Experimental Design and Cognitive Practices Vocabulary

Vocabulary terms and definitions covering experimental design basics, research ethics, and faulty cognitive practices.

Hypothesis

Your best guess or prediction about the outcome of an experiment based on different variables.

Consent

Permission required when working with a partner or participant, ensuring they are 18 years of age and following standard protocols.

Operational definition

A core component of experimental design that specifies how variables are defined and measured.

Dependent variable

An experimental element that describes what is being measured or assessed in the study's results.

Mind, side bias

A faulty cognitive practice mentioned alongside overconfidence that makes us believe we are right when we are actually not.

Overconfidence

A faulty cognitive practice that makes individuals falsely believe their beliefs or guesses are correct.

Tendency to perceive patterns in random events

A faulty cognitive practice involving correlating unrelated events, leading people to believe they are right when they are not.

What is psychology?

The scientific study of mind and behaviour.

What does the word psychology come from?

The Greek words psyche, meaning soul or mind, and logia, meaning study.

Why can people be described as "intuitive psychologists"?

People naturally use common sense, personal experience, and intuition to try to understand behaviour and mental processes.

What makes psychology different from simply using intuition or common sense?

Psychology systematically studies behaviour and mental processes using scientific methods and evidence.

What is the key word in today's definition of psychology?

Science.

What is the scientific attitude?

An approach combining curiosity, skepticism, and humility to investigate claims and evaluate evidence.

What three qualities make up the scientific attitude?

Curiosity, skepticism, and humility.

What is humility in psychological science?

Awareness of our vulnerability to error and openness to new perspectives and evidence.

What does it mean to be skeptical but not cynical?

Question claims and demand evidence without automatically assuming that every claim is false.

What does it mean to be open-minded but not gullible?

Be willing to consider new ideas without automatically believing them.

What is critical thinking?

Thinking that examines assumptions, evaluates sources, identifies hidden biases, evaluates evidence, and assesses conclusions.

What five things does critical thinking involve?

Examining assumptions, appraising the source, identifying hidden biases, evaluating evidence, and assessing conclusions.

Why is critical thinking important in psychology?

It helps us check our biases and determine whether conclusions are actually supported by evidence.

Who is identified as the father of psychology?

Wilhelm Wundt.

What major event involving Wilhelm Wundt occurred in 1879?

Wundt established the first experimental psychology laboratory at the University of Leipzig.

Why is Wilhelm Wundt historically important?

His experimental laboratory helped establish psychology as an independent experimental scientific discipline.

Who was Edward Bradford Titchener?

A student of Wundt associated with structuralism and the use of introspection.

What is structuralism?

An early school of psychology that attempted to identify the basic structures or elements of conscious experience.

What method was associated with structuralism?

Introspection.

What is introspection?

Looking inward and reporting the elements of one's conscious experience.

What example does the professor use to explain introspection?

A person might look at or smell a rose and report the elements of their conscious experience.

Why was introspection considered unreliable?

Reports varied from person to person and experience to experience, people often do not know why they feel or behave as they do, recollections can be inaccurate, and the method required participants who were verbally capable.

What were the major weaknesses of structuralism's introspection method?

It required intelligent and verbally capable participants, produced unreliable results that varied between people, relied on people knowing their own mental processes, and depended on recollections that could be inaccurate.

A psychologist asks participants to look at a rose and describe the individual elements of their conscious experience. Which early approach is being demonstrated?

Structuralism using introspection.

Who is most strongly associated with functionalism?

William James.

What is functionalism?

An early approach that examined how mental and behavioural processes function to help organisms adapt, survive, and flourish.

What major question did functionalism ask?

What are mental and behavioural processes for, and how do they help organisms adapt, survive, and flourish?

How did functionalism differ from structuralism?

Structuralism tried to identify the elements or structure of conscious experience, whereas functionalism examined the purposes or functions of mental and behavioural processes.

Who influenced William James and functionalism?

Charles Darwin.

How did Darwin's ideas influence William James?

James believed mental processes such as thinking were adaptive and developed because they helped our ancestors survive.

What aspects of consciousness did William James study?

The stream of consciousness and emotion.

A psychologist asks how thinking helps humans adapt to their environment rather than asking what consciousness is made of. Which school is this?

Functionalism.

Structuralism is associated with which two psychologists?

Wilhelm Wundt and Edward Titchener.

Functionalism is associated primarily with whom?

William James.

Who was Mary Whiton Calkins?

An important memory researcher who became the first female president of the American Psychological Association.

What role did William James play in Mary Whiton Calkins's education?

He admitted her to his Harvard graduate seminar despite objections.

What area did Mary Whiton Calkins research?

Memory.

What major APA milestone did Mary Whiton Calkins achieve?

She became the first female president of the APA.

Who was Margaret Floy Washburn?

The first woman to receive a psychology PhD, author of The Animal Mind, and the second female APA president.

What book is associated with Margaret Floy Washburn?

The Animal Mind.

Who was the first woman to receive a psychology PhD?

Margaret Floy Washburn.

Who was the first female APA president?

Mary Whiton Calkins.

Who was the second female APA president?

Margaret Floy Washburn.

What evidence do the professor's slides give for psychology's increasing gender diversity?

From 1988 to 2025, more than half of elected Association for Psychological Science presidents were women, and women now earn most psychology doctorates in the United States, Canada, and Europe.

What is behaviorism?

The view that psychology should be an objective science that studies observable behaviour without reference to inner mental processes.

What two major principles defined behaviorism?

Psychology should be an objective science, and it should study behaviour without reference to inner mental processes.

Why did behaviorists reject introspection?

They wanted psychology to focus on objectively observable and measurable behaviour rather than subjective reports of internal mental processes.

Who were John B. Watson and Rosalie Rayner?

Researchers associated with behaviorism and the Little Albert study of learned fear.

What did the Little Albert study demonstrate?

That fear could be learned through conditioning.

Who was Ivan Pavlov?

A researcher whose conditioning work strongly influenced behaviorism.

What happened in Pavlov's famous dog research?

Dogs learned to salivate to a tone that had previously been associated with the presentation of food.

What does Pavlov's dog research demonstrate?

Conditioning, in which an organism learns an association between events.

Who was B. F. Skinner?

A leading behaviorist who rejected introspection and studied how consequences shape behaviour.

What concepts are especially associated with B. F. Skinner in the professor's slides?

Conditioning, reinforcement, punishment, and the way consequences shape behaviour.

How long did behaviorism remain highly influential?

Well into the 1960s.

Match the behaviorist with the idea: Watson and Rayner, Pavlov, Skinner.

Watson and Rayner = Little Albert and learned fear; Pavlov = dogs and conditioning; Skinner = consequences, reinforcement, and punishment.

A psychologist studies only observable actions and refuses to explain behaviour using unobservable mental processes. Which approach is being used?

Behaviorism.

A dog begins salivating to a tone because the tone has repeatedly been paired with food. What concept does this illustrate?

Conditioning, as demonstrated by Ivan Pavlov.

A researcher studies how rewards and punishments change behaviour. Which psychologist's approach does this most closely resemble?

B. F. Skinner's behaviorism.

What is psychoanalytic psychology?

An approach emphasizing how the unconscious mind and childhood experiences affect behaviour.

Who founded psychoanalytic psychology?

Sigmund Freud.

What did Freud believe strongly influenced behaviour?

Unconscious conflicts and childhood experiences.

What kinds of unconscious conflicts did Freud emphasize?

Unconscious sexual conflicts and the mind's defenses against its own wishes and impulses.

What three methods associated with Freud are specifically included in the professor's slides?

Talk therapy, dream analysis, and free association.

What is another term associated with Freudian psychology?

Psychoanalysis.

What are the three components in Freud's theory of personality?

Id, ego, and superego.

What are Freud's psychosexual stages in order?

Oral, anal, phallic, latency, and genital.

How are Freud's ideas regarded in the professor's slides today?

Many are described as controversial today.

A psychologist explains an adult's behaviour in terms of unconscious conflict and childhood experiences. Which perspective is being used?

Psychodynamic or psychoanalytic.

Which approach focuses on unconscious drives and conflicts?

Psychodynamic psychology.

What is humanistic psychology?

An approach emphasizing human growth potential, the need for love and acceptance, and environments that nurture or limit personal growth.

Which two psychologists are strongly associated with humanistic psychology?

Abraham Maslow and Carl Rogers.

Why did Rogers and Maslow develop a different approach?

They believed both behaviorism and Freudian psychology were too limiting.

How did humanistic psychologists generally view humans?

As inherently good and driven by an innate desire to grow.

What is self-actualization?

The humanistic idea of fulfilling one's potential and innate desire for personal growth.

Who is associated with the hierarchy of needs?

Abraham Maslow.

Who is associated with the person-centered approach?

Carl Rogers.

According to Rogers, what three qualities facilitate personal growth?

Genuineness, empathy, and unconditional positive regard.

What is unconditional positive regard in Rogers's approach?

An attitude of acceptance toward another person that is not dependent on them meeting particular conditions.

A therapist emphasizes empathy, genuineness, and unconditional positive regard. Which psychologist's approach is this?

Carl Rogers's person-centered approach.

A psychologist focuses on people's growth potential, love, acceptance, and self-actualization. Which approach is this?

Humanistic psychology.

How does humanistic psychology differ from behaviorism?

Behaviorism focuses on observable learned behaviour, whereas humanistic psychology emphasizes growth potential, personal development, love, acceptance, and self-actualization.

How does humanistic psychology differ from Freudian psychology?

Freudian psychology emphasizes unconscious conflicts and childhood experiences, whereas humanistic psychology emphasizes growth potential, acceptance, and self-actualization.

From the 1920s through the 1960s, what two major forces were especially influential in psychology?

Behaviorism and Freudian or psychoanalytic psychology.

What was the Cognitive Revolution?

A shift away from strict behaviorism that renewed psychology's scientific study of internal mental processes.

Who do the professor's slides identify as a primary instigator of the Cognitive Revolution?

Noam Chomsky.

When did the Cognitive Revolution gain momentum?

During the late 1950s and 1960s.

What idea did the Cognitive Revolution challenge?

The behaviorist idea that psychology should focus only on observable behaviour and exclude internal mental processes.

According to the professor's slides, how did Chomsky characterize the mind?

As an active, modular system governed by innate structures and internal mental states.

What is cognitive psychology?

The study of mental processes involved in thinking, knowing, remembering, and processing information.

What is cognitive neuroscience?

The interdisciplinary study of how brain activity is linked with cognition and mental processes.

A psychologist investigates how people encode, store, and retrieve information. Which perspective is being used?

The cognitive perspective.

What is the nature-nurture issue?

The question of the relative contributions of biology or genes and environment or experience to behaviour and mental processes.