AP Psych methods and 4.1-4.3e test

Psychology

The scientific study of behavior and mental processes.

Scientific Attitude

An approach using curiosity, skepticism, and humility to examine ideas and evidence.

Critical Thinking

Thinking that questions assumptions, evaluates evidence, checks sources, and considers different conclusions.

Hindsight Bias

The tendency to believe after something happens that you knew it was going to happen. "I knew it all along."

Overconfidence

The tendency to be more confident in your knowledge or abilities than you should be.

Perceiving Order in Random Events

The tendency to see patterns or meaning in events that are actually random.

Psychodynamic Approach

Explains behavior through unconscious thoughts, childhood experiences, conflicts, and motivations.

Biological Approach

Explains behavior using the brain, nervous system, hormones, genetics, and other biological processes.

Behavioral Approach

Explains behavior through learning, conditioning, rewards, punishments, and the environment.

Humanistic Approach

Focuses on free will, personal growth, self-concept, and reaching one's full potential.

Evolutionary Approach

Explains behaviors and traits based on natural selection, survival, and reproduction.

Sociocultural Approach

Explains how behavior and thinking are influenced by society, culture, social groups, and norms.

Cognitive Approach

Focuses on mental processes such as thinking, memory, perception, problem-solving, and language.

Person Perception

The process of forming impressions and judgments about ourselves and other people.

Attribution Theory

The theory that we explain someone's behavior by attributing it either to the person or to the situation.

Dispositional Attribution

Explaining someone's behavior based on internal traits, personality, or character.

Situational Attribution

Explaining someone's behavior based on external circumstances or the situation.

Fundamental Attribution Error

The tendency to overestimate personality and underestimate the situation when explaining someone else's behavior.

Actor-Observer Bias

The tendency to explain our own behavior using situations but explain other people's behavior using their personality.

Prejudice

An unjustifiable and usually negative attitude toward a group and its members.

Stereotype

A generalized belief about a group of people.

Discrimination

Unjustifiable negative behavior toward a group or its members.

Just-World Phenomenon

The belief that people generally get what they deserve and deserve what they get.

Self-Serving Bias

The tendency to take credit for successes but blame failures on outside circumstances.

Attitude

Feelings, beliefs, and ideas that influence how we respond to people, objects, and events.

Foot-in-the-Door Phenomenon

The tendency for someone who agrees to a small request to later agree to a larger request.

Door-in-the-Face Phenomenon

Making a very large request first so that a smaller request afterward seems more reasonable.

Role

A set of expectations about how someone in a particular social position should behave.

Cognitive Dissonance Theory

The idea that conflicting thoughts, beliefs, or behaviors create discomfort, motivating us to reduce the inconsistency.

Persuasion

The process of changing someone's attitudes, beliefs, or behaviors through communication.

Peripheral Route Persuasion

Persuasion using surface-level cues such as attractiveness, emotions, or celebrity endorsements instead of strong arguments.

Central Route Persuasion

Persuasion using logical arguments, evidence, and careful thinking.

Norms

Expected rules or standards for acceptable behavior within a group or culture.

Conformity

Adjusting your behavior or thinking to match a group standard.

Normative Social Influence

Conforming because you want to gain approval, fit in, or avoid rejection.

Informational Social Influence

Conforming because you believe other people have correct information.

Obedience

Following direct commands or orders from an authority figure.

Social Facilitation

Improved performance on easy or well-learned tasks when other people are present, but worse performance on difficult tasks.

Social Loafing

The tendency to put in less effort when working in a group than when working alone.

Deindividuation

Loss of self-awareness and self-restraint in group situations that create anonymity and arousal.

Group Polarization

The strengthening of a group's existing opinions after members discuss them together.

Groupthink

When the desire for group harmony causes people to ignore alternatives or make poor decisions.

Culture

Shared behaviors, ideas, attitudes, values, and traditions passed from one generation to another.

Tight Culture

A culture with strong social norms and little tolerance for behavior that violates those norms.

Loose Culture

A culture with weaker social norms and greater tolerance for behavior that differs from those norms.

Aggression

Physical or verbal behavior intended to harm someone.

Frustration-Aggression Principle

The idea that frustration can create anger, which can lead to aggression.

Social Script

A culturally learned guide for how people are expected to behave in certain situations.

Mere Exposure Effect

The tendency to develop a greater liking for something simply because we are repeatedly exposed to it.

Passionate Love

An intense state of attraction and arousal usually associated with the beginning of a romantic relationship.

Companionate Love

Deep affectionate attachment that develops as a relationship becomes more established.

Equity

A condition in which people in a relationship receive benefits roughly proportional to what they contribute.

Self-Disclosure

Sharing personal and intimate information about yourself with another person.

Altruism

Helping another person without expecting personal benefit or reward.

Bystander Effect

The tendency for a person to be less likely to help when other people are present.

Social Exchange Theory

The idea that social behavior involves weighing the potential benefits of an interaction against its costs.

Reciprocity Norm

The expectation that people should help, rather than hurt, those who have helped them.

Social-Responsibility Norm

The expectation that people should help those who need assistance, even if they cannot repay the help.

Conflict

A perceived incompatibility between people's actions, goals, or ideas.

Social Trap

A situation where individuals or groups pursue their own self-interest and end up harming everyone involved.

Mirror-Image Perceptions

When opposing groups each see themselves as good and the other side as aggressive, untrustworthy, or evil.

Self-Fulfilling Prophecy

A belief or expectation that leads someone to behave in a way that causes the expectation to come true.

Superordinate Goals

Shared goals that require opposing groups to cooperate in order to achieve them.

GRIT

Graduated and Reciprocated Initiatives in Tension-Reduction; a strategy for reducing conflict through small cooperative actions that encourage the other side to respond similarly.