FCPS AP Psych Unit 7

Motivation

a need or desire that energizes and directs behavior

Instinct

complex, inherited behavior patterns characteristic of a species that is unlearned.

Incentive

Force that pulls a person toward a particular behavior.  

Intrinsic Motivation

Motivation that stems from internal factors, benefits associated with the process of pursuing a goal (autonomy, mastery, purpose)

Extrinsic Motivation

Motivation that stems from external factors, benefits associated with achieving a goal or avoiding punishment (compensation, punishment, reward)  

Overjustification Effect

Promising a reward for doing something you like to do results in you seeking the reward as the motivation for performing the task.

Self-Efficacy

Our belief that we can perform behaviors that are necessary to accomplish tasks, and that we are competent

Achievement Motivation

The need for achievement drives accomplishment and performance and thereby motivates our behavior

Drive Reduction Theory

The idea that a physiological need creates an aroused tension state (a drive) that motivate an organism to satisfy the need

Incentive Theory

We are pulled into action by—positive or negative— outside incentives

Optimum Arousal Theory

Human motivation aims to increase arousal  - We feel driven to experience stimulation

Arousal

level of alertness, wakefulness, and activation causes by activity in the central nervous system

Yerkes-Dodson Law

people perform best at a moderate level of arousal.

Hierarchy of Needs

Maslow’s pyramid of human needs, beginning at the base with physiological needs that must first be satisfied before higher-level safety needs and then psychological needs become active.

Cognitive Dissonance Theory

refers to a situation involving conflicting attitudes, beliefs or behaviors. This produces a feeling of mental discomfort leading to an alteration in one of the attitudes, beliefs or behaviors to reduce the discomfort and restore balance.

Hunger Motivation

Understanding why we eat, hunger is something that makes us do things (motivator) and is a drive state

Set point

the point at which an individual’s “weight thermostat” is supposedly set.  When the body falls below this weight, an increase in hunger and a lowered metabolic rate may act to restore the lost weight.

Lateral hypothalamus (LH)

the “on” button for eating.  *Remember: If it is lesioned, people will not feel hungry and they will become little (LH).

Ventromedial hypothalamus (VMH)

the “off” button for eating.  *Remember: If it is lesioned, people will not feel full and they will become very huge

Basal metabolic rate

the body’s resting rate of energy expenditure.

Anorexia nervosa

an eating disorder in which a person (usually an adolescent female) diets and becomes significantly (15 percent or more) underweight, yet, still feeling fat, continues to starve.

Bulimia nervosa

an eating disorder characterized by episodes of overeating, usually high-calorie foods, followed by vomiting, laxative use, fasting, or excessive exercise.

Binge-eating disorder

significant binge-eating episodes, followed by distress, disgust, or guilt, but without the compensatory purging, fasting, or excessive exercise that marks bulimia nervosa.

Body Mass Index (BMI)

: the percentage of a person’s body fat.

Obesity

a disorder characterized by being excessively overweight, usually considered to have a BMI of over 30%.

Sexual Motivation

The normal human interest in sexual objects and activities

Sexual response cycle

the four stages of sexual responding described by Masters and Johnson – excitement, plateau, orgasm, and resolution.

Estrogen

sex hormone secreted in greater amount by females than males and contributing to female sex characteristics.

Testosterone

the most important of the male sex hormones. 

Social Motivation

People need each other and need groups in order to survive and thrive 

Ostracism (Social Exclusion)

Being deliberately left out of a group or social setting by exclusion and rejection

Alfred Kinsey

Pioneering sex researcher, gained his data mostly through interviews that culminated in reports

Abraham Maslow

Humanist who developed the Hierarchy of Needs.

Homeostasis

The body’s tendency to maintain an internal steady state of metabolism, to stay in balance

Need

a necessity, especially a physiological.

Primary drive

drives that are innate such as hunger, thirst, and sex.

Secondary drive

drives that are learned through conditioning such as working for money.

Emotion

a response of the whole organism, involving (1) physiological arousal, (2) expressive behaviors, and (3) conscious experience.

James-Lange theory

our experience of emotion is our awareness of our physiological responses to emotion-arousing stimuli.

Cannon Bard theory (Thalamic Theory)

an emotion-arousing stimulus simultaneously triggers (1) physiological responses and (2) the subjective experience of emotion.

Schachter-Singer theory (Schachter-Two Factor)

to experience emotion one must (1) be physically aroused and (2) cognitively label the arousal.

Zajonc; LeDoux

some embodied responses happen instantly, without conscious appraisal - we automatically feel startled by a sound in the forest before labeling it as a threat

Lazarus

cognitive appraisal (“is it dangerous or not?”) - sometimes without our awareness - define emotion. Example: The sound is “just the wind”.

Paul Ekman

  Universal emotions (all cultures). Identified every muscle in the human face and then every possible combination of facial muscles

Facial Feedback Hypothesis

Facial movement and expressions can influence attitude and emotional experience

Display Rule

A social group or culture's informal norms about how to appropriately express emotions

Stress

the process by which we perceive and respond to certain events, called stressors, that we appraise as threatening or challenging.

Stressor

anything that brings on the reaction to stress.

Distress

bad stress such as losing a job, a loved one, divorce, etc.

Eustress

good stress such as going on a vacation, the holidays, getting married, etc.

General Adaptation Syndrome (GAS)

Selye’s concept of the body’s adaptive response to stress in three phases – alarm, resistance, exhaustion. 

Alarm stage

encounter threatening stimulus, fight or flight activated.  If threat avoided, stage ends

Resistance stage

if the threat is not avoided there’s prolonged state of stress.  Activation of stress cannot be kept up indefinitely.

Exhaustion stage

energy and strength are used up by maintaining resistance, can become vulnerable to illness, fatigue & injury.

Approach-approach

the least stressful social conflict that involves 2 options, only one of which you can choose. Ex. You are accepted to both Harvard and Dartmouth.  Which do you choose? 

Avoidance-avoidance

involves 2 negative options, one of which you must choose.

Approach-avoidance

involves whether or not to choose an option that has both a positive and negative consequence or consequences.  You are both attracted and repelled by the same goal. 

Multiple approach-avoidance

most complex of the social conflicts that involves several alternative courses of action that have both positive and negative aspects. 

Coronary heart disease

the clogging of the vessels that nourish the heart muscle; the leading cause of death in North America.

Acute Stress disorder

diagnosed within the 1^st month after exposure to a traumatic event.  The person experiences depression and/or anxiety.

Type A

Friedman and Rosenman’s term for competitive, hard-driving, impatient, verbally aggressive, and anger-prone people.

Type B

Friedman and Rosenman’s term for easygoing, relaxed people.

Psychophysiological illness

literally, “mind-body” illness; any stress-related physical illness, such as hypertension and some headaches.

Lymphocytes

the two types of white blood cells that are part of the body’s immune system; B lymphocytes form in the bone marrow and release antibodies that fight bacterial infections; T lymphocytes form in the thymus and other lymphatic tissue and attack cancer cells, viruses, and foreign substances.

B lymphocytes

fight bacterial infections.

T lymphocytes

attack cancer cells and viruses.

Sigmund Freud

The Father of Psychoanalysis

Carl Jung

Early follower of Freud, established rival theoretical perspective

Alfred Adler

believed people strive for superiorityto be altruistic, cooperative, creative, unique, aware, and interested in social welfare

Psychoanalytic Theories

Sigmund Freud developed theory of personality development, human behavior and experience are determined by forces over which we have very little control and about which we are generally unaware 

Unconscious

According to Freud, a reservoir of mostly unacceptable thoughts, wishes, feelings, and memories

Id

Part of the human personality that is made up of all our inborn biological urges that seeks out immediate gratification

Ego

The largely conscious, “executive” part of personality that, mediates among the demands of the id, superego, and reality

Superego

The part of personality that, represents internalized ideals and provides standards for judgment (the conscience) and for future aspirations

Psychosexual Stages

The childhood stages of development (oral, anal, phallic, latency, genital) during which, according to Freud, the id’s pleasure seeking energies focus on distinct erogenous zones

Oral (0-1)

Obtain pleasure from the mouth via sucking, biting, swallowing.

Anal (1-3)

Pleasure obtained by learning to control bodily wastes.

Phallic Stage

Pleasure zone in our genitals and we are focusing on coping with incestuous feelings

Latency Stage(5-12)

Suppress sexual interest - play mostly with same sex peers

Genital Stage (adolescent & Up)

Adult sexuality. Feeling more comfortable with the mature understanding of what sex means and what is about. Comfort and maturity in expressing sexual feelings towards others.

Oedipus complex

boys have feelings of love towards mothers and feel hostile their fathers

Electra Complex

Girls develop penis envy and love towards fathers, but feel hostile towards mothers

Identification

The process by which, according to Freud, children incorporate their parents’ values into their developing superegos

Fixation

According to Freud, a lingering focus of pleasure-seeking energies at an earlier psychosexual stage, in which conflicts were unresolved

Psychoanalysis

Freud’s techniques used in treating psychological disorders by seeking to expose and interpret unconscious tensions

Free Association

In psychoanalysis, a method of exploring the unconscious in which the person relaxes and says whatever comes to mind, no matter how trivial or embarrassing

Repression

banishing anxiety arousing thoughts, feelings, and memories from consciousness. Example: Witness a murder and when the police ask you what happened, you forget

Regression

an individual faced with anxiety retreats to a more infantile psychosexual stage, where some psychic energy remains fixated. Example: Anxious on a first day of school, a child may result to a “thumb sucking” phase to help him/her get through

Reaction Formation

the ego unconsciously switches unacceptable impulses to their opposite. People may express feelings that are opposite of their unconscious feelings. Example: “I hate him” may really mean, “I love him”

Projection

People disguise their own threatening impulses by attributing them to others. Example: “He doesn’t trust me,” may mean “I don’t trust him.”

Rationalization

offers self-justification explanations in place of the real, more threatening, unconscious reasons for one’s actions. Example: Students who don’t study may think, “All work and no play makes me a boring person” or someone who is an alcoholic say, “I only drink in social settings.”

Displacement

Shifts sexual or aggressive impulses toward a more acceptable or less threatening object or person; redirecting anger toward a safer outlet. Example: Bullying

Denial

People refuse to believe or even perceive painful realities. Example: See your boyfriend cheating, but still don’t believe it

Collective unconscious

This is our supposedly common collection of images that we have gained together as human beings from our ancestral & evolutionary past 

Archetypes

Major structural components of the collective unconscious, universal pattern or predispositions that structure how all humans consciously and unconsciously adapt to their world

Anima

The hidden feminine side of man, based on men’s collective experiences with women throughout time 

Animus

The hidden masculine side of woman

inferiority complex

consists of feelings of not measuring up to standards, a doubt and uncertainty about oneself, and a lack of self-esteem

Operant Conditioning Theory

B.F. Skinner maintained that behavior is personality. The environment shapes who we come and who we become is determined by the contingencies of reinforcement we have experienced

Social Cognitive Theory (Albert Bandura)

Views behavior as influenced by the interaction between people’s traits (including their thinking) and their social context