Psychology

Informed Consent

The process of obtaining voluntary agreement from participants before they partake in research, ensuring they understand the study's nature, risks, and benefits.

Nonmaleficence

An ethical guideline in research that dictates researchers must avoid causing harm, whether physical or psychological, to participants.

Explicit Memory

Also known as declarative memory, it refers to long-term memories that can be consciously recalled and require effortful processing.

Implicit Memory

A type of memory that is formed without conscious awareness and is often difficult to articulate; includes procedural memories.

Episodic Memory

A category of explicit memory involving personally experienced events or specific moments in time.

Semantic Memory

A type of explicit memory that involves general knowledge and facts about the world, which can be shared and stated.

Prospective Memory

The ability to remember to perform actions in the future, such as taking medication or attending appointments.

Short-Term Memory

A memory system that temporarily holds a limited amount of information and lasts for about 10-30 seconds.

Working Memory

A memory system responsible for the active manipulation and maintenance of information in conscious awareness.

Algorithm

A well-defined procedure that guarantees a solution to a problem by trying every possible option, albeit often time-consuming.

Heuristic

A mental shortcut or rule of thumb that allows for quicker problem-solving but is not guaranteed to be correct.

Cognitive Bias

Patterns of thinking that can lead to systematic deviations from norm or rationality in judgment, affecting decision-making.

Availability Heuristic

A cognitive bias where people judge the likelihood of an occurrence based on how easily examples come to mind.

Confirmation Bias

The tendency to search for, interpret, and remember information that confirms one's preexisting beliefs or values.

Memory Consolidation

The process through which memories become stable in the brain and are integrated into long-term storage.

Misinformation Effect

A cognitive phenomenon where a person's memory of an event becomes less accurate due to misleading information received after the event.

Long-Term Potentiation

The biological process that leads to the strengthening of synapses based on recent patterns of activity, considered crucial for memory formation.

Forgetting Curve

A theory that describes how information is lost over time when there is no attempt to retain it, showing rapid forgetting initially.

Retroactive Interference

A memory phenomenon where new information interferes with the recall of previously learned information.

Proactive Interference

A situation where old information interferes with the learning of new information.

Amnesia

A condition characterized by memory loss, which can be either retrograde (loss of past memories) or anterograde (inability to form new memories).

Mental Set

A tendency to approach problems in a habitual way, often based on what has worked in the past.

Functional Fixedness

A cognitive bias that limits a person to using an object only in the way it is traditionally used.

Sunk-Cost Fallacy

The tendency to continue an endeavor or continue consuming a product based on previously invested resources, such as time or money.

Cognitive Flexibility

The ability to switch between thinking about two different concepts or to think about multiple concepts simultaneously.

Test-Effect

The phenomenon where self-testing or retrieving information enhances long-term memory and retention.