Psyc 100 Final

The nervous system converts an external stimulus, like light or sound, into electrical signals within neurons

Specialized cell responsible for converting external stimuli into neutral activity for a specific sensory system

Lowest level of a stimulus needed for the nervous system to detect a change 50% of the time

Sensation we experience is determined by the nature of the sense receptor, not the stimulus

Detection of physical energy by sense organs, which then send info to the brain

The brain's interpretation of raw sensory inputs

The smallest change in the intensity of a stimulus that we can detect

There's a constant proportional relationship between the JND and the original stimulus intensity

Conceptually driven processing influenced by beliefs and expectant. Starts processing in the association cortex followed by the primary visual cortex

A whole is constructed from parts. Starts by primary visual cortex followed by the association cortex

Perceptually, we make an instantaneous decision to focus attention on what we believe to be the central figure and largely ignore what we believe to be the background

Attending to multiple senses at once

• Experiencing cross-model sensations.
• Ex. Tasting color

Expecting to see something

Gathering pieces, visually, and putting them together

The eye captures light and converts it into neural messages

Receptor cells in the retina allowing us to see in low levels of light

Receptor cells in the retina allowing us to see in color

Part of the eye that changes curvature to keep images in focus

Membrane at the back of the eye responsible for converting light into neural activity

Objects physically close to each other tend to be perceived as unified wholes

All things being equal, we see similar objects as comprising a whole, much more so than dissimilar objects

When partial visual info is present, our brains fill in what's missing

We still perceive objects as wholes, even if other objects block part of them

We perceive objects that are symmetrically arranged as wholes

Psychological phenomenon, entirely subjective

Brain judging how things in the world constantly change

Perceive three dimensions using only one eye

Using both eyes to focus an object

Wavelength

Inability to see

Inability to see colors

Being able to see without using your eyes

Starring at one color then look away to see a different color image

Nearsightedness, can't see far only near

Farsightedness, can't see close only distant objects

• We perceive colors in terms of three pairs of opponent cells.
• Red=>Green
• Blue=>Yellow

We base our color vision based on three primary colors (Red, Blue, Green)

Failure of the inner ear, eardrum

Damage to the auditory nerve

Parkinson's or Alzheimer's disease can damage taste and/or smell

The ear channels sound waves into the ear canal and converts the vibration to neural activity

Sense of touch, temperature, and pain

Sense of body position and movement

Sense of equilibrium or balance

The quality or complexity of the sound

Amplitude of wvae

Frequency of wave

• Phonemes
• Morphemes
• Syntax
• Extralinguistic Info

Sounds produced by our vocal apparatus

Smallest units of meaning in a language

Grammatical rules, structure of a sentence

• Communication not part of context, but are critical to understand meaning
• Ex. Sarcasm

• Listening language
•    In womb
• Babbling learning to control noises
•    0-1 years old
• One word speech
•    1-2 years old
• Small phrases with syntax
•    2-3 years old
• More complex sentences and knows most grammar rules
•    3+ years old

Metalinguistics (understanding the structures of languages)

Acquisition rate is lowered

Babies hear language used in systematic ways, doesn't account for generality

Children are born with some basic knowledge of how language works

Children infer what words and sentences mean from context

Children's ability to learn languages from general cognitive skills

Animals communicate with scent, visual displays, or vocal with no new ideas

Simplify what we attend to and keep the info we need for decision making to a manageable minimum

Involves judging the probability of an event by its superficial similarit to a prototype

How common a characteristic or behavior is in general population

How easily the thing comes to mind

Most noticeable or important

The way a question is formulated can influence how we make a decision

Process of selecting among a set of possible alternatives

Being stuck in an idea or solution, inhibiting our ability to generate alternatives

Difficulty conceptualizing that an object typically used for one purpose can be used for another

Overestimate how accurately we could have predicted something to happen once we know the outcome

Tendency to seek out evidences that supports our beliefs rejecting others

• Researchers examine people who are of different ages at a single point of time
• Pros: Observe many different variables at once
• Cons: Cohort Effect

Effects due to the fact that sets of people who lived during one time period can differ in some systematic way from people of another time period

• Track the development of the same group over time
• Pros: observe changes over time within individuals as  a consequence of getting older
• Cons: Costly, time-consuming, attrition

Participants dropping out of the study before it is completed

Activation or deactivation of genes by environmental experiences throughout development

Individuals with certain genetic predispositions to seekout and create their own environments

Situation in which the effects of genes depend on the environment they are expressed

• Germinal Stage
• Embryonic Stage
• Fetal Stage

Zygote begins to divide and double, forming a blastocyst (1-2 weeks)

Fertilized egg

A ball of identical cells that haven't taken part of a body part

Limbs, facial features, and major organs take shape (2-8 weeks)

Physical maturation, no new structures are added (2-9 months)

• Hazardous environment
• Biological disorders
• Premature birth

Environmental factor that can exert negative impact on prenatal development

• Sensorimotor
• Preoperational
• Concrete Operations
• Formal Operations

No thought beyond immediate physical experiences

Able to think beyond here and now, but only see the world in their eyes and not others

Able to perform mental transformations but only on concrete, physical objects

Able to perform hypothetical and abstract reasoning

Generalizations based on experience with the world

Use old schema to understand new info

To update or create a schema

Understanding that objects continue to exist even when out of view. Sensorimotor stage children lack this (Ex. peek-a-boo)

Inability to see the world from other's point of view. Children have this in the preoperational stage (Piaget's three mountain task)

Ability to reason about what other people know or believe. This lacks in the preoperational stage (false-belief task)

Things stay the same even if appearances change. This lacks in the preoperational stage (cup-fill task or spacing pennies)

Vygotskian learning mechanism in which parents provide initial assistance in children's learning but slowly remove structure as children become more competent

The strong emotional connection we share with those to whom we feel closest

Explores room but checks if mom is watching

Explores room but doesn't check if mom is watching

Infant doesn't explore without mom's assistance

Unusual behaviors/ Unpredicted

• Secure
• Insecure-Avoidant
• Insecure-Anxious
• Disorganized

• Authoritarian
• Authoritative
• Permissive
• Uninvolved

Strict, use punishment with no affection but very controlling

Supportive, firm but fair, encourage independence but set limits. High warmth and high control

Lenient with children, rarely uses punishment. High warmth but low control

Neglecting parents. Low control Low warmth

• Easy
• Difficult
• Slow to Warmup

Babies that are adaptable and relaxed

Babies that are fussy and easily frustrated

Babies that are disturbed by new stimuli but slowly adjust to them

Punishment or reward decision

Focus on societal values

Focus on internal moral principles that may differ from conventional societal values

• Preconventional
• Conventional
• Postconventional

Humans experience only a small number of primary emotions that combine in complex ways

Emotion result from our interpretations of our bodily reactions to stimuli

Emotion-provoking events leads simultaneously to an emotion and to bodily reactions

Every emotion has experience arousal, and then label where the arousal comes from to figure out what the emotion is

• Genuine smile
• Fake smile

Gestures that convey conventional meanings recognized by members of a culture, such as a hand wave

Gestures that highlight or accentuate speech

Gestures in which one body part touches another part. Ex. biting fingernails

Study of personal space

Ability to predict our own and others' happiness

Belief that both our good and bad moods will last longer than they do

Tendency for our moods to adapt to external circumstances

• Money doesn't cause happiness, small correlation.
• Increases with age

Strategy of anticipating failure and compensating for this expectation by mentally over preparing for negative outcomes

Evaluation of their own worth highly

Evaluation of their own worth very low

Certain drives like hunger, thirst, etc. motivate us to act in ways that minimize negative feelings and seek pleasure

Inverted U-Shaped relation between arousal and mood and performance on the other. Optimal amount of arousal is lower for complex tasks compared to simple ones

Predisposition toward certain stimuli

Disposition away from certain stimuli

Biological necessities like hunger and thirst

Psychological desires like needing for achievement

Our desire or internal goals

External goals

Obese people are motivate to eat more by external cues than internal cues

Hormone that signals the hypothalamus and brain stem to reduce appetite and increase the amount of energy used

Large plates will make us think we are eating less than a small plate

Value that establishes a range of body and muscle mass we tend to maintain

Physical nearness, a predictor of attraction

Extent to which we have things in common with others, prediction of attraction

Rule of give and take, predictor of attraction

Judging a person by their appearences

Biological variables play a role in people's preferences

Seeing someone on a frequent basis

• Intimacy, Passion, Commitment
• Negative ""...

• Intimacy and Passion: Romantic Love
• Intimacy and Commitment: Companionate
• Passion and Commitment: Fatuous Love
• Intimacy, Passion and Commitment: Consummate Love

• Need to belong Theory
• Social Comparison Theory
• Social Contagion
• Social Facilitation

Humans have a biologically based need for interpersonal connections

• We seek to evaluate our abilities and beliefs by comparing them with those of others.
• Comparing with superior or inferior others

Looking to others for knowledge or deciding how to act

• The presence of others can enhance our performance in certain situations.
• Social Disruption: Choking

Overestimate the impact of dispositional influences on other people's behaviors

Have too much attribution toward personality traits or intelligence

Have too little attribution of the persons behavior to what's going on around them

Tendency to alter our behaviors as a result or group pressure

• Uniformity of Agreement
• Differences in Wrong Answer
• Size

Everyone agrees, hard to be the one to go against the group

Just one other person that differs from the majority can lower conformity

Size majority makes a difference, but only up to a group of 5

Individuals become less productive in a group because they feel less responsible

Group unanimity at the expense of critical thinking (Ex. Challenger/ Bay of Pigs)

Group discussions to strengthen the dominant positions held by individual group members

Group of individuals who exhibit intense and unquestioning devotion to a single cause

Adherance to instructions from those of higher authority

Watching the proceedings rather than participating

Closer proximity, experimenter disagreements

Pluralistic ignorance, diffusion of responsibility

People alone rather than group

Unpleasant mental experience of tension resulting from two conflictin thoughts or belief usually picking the one with the least anxiety

We acquire our attitudes by observing our behaviors

We don't really change our attitudes, but report that we do

Making a small request before making a bigger one

Large request then small, but not too large

Buy the product then seller adds more things on that you have to buy

Free not to do it

Snap judgments based on surface aspects

Evaluating carefully and thoughtfully based on information content

The drawing of a conclusion of someone prior to evaluating the evidence. Show a negative attitude

A belief about a characteristics of members of a group thats applied to most members of the group

Negative behaviors toward others

• Genetic factors
• Shared environmental factos
• Non-shared environmental factors

Experiences that make individuals within the same family more alike. Not a strong influence in personality

Experiences that make individuals within the same family less alike. Important role in personality. Ex. Birth Order

Biology, has a strong influence in personality when twins were either reared together or apart

• Id
• Ego
• Superego

Completely in the unconscious; operates according to the pleasure principle "devil"

"The Mediator" between the Id and the Superego; operates on the reality principle

The internalization of societal standards and rules; our moral guide "God"

• Unconscious maneuvers intended to minimize anxiety
• Repression
• Denial
• Regression
• Reaction-formation
• Projection
• Displacement
• Rationalization
• Intellectualization
• Sublimation
• Identification of the Aggressor

Making the threatening memories or impulses unconscious ("forget it happened")

Claim our impulse doesn't exists

Returning psychologically to younger time

Do the exact opposite (Act like you hate something but unconsciously you like it)

Attribute our impulse to someone else

Direct an impulse to a safer and more socially acceptable target

Make our impulse sound reasonable

Channel our impulse into something productive

Foucus on abstract and impersonal thoughts

Adopting the psychological characteristics of people we find threatening

• Oral
• Anal
• Phallic
• Latent
• Genital

• Birth to 12-18 months
• Sucking and drinking, focuses on mouth

• 1.5-3 years
• Focuses on toilet training

• 3-6 years
• Focuses on the genitals
• Oedipus Complex: Boys like their mothers
• Electra Complex: Girls like their fathers

• 5-12 years
• Focuses on calmness other gender is yucky

• 12-death
• Mature Sexuality

• Optimism is the prospect of long term personality growth not the driving force of sexuality
• Collective Unconscious, Inferiority complex, and feminist psychology

By Jung, Memories past down by ancestors

Try to overcompensate for feelings of inferiority by Alder

By Horney, Inferiority complex in women is driven by social factors not by penis envy

All actions are products of preexisting causal influences making them predictable

Ability to choose how we act and choose our behavior freely

People believe that reinforcers and punishers lie inside or outside our control

Tendency for people to mutually influence each other's behaviors

How we interpret our environmental affects how we react to it using observational learning and Locus of Control with Internal/External beliefs

Watching teachers/ parents, changing/ shaping our personalities

Belief that life events are due to their own efforts

Belief that life events are a product of chance/ fate

Drive to develop our inmate potential to the fullest possible extent

Need to satisfy primary needs (like food, water, etc.) before more complex ones

Expectations we place on ourselves for appropriate and inappropriate behavior

Beliefs about whom we are

Genetic Blueprint(innately good)

Tendency to feel helpless in the face of events we can't control

Our DNA (which is good), our Goals to be ourselves, and what society allows. Show self-actualization, conditions of work

Our interpretation of situation, shows LoC and Observational Learning

The situation gives rewards/ punsishments; genes no free will

Fixations during psychosexual stages, shows psyche(id, ego, superego), defense mechanisms, stages/ fixations

• Extroversion
• Agreeableness
• Neuroticism
• Openness to new Experiences
• Conscientiousness
• (OCEAN)

Enjoy new experiences and ideas

Sense of duty, discipline, orderliness, successful

Tendency to seek out stimulation and company

Degree to which you are willing to up set others

Tendency to experience and express unpleasant emotions

Uncommon to the population

Produce emotional pain

Negatively affect an individual's ability to function normally

Can fall subject to the climate of the times

Many mental illness arise as a result of a breakdown of physiological systems

Experiences marked by dramatically elevated mood, decrease need for help

Condition marked by a lengthy history of irresponsible and/ or illegal actions

• Schizophrenia
• Psychopathy
• Psychopathic personality

Arctic hysteria, Ataque de Nervios, etc.

They are unreliable, they are invalid they disapprove on the people...

One diagnosis can be related to one or more other diagnoses

Co-occurrence of two or more diagnoses within the same person

Model in which a mental disorder differs from normal functioning than degree. It's either there or not

Model in which a mental disorder differs from normal functioning in degree rather than in kind.

One diagnosis can be related to one or more other diagnoses

Repeated and unexpected panic attacks, concern of future attacks or change behavior to try to avoid them

Fear of being in a place or situation from which escape is difficult or in which help is unavailable in the event of a panic attack

Intense fear of an object or a situation that's greatly out of proportion to its actual threat

Fear of social humiliation

Sustained anxiety 60% of day worrying, can't concentrate

Emotional disturbance after experiencing stressful event

Repeated and length immersion in obsessions, compulsions, or both

Symptoms of sadness, hopelessness, lack of motivation, loss of enjoyment from activities

• Consists of depression and manic episodes
• Symptoms are elevated mood, less sleep, high energy, ...

When people become depressed, they seek excessive reassurance leading others to dislike and reject them

Depression is caused be negative beliefs and expectations remembering the more negative things

Lower levels of some neurotransmitters, dampen ability to handle negative events

Depression results from a low rate response of positive reinforcement

Learned helplessness. Either outcome is unwanted stimuli

Conditioned marked by extreme instability in mood identity and impulse control

Personality traits are inflexible, stable, and expressed in a wide variety of situations, and lead to distress or impariment

Disruptions in consciousness, memory, identity, or perception

Presence of two or more distinct personality states

Is it a response to early trauma or a consequence of social and cultural factors

Severe disorder of thought and emotion associated with loss of contact with reality

• Delusion
• Emotional Dysregulation
• Hallucination
• Speech Issues

Strongly held fixed belief that has no basis in reality

Emotional response that is less than normal

Sensor perception that occurs in the absence of an external stimulus

Speech goes from topic to topic in a disjointed way

Mental disorders are a joint production of a genetic vulnerability, and stressors that trigger this vulnerability

Structures in the brain are enlarged

Abnormalities in dopamine receptors

Genes can carry some of the disorder

Maladaptive thoughts, interpersonal interactions

15% adults and 21%children more women than men, more Caucasians than any other race

People considering lifestyle changes

• Psychiatrists
• Clinical Psychologists
• Paraprofessionals

Medical doctors, can prescribe drugs. Focus on chemical imbalance

Typically PhD, no drugs. Focus on altering psychological processes

Substance abuse counselors

• Treatments inspired by classical psychoanalysis, influenced by Frued.
• Trying to fix abnormal behavior where the patient has behavior rooted in unconscious conflicts

• Free association
• Interpretation
• Dream Analysis
• Resistance
• Transference
• Working through

Therapies were for high class people, didn't allow replication of experiment, but sometimes better than no therapy

• Emphasize the development of human potential, human nature is usually positive focusing on here and now not childhood, failure of innate drive to grow causing disorder
• Two approaching therapies, Peron-centered and Gestalt

Therapies focused on specific behaviors

• Therapy that confronts clients with what they fear with the goal of reducing the fear
• Includes flooding and systematic desensitization

Patience are taught to relax as they are gradually exposed to what they fear

Safe massive exposure to feared stimulus, response prevention

Clients watches other people perform desired behaviors, social skills, assertiveness

Desirable behaviors are rewarded with tokens that clients can exchange for rewards

Uses punishment to decrease the frequency of undesirable behaviors

• Psychological disorders are from errors in thinking usually changing interpretation of ourselves, effective for anxiety disorders and mood disorders
• Less chance of relapse

• All therapies have equal effectiveness
• Therapies create trust hope, support

Placebo effect, self-serving biases(persuade the therapy works to themselves) retrospective rewriting of the past, regression of mean

Brief shock administered to the brain, causes no pain, for severe depression

Destroy brain tissue in prefrontal cortex, last resort for OCD, depression, bipolar disorder

Use medication for disorder; treats depression, anxiety disorders, biploar, schizophrenia but can cause a lot of side effects

Rules governing how we perceive objects as wholes within their overall context

double meanings of various kinds of words

Feeling detached from yourself

Inability to recall personal information following a stressful experience

Sudden, unexpected travel away from home or workplace with amnesia for significant life events