PSYC101 Exam 1

What does clinical psychology study?

Clinical psychologists study, assess, and treat people with psychological disorders

What do psychiatrists do?

Psychiatrists are under the branch of medicine. They deal with medicating psychological disorders.

What do educational psychologists do?

They try to understand how people learn. They proctor achievement tests, and do best practicing in the classroom. They also study learning disabilities.

What do counseling psychologists do?

They deal with non-deviant behavior and relationships (ex. family, marriage, career, school counseling)

What do industrial/organizational psychologists do?

They train and motivate workers. They focus on job satisfaction, good work relations, human/environment interactions, and environmental design.

Who is Willheml Wundt?

He worked in the first psychology lab in Leipzig Germany. He studied the conscious.

Who was William James?

He created the "Principles of Psychology". He was a functionalist.

Who was Sigmund Freud?

He focused on the "Interpretation of Dreams" and the role of the unconscious.

Who was John B. Watson?

He believed that psychology should only study observable behavior. He was a believer in behaviorism. He proposed that psychology should be more scientific.

Who was B. F. Skinner?

He proposed that we are controlled by our environment.

Who were Carl Rogers and Abraham Maslow?

They were believers that humans are unique, free, rational beings with potential for personal growth.

What are the steps to the scientific method?

Theory;
Hypothesis;
Operational definitions;
Replication

What is the purpose of a theory?

An explanation that organizes and predicts observations.

What describes a hypothesis?

A specific, testable prediction.

What are operational definitions?

They are procedures used in research.

What is the purpose of replication?

To see if the original findings generalize to other participants and situations.

What is a case study? What is an example? What are its limitations?

A case study is where one or a few individuals are studied in depth.

Example: Piaget and child development.

Limitations: Any given individual can be atypical, therefore it becomes easy to make false conclusions.

What is a survey? What is an example? What are its limitations?

Surveys must use a representative, random sample.

Example: political polls

Limitations: sampling errors and response rates.

What is naturalistic observation? What is an example? What are its limitations?

it is observing and recording behavior in naturally occurring situations without direct intervention with subjects.

Examples: Jane Goodall and chimps

Limitations: does not explain behavior.

What is correlation?

Correlation (r) is a statistical measure of the extent to which factors predict each other.

Can be positive or negative, on a scale of -1 to 1.

-1 is a strong negative correlation.
0 is no correlation.
1 is a strong positive correlation.

Why do we use correlation? What is its limitation?

1. When experimentation is unethical.
2. When experimentation is impossible or too difficult.
3. When you're looking at traits that can't be controlled.

Correlation is NOT causation.

What is experimentation?

What does it require?

An investigator manipulates one or more factors (independent variables) to observe the effect on some behavior or mental process (the dependent variable).

It requires an experimental condition, control condition, random assignment, an indep. variable, and a dep. variable.

What is an independent variable?

The experimental factor that is manipulated; the variable whose effect is being studied.

What is a dependent variable?

The experimental factor that is being measured; the variable that may change in response to manipulations of the IV's.

What is a neuron?

The basic building block of the nervous system.

What is a dendrite?

it is a part of a neuron that receives messages from other cells and passes the messages to the cell body.

What is the cell body?

The control center of the neuron. It contains a nucleus.

What is the axon?

It sends messages to other neurons, glands, muscles, etc.

What is the myelin sheath?

It is the fatty tissue covering some axons. It speeds conduction of neural impulse.

What is a synapse?

It is the junction between the axon of one neuron and the dendrite of another.

What is a receptor?

It is a protein that binds neurotransmitters, hormones, or drugs.

What is the action potential?

It is a brief electrical charge that ravels down an axon. It is caused by positively charges ions moving in and out of channels on the axon's membrane.

What is the threshold?

It is the level of stimulation required to trigger an action potential. The threshold is reached through depolarization.

What is depolarization?

It is when the inside of an axon becomes more positive through an inward flow of ions.

What is hyperpolarization?

It is the return of the inside of the axon to a more negative charge.

What does "all-or-none" refer to?

It refers to how action potentials can't be partial. They either happen or they do not.

What is the refractory period?

It is the period in which a new action potential cannot occur.

What are neurotransmitters?

They are the chemical messengers that traverse the synaptic gaps between neurons and bind to receptors.

What is dopamine linked to?

Movement, learning, attention, emotion, and reward.

It is linked with schizophrenia and Parkinson's.

What is serotonin linked to?

Mood, hunger, sleep, arousal.

It is linked to depression.

What is norepinephrine linked to?

Alertness and arousal.

It is linked with depression.

What are endorphins linked to?

They are natural opiate-like transmitters that are linked to pain control and pleasure.

What are the sequence of events within the brain?

1. Dendrite receives messages via neurotransmitters.
2. Through temporal and spatial summation, the message is passed to the cell body.
3. Depolarization of the cell body starts.
4. If depol. reaches threshold, action potential occurs.
5. Action potential travels down axon.
6. At synapse, A.P. is concerted into neurotransmitter. N.T is released into synaptic cleft.
7. N.T. binds to receptors on dendrites of next neuron (repeat).
8. Hyper-polarization occurs in original neuron and refractory period begins.

List the parts of the "hindbrain"

1. Cerebellum
2. Lower brain stem
a. Medulla
b. Pons

What does the cerebellum do?

It coordinates voluntary movement and balance.

What does the lower brain stem do?

It handles automatic survival functions, and it is the crossover point for information leaving and entering the brain.

The lower brain stem can be harmed by heroin and alcohol.

What does the medulla do?

It controls heartbeat and breathing.

What does the pons do?

It is the bridge between the cerebellum and the brain stem.

List the parts of the "midbrain"

1. Upper brain stem
2. Reticular formation

What does the upper brain stem do?

It is the integration of sensory processes.

What is the reticular formation?

It deals with arousal, sleep, pain perception, and the relay center.

It wakes you up naturally and sends messages down the spinal chord to illicit pain.

List the parts of the "forebrain"

1. Thalamus
2. Hypothalamus
3. Limbic System
- Hippocampus
- Amygdala
- Hypothalamus/Thalamus
- Nucleus accumbens
4. Cerebrum
- Frontal lobe
- Parietal lobe
- Occipital lobe
- Temporal lobe

What does the thalamus do?

It is the sensory relay center and integrator; filter. It deals with all senses except smell.

What does the hypothalamus do?

It deals with maintenance; temperature regulation, eating, drinking, and sexual behavior. It helps govern the endocrine system via the pituitary gland. It is the reward center and links to emotion.

What does the limbic system do?

It handles basic drives and emotion.

What does the hippocampus do?

It handles memory processing.

What does the amygdala do?

It deals with fear, aggression, and emotion.

What is the nucleus accumbens?

It is a part of the dopamine reward system.

What does the cerebrum do?

It handles higher-order control, information processing, reasoning, personality, intelligence, and language.

What does the frontal lobe do?

It handles motor initiation.

What does the prefrontal cortex?

It handles attention, planning, sense of self, and social life.

What does the parietal lobe do?

The somatosensory system. (touch)

What does the occipital lobe do?

It handles vision.

What does the temporal lobe do?

It handles hearing.

What does the left-hemisphere handle?

language

What does the right-hemisphere handle?

Spatial-reasoning and orientation, facial recognition, reading maps, and drawing geometric shapes.

What does the corpus callosum do?

It connects the two hemispheres of the brain and allows them to communicate.

What is plasticity referring to regarding the brain?

How the brain changes with experience, and how connections are flexible.

What is the difference between the sympathetic and the parasympathetic nervous system?

The sympathetic nervous system activates the fight or flight response during a threat or perceived danger, and the parasympathetic nervous system restores the body to a state of calm

What are the binocular cues for depth perception?

Retinal disparity and convergence.

What is retinal disparity?

The greater the difference between two images the retina receives of an object, the closer the object is to the viewer.

What is convergence?

The extent to which the eyes converge inward when looking at an object.

What are the monocular cues for depth perception?

Interposition (object in front blocks), relative size, relative height, relative motion, linear perspective, and light/shadow.

What is sensation?

Sensory receptors and nervous system receive and represent stimulus energies from our environment.

What is perception?

Organization and interpretation of sensory information, enabling us to recognize meaningful objects and events.

What are the different components of the eye?

Cornea, pupil, iris, lens, retina, fovea, blind spot, and the pigment epithelium.

What does the cornea do?

The cornea helps your eye to focus light so you can see clearly

What does the pupil do?

The pupil changes size to let light into the eye.

What does the iris do?

The colored part of the eye which helps regulate the amount of light entering the eye; moves the pupil

What does the optical lens do?

The main optical function of the lens is to transmit light, focusing it on the retina.

What does the retina do?

The retina converts light that enters into your eye into electrical signals your optic nerve sends to your brain which creates the images you see.

What does the fovea do?

The fovea is responsible for sharp central vision (also called foveal vision), which is necessary in humans for reading, driving, and any activity where visual detail is of primary importance.

What is the "pigment epithelium"?

The retinal pigment epithelium (RPE) is a single layer of post-mitotic cells, which functions both as a selective barrier to and a vegetative regulator of the overlying photoreceptor layer, thereby playing a key role in its maintenance.

What are the "cone" photoreceptors? Where are they located?

Cones are located in the cornea. We have around 6 million of them and they are oriented around color. They are in the center, are sensitive to detail, and are NOT sensitive to dim lighting.

What are the "rod" photoreceptors? Where are they located?

Rods are located in the cornea. We have around 120 million of them. They are in the periphery, are sensitive to dim light, and are NOT sensitive to detail.

What is grouping? What are the grouping principles of form perception?

Grouping is the perceptual tendency to organize stimuli into coherent groups.

The principles are:
Proximity, Similarity, Continuity, and Connectedness.

What is the proximity principle of form perception?

That nearby objects go together.

What is the similarity principle of form perception?

Similar objects go together.

What is the continuity principle of form perception?

We perceive smooth, continuous patterns rather than discontinuous.

What is the connectedness principle of form perception?

When uniformed or linked, we perceive items as a single unit.

List the order in which we see things.

Rods & cones -->
Bipolar cells -->
Ganglion cells -->
Optic nerve -->
Thalamus -->
Visual cortex (in optical lobe)

What is perception affected by?

Ambiguous stimuli, context, previous experience, and expectancies.

What is the difference between taste and flavor?

We have five basic tastes.

For flavor, it is a combination of retronasal olfaction and taste. Feel, look, sound, cognition, and emotion can contribute to an item's flavor.

What are the five basic tastes?

Salty, sweet, bitter, sour, and umami.

Are there innate preferences/aversions for tastes?

Yes! It's hardwired.

We like sweet and salty things because they are generally safer for us. Although we don't need a lot, salt is important.

We have 25 different bitter receptors because they are essentially poison receptors and were important for survival in the wild.

We (generally) dislike sour things because their acid can be damaging to our tissue.

We (generally) like umami because its a good detector for glutamate/protein.

How do we detect fat?

Fat molecules are too big to interact with taste receptors. They do, however, stimulate trigeminal nerves producing tactile sensations.

What are the steps in taste sensation?

1. Chewing breaks down food into small molecules that are dissolved in saliva.
2. Papillae cover the tongue
3. Taste buds are embedded in papillae
4. Each taste bud contains a number of taste receptor cells.
5. Interaction between taste receptor cell and preferred molecule sends action potential along cranial nerve to the brain

More simply:
Taste --> Thalamus --> Primary taste cortex --> OFC

What is the orbitofrontal cortex?

It is the integration area. This is where perception of flavor occurs.

What factors account for differences in flavor perception and pleasure?

Genetic variation