Psychology - Chapter 1: Variations in Psychological Attributes Vocabulary

Flashcards covering key vocabulary terms from Chapter 1 of the Psychology textbook, focusing on variations in psychological attributes.

Individual Differences

Distinctiveness and variations among people’s characteristics and behaviour patterns.

Situationism

The view that situations and circumstances influence one’s behaviour more than personal traits.

Psychological Attributes

Characteristics or qualities of individuals that can be assessed or measured.

Assessment

Measurement of psychological attributes of individuals and their evaluation using multiple methods.

Intelligence

The global capacity to understand the world, think rationally, and use available resources effectively when faced with challenges.

Aptitude

An individual’s underlying potential for acquiring skills with proper environment and training.

Interest

An individual’s preference for engaging in one or more specific activities relative to others.

Personality

Relatively enduring characteristics of a person that make her or him distinct from others.

Values

Enduring beliefs about an ideal mode of behaviour.

Psychological Test

An objective and standardised measure of an individual’s mental and/or behavioural characteristics.

Interview

Seeking information from a person on a one-to-one basis.

Case Study

An in-depth study of the individual in terms of her/his psychological attributes and history.

Observation

Employing systematic, organised, and objective procedures to record behavioural phenomena.

Self-Report

A method in which a person provides factual information about herself/himself and/or opinions.

g-factor

General factor in Spearman's two-factor theory of intelligence, common to all performances.

s-factor

Specific factors in Spearman's two-factor theory of intelligence, allowing individuals to excel in specific domains.

Mental Age (MA)

A measure of a person’s intellectual development relative to people of her/his age group.

Chronological Age (CA)

The biological age from birth.

Intelligence Quotient (IQ)

Mental age divided by chronological age, and multiplied by 100.

Intellectual Disability

Significantly sub-average general intellectual functioning existing concurrently with deficits in adaptive behaviour during the developmental period.

Intellectual Giftedness

Exceptional general ability shown in superior performance in a wide variety of areas.

Culture-Fair Test

An intelligence test designed to not discriminate against individuals belonging to different cultures.

Culture-Biased Test

An intelligence test that favors the culture in which it was developed.

Emotional Intelligence

The ability to monitor one’s own and other’s emotions, to discriminate among them, and to use the information to guide one’s thinking and actions.

Creativity

The ability to produce ideas, objects, or problem solutions that are novel, appropriate and useful.

Componential Intelligence

The analysis of information to solve problems.

Experiential Intelligence

Using past experiences creatively to solve novel problems.

Contextual Intelligence

The ability to deal with environmental demands encountered on a daily basis.

Simultaneous Processing

Perceiving the relations among various concepts and integrate them into a meaningful pattern for comprehension

Successive Processing

Remembering all the information serially so that the recall of one leads to the recall of another

Planning

Allows us to think of the possible courses of action, implement them to reach a target, and evaluate their effectiveness.