12 Psych - Unit 3 AOS 2

Acronym

a pronounceable word formed from the first letters of a group of words

Acrostic

making verbal associations for items to be remembered by constructing a sentence, phrase or other

Alzheimer's disease

a neurodegenerative disorder characterised by gradual widespread degeneration of brain neurons, progressively causing memory decline, deterioration of cognitive and social skills, and personality changes

Amygdala

a small structure in the medial temporal lobe, deep within the brain and part of the limbic system; involved in emotional reactions (particularly fear and anger) and formation of a wide variety of emotional memories

Aphantasia

absence of visual imagery

Atkinson-Shiffrin multi-store model

a representation and explanation of memory as consisting of three separate stores called sensory memory, short-term memory and long-term memory, differing in function, capacity and duration

Basal ganglia

a group of structures (neuron cell bodies called nuclei) deep within the brain, involved in the generation of voluntary movements and long-term implicit memories involving motor skills

Autobiographical event

experiences that have occurred at some time in our own lives

Brain lesion

any disruption of or damage to the brain's normal structure.

Cerebellum

structure at the base of the brain with multiple roles, including coordination of fine muscle movements, regulation of posture and balance, and various perceptual and cognitive processes; in relation to memory, involved in formation of long-term motor skill memories and stores implicit memories of simple conditioned reflexes

Classically conditioned memory

implicit memory of a conditioned response to a conditioned stimulus acquired through classical conditioning, e.g. simple conditioned reflex responses

Consolidation

the neurobiological process of making a newly formed memory stable and enduring following a learning experience

Encoding

in relation to memory, conversion of information into a usable form so that it can be neurologically represented and stored in memory

Episodic memory

the long-term explicit memory of personally experienced events associated with a particular time and place

Explicit memory

long-term memory that can be consciously retrieved and stated ('memory with awareness');

Habituation

the process of growing accustomed to a stimulus and decreasing responsiveness to it

Hippocampus

a structure in the medial temporal lobe, deep within the brain and part of the limbic system; crucial role in the formation, encoding and consolidation of new long-term explicit memories and their transfer to the cortex for storage

Imagined future

imagining what might occur in the future

Implicit memory

long-term memory that does not require conscious or intentional retrieval ('memory without awareness');

Long-term memory

a memory store that holds a potentially unlimited amount of information for a very long time, possibly permanently

Memory

processing, storage and retrieval of information acquired through learning; often described as neurological representation of learning

Method of loci

a mnemonic device for which the items to be remembered are converted into mental images and associated with specific locations

Mnemonic

any technique used to assist memory

Neocortex

the largest and most recently evolved part of the brain's cerebral cortex

Oral culture

the cultural knowledge and information that has been passed down through speech from one generation to the next

Post-mortem study

a type of neurobiological research involving autopsy, which provides information to researchers and individuals

Procedural memory

the long-term implicit memory of skills that have been learned previously

Retrieval

in relation to memory, recovery of stored information and bringing it into conscious awareness for use

Semantic memory

long-term explicit memory of facts and knowledge about the world

Sensory memory

the entry point of memory where new incoming sensory information is stored in its original, raw state for a very brief time

Short-term memory

a memory system with limited storage capacity in which information is stored for a relatively short time, unless renewed in some way; also maintains information in conscious awareness and functions as 'working memory'

Songline

a navigational route comprising a sequence of locations used by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples which may also serve as mnemonic

Storage

in relation to memory, retention of encoded information over time

Sung narrative

knowledge and information such as stories told using song

Written culture

the cultural knowledge and information that has been passed down through writing from one generation to the next

Antecedent

what happens just before something else

Attention

the process of focusing on specific stimuli or aspects of the sensory environment whilst ignoring and therefore excluding others; in observational learning, the first step in the process which involves watching a model's behaviour and its consequences

Behaviour

any action made by a living person (or animal) that can be observed or measured

Behaviourist approach to learning

emphasises the study of observable behaviour alone to understand and explain learning, without regard to underlying mental processes;

Classical conditioning

a three-phase learning process (before conditioning, during conditioning and after conditioning) that results in the involuntary association between a neutral stimulus and unconditioned stimulus to produce a conditioned response

Conditioned response (CR)

in classical conditioning, the learned or acquired response to the conditioned stimulus

Conditioned stimulus (CS)

in classical conditioning, the stimulus that is initially neutral and does not normally produce the unconditioned response but eventually becomes associated with the unconditioned stimulus and elicits a conditioned response

Consequence

in operant conditioning, the environmental event that occurs immediately after the relevant behaviour and has an effect on the occurrence of the behaviour

Learning

a relatively permanent change in behaviour due to experience

Motivation

processes within an organism which activate behaviour that is directed towards achieving a particular goal

Negative punishment

the removal or loss of a desirable stimulus thereby weakening or decreasing the likelihood of a response recurring again

Negative reinforcement

the removal of an unpleasant or aversive stimulus, thereby strengthening or making a desired response more likely to reoccur

Neutral stimulus (NS)

in classical conditioning, any object or event that does not normally produce a predictable response; becomes a conditioned stimulus through repeated association with the unconditioned stimulus

Observational learning

acquisition of information, skills or behaviour through watching the performance of others, either directly or indirectly; involves a sequence of processes called attention, retention, reproduction, motivation and reinforcement

Operant conditioning

a learning process whereby the consequences of a behaviour (e.g reward or punishment) determine the likelihood that it will be performed again in the future

Positive punishment

presentation of an unpleasant stimulus that weakens a response or decreases the likelihood of the response occurring again;

Positive reinforcement

presentation of a positive reinforcer following a desired response

Punishment

delivery of an unpleasant consequence following a response, or the removal of a pleasant consequence following a response, in order to weaken a response or decrease the likelihood of it occurring again

Reinforcement

when a stimulus strengthens or increases the frequency or likelihood of a response that it follows; may also refer to the process of administering the stimulus (i.e. reinforcer);

Reproduction

when a behaviour that has been closely attended to and retained in memory is imitated

Retention

remembering a behaviour that has been closely attended to

Social-cognitive approach

emphasises the role of cognitive processes such as attention, memory and motivation in learning, in addition to environmental stimuli such as conditioning, reinforcement and punishment

Three phase model of operant conditioning

explains operant conditioning as occurring in a specific sequence: (1) presence of an antecedent stimulus that occurs before the behaviour; (2) the behaviour that occurs due to the antecedent and (3) the consequence to the behaviour;

Vicarious conditioning

in observational learning, when an individual observes a model displaying behaviour that is either reinforced or punished and later behaves in the same way, in a modified way, or refrains from doing so as a result of the observation

Vicarious punishment

being conditioned indirectly by observing someone else's punishment

Vicarious reinforcement

being conditioned indirectly by observing someone else's reinforcement

Unconditioned response (UCR)

in classical conditioning, an involuntary response that occurs when the unconditioned stimulus is presented

Unconditioned stimulus (UCS)

in classical conditioning, any stimulus that consistently produces a particular naturally occurring, involuntary response (i.e. an unconditioned response)

Ways of knowing

different ways people arrive at a sense of knowledge of the world and respective fields

Connections to country

Indigenous ways of knowing are rooted in a deep respect for the ecology and an understanding of the importance of the connected relationship with the land.

Autobiographical memory

a memory system consisting of episodes recalled from person's life, based on a mixture of episodic (such as sensory details, thoughts and emotions, details that relate to times and places) and semantic (including general event knowledge, personal facts without context) memory.