling of inadequacy stemming from childhood experiences
- role-play
- technique in therapy and training in which participants act out new behaviors or skills
- hypochondriasis
- a disorder characterized by an unreasonable fear that one has a serious disease
- person-centered
- therapy developed by Rogers featuring the patient's self-discovery and actualization; also called client-centered
- phobia
- fear
- integrity vs despair
- Erikson's final stage in which those near the end of life look back and evaluate their lives
- split brain
- a condition in which the two brain hemispheres are isolated by cutting the corpus callosum
- population
- all of the individuals from which subjects for an experiment may be drawn
- dependent variable
- the variable that the experimenter measures at the end of the experiment
- rods
- responsible for black and white vision
- rooting
- a reflex in which a newborn turns its head in response to a gentle stimulus on its cheek
- place theory
- the idea that different sound frequencies stimulate different locations on the basilar membrae
- cochlea
- this coiled structure in the inner ear is fluid-filled and in it the energy from sound waves stimulate hair cells
- reliability
- in testing, the characteristic of a test that produces consistent scores through retesting or alternate halves or other methods
- after image
- an image that remains after a stimulus is removed, especially one in which the colors are reversed
- bottom-up processing
- analysis that begins with sensory receptors and works its way up to the brain's integration of sensory information
- olfactory bulb
- the first brain structure to pick up smell information from the nose
- morpheme
- in language, the smallest unit that carries meaning
- confounding variable
- extraneous factor that interferes with the action of the independent variable on the dependent variable
- schemata
- plural form of schema
- achievement test
- a test that assesses what one has learned
- client-centered therapy
- developed by Carl Rogers, this humanistic therapy includes unconditional positive regard
- accommodation
- the process of modifying a schema to account for new information; the process of the eyes lens changing shape in order to focus on distant or near objects
- foot-in-the-door
- term describes a phenomenon in which people who agree to a small request are more likely to later agree to a larger request
- sensorimotor
- describes Piaget's stage in which the child explores the world through interaction of his mouth and hands with the environment
- twin studies
- a common method of investigating whether nature or nurture affects behavior
- blind spot
- point in the retinal where the optic nerve leaves the retina so there are no rods or cones there
- semantics
- in language, study of meanings of words
- motor neuron
- this carries information from the brain to the muscles; also called "efferent"
- EEG
- electroencephalogram; initials of a method of representation of brain waves; detects electrical activity in brain through electrodes on scalp. Results show as wavy lines.
- just world
- phenomenon that describes the belief that what happens to people is what they deserve
- babbling
- stage of language development at about 4 months when an infant spontaneously utters nonsense sounds
- ablation
- removal or destruction of brain tissue in a surgical procedure
- threshold
- in a neuron, reaching this causes the neuron to fire
- gestalt
- German word for "whole", it refers to our tendency to perceive incomplete figures as complete
- insanity
- a legal term describing one's inability to be responsible for one's action due to the condition of the mind
- set point
- the point at which one's body tries maintain weight
- industry vs. inferiority
- Erikson's stage between 6 and 11 years, when the child learns to be productive
- schedules of reinforcement
- these include fixed interval and variable ratio
- psychiatrist
- medical doctor who has specialized in treating psychological disorders
- myelin sheath
- a layer of fatty tissue encasing a neuron's axon that speeds transmission
- grammar
- a system of rules in a language
- opponent process theory
- term used in both vision theory and emotion theory
- group polarization
- tendency of group members to move to an extreme position after discussing an issue as a group
- temperament
- personality component that ranges from very calm to very exitable
- signal detection
- this theory predicts how and in what circumstances we can detect a stimulus; assumes there is no single threshold
- dispositional attribution
- assuming that another's behavior is due to personality factors, not situational ones
- structuralism
- school of psychology developed by Wilhelm Wundt
- control group
- subjects in an experiment who do not receive application of the independent variable but are measured nonetheless for the dependent variable
- cerebellum
- brain structure that controls well-learned motor activities like riding a bike
- REBT
- Albert Ellis's form of therapy for psychological disorders
- explicit
- term that describes memories that can be consciously recalled
- long term
- refers to memory that is stored effectively in the brain and may be accessed over an extended period of time
- regression
- defense mechanism in which one retreats to an earlier stage of life
- in-group bias
- tendency to favor one's own group over other groups
- oral stage
- Freud's first stage of psychosexual development during which pleasure is centered in the mouth
- preconventional
- Kohlberg's stage of moral development in which rewards and punishments dominate moral thinking
- information processing
- humans accomplish this either in parallel (unconsciously) or in serial fashion (consciously)
- mnemonic device
- method of improving memory by associating new information with previously learned information
- serotonin
- a neurotransmitter; associated with improved mood and other positive emotions
- generativity vs. stagnation
- Erikson's stage of social development in which middle-aged people begin to devote themselves more to fulfilling one's potential and doing public service
- humanist
- perspective in psychology that stresses the goodness of people and their possibility of reaching their fullest potential
- cones
- neurons in the retina that are responsible for color vision
- extraversion
- one of the Big 5, a personality trait orients one's interests toward the outside world and other people, rather than inward
- DSM
- initials of the American Psychiatric Association's book that lists diagnostic criteria for many psychological disorders
- eardrum
- also called the tympanic membrane
- divergent thinking
- a type of creative thinking in which one generates new solutions to problems
- dendrite
- a branch off the cell body of a neuron that receives new information from other neurons
- conditioned response
- in classical conditioning, the response elicited by the conditioned stimulus
- peripheral nervous system
- the subsystem of the nervous system that does not include the CNS
- stereotype
- a set of generalizations about a group
- debriefing
- giving participants in a research study a complete explanation of the study after the study is completed
- flashbulb
- term describes a vivid memory of a personally significant and emotional event
- gene
- made of DNA, it is the basic building block of heredity
- fixed interval
- describes the schedule of reinforcement wherein a worker receives a paycheck every Friday
- ego
- the Latin for "I"; in Freud's theories, the mediator between the demands of the id and the superego
- belief perseverance
- situation in which one's beliefs continue despite the fact that the ground for the beliefs have been discredited
- hypothesis
- a prediction of how the an experiment will turn out
- experimental group
- subjects in an experiment to whom the independent variable is administered
- autonomy vs. shame and doubt
- Erikson's stage in which a toddler learns to exercise will and to do things independently; failure to do so causes shame and doubt
- insight
- in psychoanalysis, the basic understanding one develops of the underlying sources of emotion or behavioral difficulty
- sensory adaptation
- reduced responsiveness caused by prolonged stimulation
- dissociative fugue
- disorder in which one travels away from home and is unable to remember details of his past, including often his identity
- somatic
- a division of the nervous system that controls voluntary muscle movements
- dopamine
- a neurotransmitter that is associated with Parkinson's disease (too little of it) and schizophrenia (too much of it)
- sleep apnea
- a disorder characterized by cessation of breathing during sleep
- hypnosis
- a social interaction in which one person suggests to another that certain events or emotions will occur
- encoding
- conversion of sensory information into a form that can be retained as a memory
- token economy
- a technique in operant conditioning by which desired behaviors receive forms of currency that can be exchanged for rewards
- delusion
- irrational, highly improbable belief
- MRI
- a technique that enables us to see static images of the brain's structures; uses magnetism to achieve this effect
- motion parallax
- a depth cue in which the relative movement of elements in a scene gives depth information when the observer moves relative to the scene
- just noticeable difference
- the threshold at which one can distinguish two stimuli that are of different intensities, but otherwise identical
- ganglion cells
- their axons form the optic nerve
- displacement
- defense mechanism in which unwanted feelings are directed towards a different object
- id
- in Freud's conception, the repository of the basic urges toward sex and agression
- scatterplot
- name for a graph of data points in a two variable correlation
- panic disorder
- characterized by recurrent, unexpected panic attacks
- initiative vs guilt
- Erikson's third stage in which the child finds independence in planning, playing and other activities
- cerebral cortex
- the fabric of interconnecting cells that blankets the brain hemispheres; the brain's center for information processing and control
- observational learning
- change in behavior due to watching other people behave
- refractory period
- resting time; occurs in both neuron firing and in human sexual response
- negative reinforcement
- in operant conditioning, removing something unpleasant in order to elicit more of a particular behavior
- proactive interference
- when prior learning disrupts the recall of new information
- serial position effect
- this tells us that the best recall of a list of items will be of those at the beginning of the list
- cornea
- the transparent outer covering of the eye
- afferent
- in neurons, another name for sensory
- acetylcholine (ACh)
- a neurotransmitter involved in learning, memory and muscle movement
- figure-ground
- refers to our ability to distinguish foreground from background in visual images
- self-fulfilling prophecy
- a belief or expectation that helps to make itself true
- intrinsic
- term that describes motivations that derive from one's interest in the object of the motivation, rather than from rewards that one might gain
- neuron
- the fundamental building block of the nervous system
- fixed ratio
- describes a schedule of reinforcement wherein a worker is paid for a certain sum for each product produced
- hypothalamus
- limbic system component that regulates hunger, body temperature and other functions
- insomnia
- inability to fall asleep or remain asleep long enough for sufficient rest
- chunking
- organizing units of information into manageable units such as memorizing a phone number as three groups of information 248-555-1212
- diffusion of responsibility
- reduction in sense of responsibility often felt by individuals in a group; may be responsible for the bystander effect
- REM
- describes sleep in which vivid dreams typically occur; this type of sleep increases as the night progresses while stage 4 sleep decreases
- oval window
- membrane at the enterance to the cochlea through which the ossicles transmit vibrations
- aphasia
- impairment of language usually caused by damage to the left hemisphere
- heuristic
- a useful, but unprovable, cognitive shortcut, such as a "rule of thumb"
- depressant
- any agent that reduces the activity of the CNS
- case study
- scientific investigation in which a single subject is studied in great detail
- parasympathetic
- the branch of the nervous system that automatically calms us down when the reason for arousal has passed
- fetus
- a stage in human development extending from about ten weeks after conception to birth
- homeostasis
- the steady, stable state that is the body's regulatory processes try to maintain
- retina
- the sensory reception system of the eye; includes rods and cones
- modeling
- the process of observing and imitating a behavior
- unconditioned response
- in conditioning the behavior elicited by the unconditioned stimulus
- operant conditioning
- a method of influencing behavior by rewarding desired behaviors and punishing undesired ones
- psychopharmacology
- the study of the effects of drugs on the mind and behavior
- fetal alcohol syndrome
- sometimes the result in a child of the mother's excessive drinking while pregnant, characterized by low birth weight, facial abnormalities, mental retardation
- hallucination
- a false sensory perception that seems to be real but for which there is not an actual external stimulus
- perception
- the process of organizing and interpreting sensory information
- episodic
- describes a type of memory that includes specific events that one has personally experienced
- depth perception
- an ability that we exercise by using both monocular and binocular cues
- lesion
- any destruction or damage to brain tissue
- collective unconscious
- Jung's theory that we all share an inherited memory that contains our culture's most basic elements
- deinstitutionalization
- moving people with psychological or developmental disabilities from highly structured institutions to home- or community-based settings
- cross-sectional
- type of study that measures a variable across several age groups at the same time
- conformity
- adjusting behavior to meet a group's standard
- medulla
- part of the brain nearest the spinal cord which controls breathing, heart rate and blood pressure
- confirmation bias
- a tendency to search for information that supports one's preconceptions
- motor cortex
- an area of the brain, near the rear of the frontal lobes, that controls voluntary movement
- attribution theory
- a way of explaining others' behavior by either one's disposition or one's situation
- self-serving bias
- he tendency to assign oneself credit for successes but to blame failures on external forces
- fovea
- the central focus area of the retina
- anal stage
- Freud's pychosexual period during which a child learns to control his bodily excretions
- syntax
- in language the set of rules that describe how words are arranged to make sentences
- naturalistic
- term refers to observations made of individual's behavior in an everyday life setting
- latent content
- the hidden or disguised meaning of dreams
- marijuana
- a drug, often smoked, whose effects include euphoria, impairment of judgment and concentration and occasionally hallucinations; rarely reported as addictive
- punishment
- can be either positive or negative, intended to reduce the occurrence of a behavior
- authoritarian
- style of parenting in which the parent creates strict rules for the child and the child has little or no input into determining the rules
- sensory cortex
- the parts of the brain that receive information from the sensory receptors
- biological
- perspective that stresses links between biology and behavior
- alpha waves
- seen when an individual is in a relaxed, unfocused, yet still awake state
- assimilation
- interpreting new experiences in terms of existing schema
- standard deviation
- a computation of how much scores vary around a mean
- law of effect
- Thorndike's rule that behaviors which have positive outcomes tend to be repeated
- PET scan
- method of brain imaging using positron emissions
- basic research
- scientific investigations intended to expand the knowledge base
- manifest
- describes, in Freudian terms, the surface content of a dream
- brainstem
- oldest part of the brain, beginning where the spinal cord swells upon entering the skull; controls fundamental survival processes like heartrate and breathing
- arousal
- condition in which the sympathetic nervous system is in control
- agonists
- drugs which mimic the activity of neurotransmitters
- somatoform disorder
- any of a group of psychological disturbances characterized by physical symptoms for which there is not a medical cause
- hormone
- chemical substance secreted by endocrine glands that affect body processes
- associative learning
- learning in which an organism learns that certain events occur together, such as my cat knowing that she will be fed when I get home from work
- nature vs nurture
- name for a controversy in which it is debated whether genetics or environment is responsible for driving behavior
- social norm
- a group's determination of socially acceptable behavior
- antisocial personality disorder
- psychological disorder in which one demonstrates a lack of conscience
- classical conditioning
- method of learning in which a neutral stimulus can be used to elicit a response that is usually a natural response to a stimulus
- cognitive therapy
- treatment for psychological disorders that centers on changing self-defeating thinking
- need for affiliation
- desire to associate with others, to be part of a group, to form close and intimate relationships
- mean
- numerical average of a set of numbers
- rehearsal
- conscious repetition of information in order to fix it in memory, such as practicing a list of terms to memorize
- concurrent validity
- the extent to which two measures of the same trait or ability agree
- optic chiasm
- the point in the brain where the visual field information from each eye "crosses over" to the appropriate side of the brain for processing
- anterograde amnesia
- loss of memory for events that occur after the onset of the amnesia; eg, see in a boxer who suffers a severe blow to the head and loses memory for events after the blow
- attraction
- feeling of being drawn toward another and desiring the company of a person
- heritability
- the extent to which differences in a group of a characteristic is due to genetics, not environment
- association areas
- areas of the cerebral cortex which have no specific motor or sensory repsonsibilities, but rather are involved in thinking, memory and judgment