Unit 1 Biological Bases of Behavior

Nature is also known as:

Heredity

Nature comes from:

Biological parents

Nature shapes:

Physical features, personality tendencies, and mental traits

Nature influences:

Eye color, height, Personality traits, Intelligence, mental health risks

Nurture depends on the:

Environment

Nurture is everything ______ that affects you

Outside your genetic code

Nurture includes:

Parenting styles, educational opportunities, cultural norms, friendships and social settings

Even if two people share the same genes, their experiences can still:

Shape them in different ways

Because experiences can shape people with the same genes in different ways, identical twins may develop:

Different habits, preferences, or mental health outcomes

Identical twins are genetically:

Identical

Evolutionary psychology looks at how human behavior and mental processes have been shaped by:

Natural selection

A perspective of psychology would ask: Which traits are most helpful for survival and reproduction throughout human history

Which perspective is this?

Evolutionary

Behaviors that increase the chances of passing on genes may still influence:

How we act today

Examples of behaviors that increased the chances of passing on genes:

Forming social bonds, detecting threats, protecting offspring

Natural selection is when traits that ______ are passed down

Help survival and reproduction

Most humans are naturally scared of snakes and heights

Which concept is demonstrated here?

Survival instincts

People are usually attracted to signs of fertility or strength

Which concept is demonstrated here?

Reproductive strategies

People exhibit behaviors like empathy, cooperation, and group bonding

Which concept is demonstrated here?

Social behaviors

Eugenics misused _____

Evolutionary theory

Eugenics promoted:

Discriminationand inequality

Social Darwinism falsely claimed that:

Some groups are more evolved than others

Many U.S. states passed laws allowing the involuntary sterilization of individuals deemed "unfit" or "feebleminded," including those with mental illnesses, disabilities, or who were part of marginalized racial and ethnic groups

Eugenics

During the Age of Exploration, Europeans justified their means of colonizing the Americans by saying that they are fitter and stronger and more developed than the tribes they are colonizing

Which concept is demonstrated above?

Social Darwinism

Psychologists cannot study nature vs nurture by:

Randomly assigning genes

Studying people to reveal how much behavior is shaped by nature vs nurture gives us clues into how traits like intelligence, personality, and mental health are:

Passed on or shaped by environment

Identical twins share ______ of genes

100%

Identical twins help to study differences that are due to:

Environment

Identical twins are also called:

Monozygotic twins

Fraternal twins are also called:

Dizygotic twins

Fraternal twins share about ______ of genes

50%

Fraternal twins can be compared with ______ to study heredity

Identical twins

Researchers compare traits like ______ across both types of twins

Intelligence, temperament, risk for mental illness

If identical twins are more alike than fraternal twins in a certain trait, that trait likely has a:

Genetic component

Family studies look at how traits run through:

Family trees

If a psychological trait shows up more in close relatives than distant ones, it may be:

Hereditary

Family studies can’t separate:

Nature from nurture perfectly

Family studies cannot separate nature from nurture perfectly because:

Families share environments

A research study examines and compares the behaviors and interests between identical and fraternal twins

Which concept is demonstrated above?

Twins studies

A study compares the frequency of a rare disease in a family of 4 with the frequency of that disease in the extended family

Which concept is demonstrated above?

Family studies

Ways to study genetic influence:

Twin, family, and adoption studies

Adoption studies help to isolate:

Environmental vs genetic effects

If adopted children resemble their biological parents in traits, ______ may be responsible

Genetics

If adopted children resemble their adoptive parents, the ______ might play a larger role

Environment

Adoption studies are especially valuable when studying traits like:

Mental illness or personality

Adoption studies are especially valuable when studying traits like mental illness or personality because they allow researchers to see:

How much is passed down biologically

A research study measures the IQ of an adopted child, and compares that with the IQ scores of his biological parents vs his adoptive parents

Which concept is demonstrated above?

Adoption studies

Heredity and environment ______ to shape who we are

Work together

The evolutionary perspective helps explain universal human traits by looking at:

Survival and reproduction

An adoption study is a research method that ______ to determine the effects of genes and environment on behavior and mental processes

Adopted children to their biological and adoptive parents

The environment involves ______ factors

External

Eugenics is a discriminatory application of:

Evolutionary principles

Eugenics seeks to:

Improve human populations

Eugenics seeks to improve human populations through:

Selective breeding and genetic manipulation

The evolutionary perspective is a theoretical approach that explores how ______ affects the expression of behavior and mental processes to ______

Natural selection; increase survival and reproductive success

A family study is a research method that examines _____ to determine the effects of heredity and environment

Similarities in traits and behaviors

Heredity is the ______ that influence physical, behavioral, and mental traits and processes

Genetic or predisposed characteristics

Natural selection is the process by which traits that increase survival and reproductive success become:

More common in a population

A twin study is a research method that compares similarities and differences between ______ to determine the effects of genes on behavior and mental processes

Identical and fraternal twins

The nervous system is divided up into the:

Central nervous system and peripheral nervous system

The central nervous system includes the:

Brain and spinal cord

The peripheral nervous system is the ______

Network of nerves

The peripheral nervous system branches out from the ______ to the ______

CNS; rest of the body

Within the peripheral nervous system, there is the:

Somatic and autonomic nervous systems

The somatic nervous system controls:

Voluntary movement

The autonomic nervous system handles ______ stuff

Automatic

The autonomic nervous system handles automatic stuff like:

Heartbeat and digestion

Subdivisions of the autonomic nervous system:

Sympathetic and parasympathetic

The central nervous system is responsible for:

Processing information, making decisions, and coordinating responses

The brain does most of the:

Thinking, sensing, and feeling

The spinal cord acts like a:

Superhighway

The spinal cord acts like a superhighway since it:

Carries messages between brain and body

The central nervous system receives and interprets:

Sensory input

The central nervous system receives and interprets sensory input like:

Sight, sound, and touch

The central nervous system sends ______ to ______

Motor commands to muscles

The central nervous system handles:

Thought, memory, emotion, awareness

The central nervous system coordinates:

Reflexes and automatic reactions

Without the central nervous system, the rest of the nervous system would not know:

What to do

When you see a ball coming, your occipital lobe processes the visual input, your frontal lobe decides to move, and your spinal cord sends signals to your muscles to catch it, all while regulating your heartbeat and breathing

Which part of the body is responsible for all this?

Central nervous system

The peripheral nervous system links the ______ to the ______

Brain and spinal cord; rest of the body

The peripheral nervous system does not:

Make decisions

The peripheral nervous system makes sure that signals:

Get where they need to go

The somatic nervous system controls ______

Voluntary actions

The somatic nervous system controls voluntary actions like:

Walking, talking, or picking up a book

The somatic nervous system carries:

Sensory information

The somatic nervous system carries sensory information from ______ to ______

Skin, muscles, joints to central nervous system

The somatic nervous system sends ______

Motor signals

The somatic nervous system sends motor signals from ______ to ______

Central nervous system to muscles

Every second, humans form conscious decisions to do voluntary movements, such as picking up a pencil

Which part of the body is responsible for this?

Somatic nervous system

The autonomic nervous system controls:

Involuntary functions

Involuntary functions are stuff that the body does:

Automatically

The autonomic nervous system regulates ______

Internal organs

The autonomic nervous system regulates internal organs like the:

Heart, lungs, stomach

The main function of the sympathetic nervous system is to:

Prepare body for action and stress

Nickname of sympathetic nervous system:

Fight or flight

Main function of parasympathetic nervous system:

Calms body and restores balance

Nickname of parasympathetic nervous system:

Rest and digest

The sympathetic division gets you going when you are:

In danger or excited

Physiological changes wrought by the sympathetic nervous system:

Increased heart rate, dilated pupils, slowed digestion

The parasympathetic division brings you back to:

Normal

Physiological changes wrought by the parasympathetic division:

Lowered heart rate and restarting digestion