AP Psychology Test Vocab 201-300

Glucose

The form of sugar that circulates in the blood and provides the major source of energy for body tissues

Grammar

In language, a system of rules that enables us to communicate with and understand others

Grit

A personality trait characterized by perseverance and passion for achieving long-term goals

GRIT Graduated and Reciprocated Initiatives in Tension-Reduction

A strategy designed to decrease international tensions

Group polarization

Tendency of group members to move to an extreme position after discussing an issue as a group

Grouping

The perceptual tendency to organize stimuli into coherent categories

Groupthink

A group of well-intentioned people make irrational or non optimal decisions spurred by the urge to conform and make peace

Habituation

Decreasing responsiveness with repeated stimuli into coherent categories

Hallucination

False sensory experiences (visual or auditory)

Hallucinogens

Psychedelic drugs, such as LSD, that distort perceptions and evoke imagery in the absence of sensory input

Hemispherectomy

Surgical removal of part of or an entire hemisphere

Heritability

The proportion of variation among individuals that we can attribute to genes

Heuristic

A simple thinking strategy that allows us to make judgements and solve problems efficiently; usually speedier but more error-prone

Availability heuristic

Estimating the likelihood of events based on how accessible they are in our memory (if instances come readily to mind, we presume such events are common)

Representativeness heuristic

Judging the likelihood of things in terms of how well they seem to align with certain prototypes; may lead us to ignore other relevant information

Hierarchy of needs

Maslows pyramid of human needs, beginning at the base with physiological needs that must first be satisfied before higher -level needs

Higher-order conditioning

A procedure in which the conditioned stimulus in one conditioning experienced is paired with a new neutral stimulus, producing the same response

Hindsight bias or (I knew it all along phenomenon)

The tendency to believe, after learning the outcome, that one would have foreseen it

Hippocampus

A neural center located in the limbic system, responsible for the processing of explicit memories for storage

Homeostasis

A tendency to maintain a balanced or constant internal state

Hormones

Chemical messengers that are manufactured by the endocrine glands

Hue

The dimension of color that is determined by the wavelength of light; what we know as red, orange, yellow, green, blue, violet, etc

Humanistic psychology

The school of psychology that believes that behaviors are determined by the fostering of personal growth

Unconditional positive regard

A caring, accepting, nonjudgmental attitude

Hypnosis

A social interaction in which one person suggest to another that certain perceptions, feelings, thoughts, or behaviors will spontaneously occur

Hypothalamus

A part of the brain located below the thalamus and in the limbic system; directs several maintenance activities (eating, drinking, body temp), helps govern the endocrine system via the pituitary gland and is linked to emotion and reward

Lateral hypothalamus

The on switch for eating, lesion here would lead to decreased hunger drive

Ventromedial hypothalamus

The off switch for eating, lesion here would cause obesity

Hypothesis

A testable prediction

Identical twins

Twins who develop from a single fertilized egg

Identity

Our sense of self

Illness Anxiety Disorder formerly Hypochondriasis

A somatoform disorder involving excessive concern about health and disease

Imagery

Mental pictures; a powerful aid to effortful processing

Imprinting

The process by which certain animals form attachments during a critical period very early in life

In attentional blindness

Failing to see visible objects when our attention is directed elsewhere

Incentive

A positive or negative environmental stimulus that motivates behavior

Independent variable

The experimental factor that is manipulated

Individualism

A society or culture that gives priority to one’s own goals over group goals

Informative social influence

Impact resulting from one’s willingness to accept others opinions about reality

Informed consent

An ethical principle that research participants be told enough to enable them to choose whether or not they wish to participate

Ingroup

Us; people with whom we share a common identity

In group bias

Tendency to favor our own group

Inner ear

Structures and liquids that relay sound waves to the auditory nerve fibers on a path to the brain for the interpretation of sound

Insight

An aha moment; a sudden and often novel realization of the solution to a problem

Insight therapy

A variety of therapies that aim to improve psychological functioning by increasing the clients awareness of underlying motives and defenses

Insomnia

A sleep disorder resulting in recurring problems in falling or staying asleep

Instinct

A complex behavior that is rigidly patterned through a species and is unlearned

Intellectual disability

A conditioned of limited mental ability, indicated by an intelligence score of 70 or below

Down syndrome

A condition of intellectual disability and associated with physical disorders caused by an extra copy of chromosome 21

Intelligence

Mental quality consisting of the ability to learn from experience, solve problems, and use knowledge to adapt to new situations

Intelligence quotient IQ

Mental age/chronological age x 100

Mental age

A measure of intelligence test performed by Alfred Binet; chronological age that most typically corresponds to a given level of performance

Intelligence test

A method for assessing an individual’s mental aptitudes and comparing them with those of others, using numerical scores

Intensity

The amount of energy in a light or sound wave, which we perceive as brightness or loudness, as determined by the waves amplitude

Internal locus of control

The perception that you control your own fate

Interpretation

In psychoanalysis, the analysts noting of supposed dream meanings, resistances, and other significant behaviors and events in order to promote insight

Intrinsic motivation

A desire to perform a behavior effectively for its own sake

Iris

A ring of muscle tissue that forms the colored portion of the eye around the pupil and controls the size of the pupil opening

James-Lange theory

The theory that physiological arousal comes before experiencing an emotion

Just-world phenomenon

Tendency for people to believe the world is good and that people therefore get what they deserve and deserve what they get

Kinesthesis

The system for sensing the position and movement of individual body parts

Language

Our spoken, written, or signed words and the ways we combine them to communicate meaning

Latent content

According to Freud, the underlying meaning of a dream

Latent learning

Knowledge that only becomes evident when a person has an incentive to display it

Lateralization

The differing functions of the left and right hemispheres of the brain

Law of effect

The idea that behaviors followed by a favorable consequence become more likely, and behavior followed by an unfavorable consequence become less likely

Learned helplessness

The hopelessness and passive resignation an organism learns when unable to avoid repeated aversive events

Learning

A relatively permanent change in an organisms behavior due to experience

Lens

The transparent structure behind the pupil that changes shape to help focus images on the retina

Lesion

Tissue destruction

Limbic system

Doughnut shaped system (consisting of the hippocampus, amygdala, and hypothalamus) associated with emotions and drives

Linguistic determinism

Whorfs hypothesis that language impacts the way we think

Localization of function

Different functions are in different, specific areas of the brain

Localization of sound

The ability of an organism to discover where a sound is coming from based on intensity and timing

Long-term memory

The relativity permanent and limitless storehouse of the memory system

Explicit memory or declarative memory

Memory of facts and experiences that one can consciously know and declare

Episodic memory

The long term storage of information regarding personal experiences

Semantic memory

The storehouse of permanent knowledge, such as the meanings of words in a language and huge collection of facts about the world

Implicit memory or non declarative or procedural memory

Retention independent of conscious recollection

Long term potentiation LTP

An increase in a synapses firing potential after brief, rapid stimulation

Believed to be a neural basis for learning and memory

Longitudinal study

A type of research in which the same people are restudied and retested over a long period

LSD

A powerful hallucinogenic drug; also known as acid

Major depressive disorder

A mood disorder in which a person experiences, in the absence of drugs or a medical condition, two or more weeks of significantly depressed moods, feelings of worthlessness, and diminished interest or pleasure in most activities

Mania

A mood disorder marked by a hyperactive, wildly optimistic state

Manifest content

According to Freud, the remembered storyline of a dream

Maturation

Biological growth processes that enable orderly changes in behavior, relatively uninfluenced by experience

Mean

The average of a distribution

Median

The middle score of a distribution

Medulla

The bae of the brainstem; controls heartbeat and breathing

Memory

The persistence of learning over time through the storage and retrieval of information

Menarche

First menstrual period

Mnemonics

Memory aids

Menopause

The time of natural cessation of menstruation

Mental set

A tendency to approach a problem in one particular way, often a way that has been successful in the past

Mere - exposure effect

The phenomenon that familiarity breeds fondness

Meta cognition

Thinking about one’s thinking

Methamphetamine

A powerfully addictive drug that stimulates the central nervous system, with speeded up body functions and associated energy and mood changes

Middle ear

The chamber between the eardrum and cochlea containing three tiny bones ( hammer, anvil, and stirrup) that concentrate the vibrations of the eardrum on the cochlea’s oval window

Minnesota multi phasic personality inventory MMPI

The most widely researched and clinically used of all personality tests. Originally developed to identify emotional disorders

Mirror image perceptions

Mutual views often held by conflicting people, as when each side sees itself as ethical and peaceful and views the other side as evil and aggressive