Psych 105 Flashcards (study)

Vocabulary flashcards for Psych 105 lecture notes.

Learning

Change in behavior due to experience.

Reflex

Stimulus + response.

Classical conditioning

A learning process that occurs when two stimuli are repeatedly paired; a response that is at first elicited by the second stimulus is eventually elicited by the first stimulus alone.

Acquisition

The initial learning of the connection between the unconditioned stimulus and the conditioned stimulus when these two stimuli are paired.

Generalization

Performing a reinforced behavior in a different situation.

Discrimination

Responding appropriately to stimuli that signal that a behavior will or will not be reinforced.

Extinction

Decreases in the frequency of a behavior when the behavior is no longer reinforced.

Spontaneous Recovery

The process in classical conditioning by which a conditioned response can recur after a time delay, without further conditioning.

Operant Conditioning

Behavior becomes stronger or weaker depending on its consequences.

Law of Effect

Behavior is a function of its consequences.

Shaping

Reinforcing successive approximations.

Reinforcement

Consequence that increases or maintains the strength of a behavior.

Positive Reinforcement

Adding something to strength/maintain behavior.

Negative Reinforcement

Something removed that strengthens/maintains behavior.

Primary Reinforcer

Not dependent on another reinforcer to be reinforcing.

Conditioned Reinforcer (secondary reinforcer)

Reinforcing because of association with other reinforcers.

Continuous reinforcement

Behavior reinforced each time.

Partial (or intermittent) reinforcement

Behavior is sometimes reinforced.

Punishment

Consequence that reduces strength of behavior.

Positive punishment

Something added that suppresses behavior.

Negative punishment

Something removed that suppresses behavior.

Observational Learning

Learning by observing another (vicarious learning).

Modeling

Observing and imitating behavior.

Retention Interval

Time between encoding and recall.

Memory Encoding

Transforming physical/sensory input into something that can be stored in memory.

Storage

Retaining encoded information in memory.

Retrieval

Gaining access to information stored in memory.

Short term memory (STM)

About 30 seconds.

Long term memory (LTM)

Longer than STM.

Chunking

Grouping items together to improve memory.

Depth of processing

Deeper processing of stimuli produces better memory of them.

Explicit memories

"Knowing that"

Implicit Memories

"Knowing how"

Priming

the activation of information that people already have in storage to help them remember new information better and faster.

Context dependent memory

Putting yourself back in the context where you learned something can prime memory retrieval.

State dependent learning

Be in the same “state” at recall as you were during encoding.

Serial position effect

The tendency to recall the items at the beginning and end of a list more readily than those in the middle.

Recency Effect

Refers to better recall for items at the end. Still in STM.

Primacy Effect

Refers to better recall for items at the beginning of a list. Moved information to LTM and than back to STM.

Availability Heuristic

If you can easily think of an example, it must be really/fairly common.

Heuristic

Mental short cut.

Mental set

Approach a problem in a way that has worked in the past.

Algorithm

Methodical, logical rule or procedure that guarantees that you will solve a problem.

Representativeness Heuristic

Tendency to judge the likelihood that something belongs to a category based on comparing it to the prototype.

Prototype

Best example of a category.

Confirmation Bias

Look for evidence to support the conclusion that you’ve already arrived at (ignoring/minimizing contradictory evidence).

Analogy

When use information one domain to solve a problem in another domain.

Framing

The way something is posed affects decision making.

Phonemes

Smallest sound unit.

Morphemes

Smallest unit that has meaning.

Grammar

Rules that enable us to understand language/enables use to communicate.