EXAM 2 psy

attention

the capacity to selectively focus awareness on particular stimuli in your external environment or on your internal thoughts or sensations

Circadian rhythm

A roughly 24-hour-long cycle of fluctuations in biological and psychological processes.

REM sleep

rapid-eye-movement sleep, is a type of sleep during which rapid eye movements, and dreaming usually occur and voluntary muscle activity is suppressed

NREM sleep

Quiet, typically dreamless sleep in which rapid eye movements are absent.

Beta brain waves

brain-wave pattern associated with alert wakefulness

alpha brain waves

brain-wave pattern associated with relaxed wakefulness and drowsiness

sleep paralysis

A temporary condition in which a person is unable to move upon awakening in the morning or during the night.

dream

an unfolding sequence of thoughts, perceptions, and emotions that typically occurs during REM sleep and is experienced as a series of real-life events

activation- synthesis model of dreaming

The theory that brain activity during sleep produces dream images, which are combined by the brain into a dream story

insomnia

A condition in which a person regularly experiences an inability to fall asleep, to stay asleep, or to feel adequately rested by sleep.

Narcolepsy

A sleep disorder characterized by excessive daytime sleepiness and brief lapses into episodes of sleep throughout the day.

parasomnias

Category of sleep disorders characterized by undesirable physical arousal, behaviors, or events during sleep or sleep transitions

sleep terrors

Sleep disturbance involving an episode of increased physiological arousal, panic, frightening hallucinations, and no recall of the episode; also called night terrors.

sleepwalking/somnambulism

A sleep disturbance characterized by an episode of walking or performing other actions during stage 3 NREM sleep.

hypnosis

A cooperative social interaction in which the hypnotized person responds to the hypnotist’s suggestions with changes in perception, memory, thoughts, and behavior

posthypnotic suggestion

An instruction given during hypnosis asking a person to carry out a specific behavior following the hypnotic session.

meditation

A group of techniques that induce an altered state of focused attention and heightened awareness.

psychoactive drug

A chemical substance that affects brain function and alters consciousness, perception, mood, or behavior.

drug tolerance

A condition in which increasing amounts of a physically addictive drug are needed to produce the original, desired effect.

drug abuse

Recurrent substance use that involves impaired control, disruption of social, occupational, and interpersonal functioning, and the development of craving, tolerance, and withdrawal symptoms.

depressants

A category of psychoactive drugs that depress or inhibit brain activity.

barbiturates

A category of depressant drugs that reduce anxiety and produce sleepiness.

opioids

A category of psychoactive drugs that are chemically similar to morphine and have strong pain relieving properties; also called opiates or narcotics.

stimulants

A category of psychoactive drugs that increase brain activity, arouse behavior, and increase mental alertness.

effect of caffeine on the brain

its stimulating the release of dopamine in the brain’s prefrontal cortex. Taken to excess, it can produce anxiety, restlessness, and increased heart rate, and can disrupt normal sleep patterns. also produces its mentally stimulating effects by blocking adenosine receptors in the brain. As noted earlier, adenosine levels gradually increase the longer a person is awake. When adenosine levels reach a certain level in your body, the urge to sleep greatly intensifies. it staves off the urge and promotes alertness by blocking adenosine’s sleep-inducing effects

amphetamines

A class of stimulant drugs that arouse the central nervous system and suppress appetite.

cocaine

An illegal stimulant derived from the leaves of the coca plant, which is found in South America, Psychologically, it produces intense euphoria, mental alertness, and self-confidence. These psychological responses occur because it blocks the reuptake of three different neurotransmitters—dopamine, serotonin, and norepinephrine. Blocking reuptake potentiates, or increases the effects of, these neurotransmitters. Chronic use produces a wide range of psychological disorders

LSD

A powerful synthetic psychedelic drug

marijuana

A psychoactive drug derived from the hemp plant. produce a sense of well-being, mild euphoria, and a dreamy state of relaxation. Taste, touch, and smell may be enhanced; time perception may be altered. interferes with muscle coordination and perception and may impair driving ability. it has also been shown to interfere with learning, memory, and cognitive functioning

MDMA (ecstasy)

Synthetic club drug that combines stimulant and mild psychedelic effects.

dissociative anesthetics

Class of drugs that reduce sensitivity to pain and produce feelings of detachment and dissociation, rather than actual hallucinations; includes the club drugs phencyclidine (PCP) and ketamine

Sigmund Freud

They believed that sexual and aggressive instincts are the motivating forces that dictate human behavior. Because these instinctual urges are so consciously unacceptable, sexual and aggressive thoughts, feelings, and wishes are pushed into the unconscious, or repressed. They believed that these repressed urges and wishes could surface in dream imagery.

Albert Bandura

they showed that observational learning involves active cognitive processes, not mere “mechanical copying,” in a famous Bobo doll experiment involving the imitation of aggressive behavior.

Ivan Pavlov

Russian physiologist who was awarded a Nobel Prize for their work on digestion. their involvement with psychology began as a result of an observation they made while investigating the role of saliva in digestion, using dogs as their experimental subjects.

B.F. Skinner

The Behavioral Psychologist, their learning theory states that a person is exposed to a stimulus, which evokes a response, and then the response is reinforced (stimulus creates response, and then reinforcement). This finally leads to the human behavior conditioning.

John Watson

their research on the conditioning process. they are also known for the Little Albert experiment, in which they demonstrated that a child could be conditioned to fear a previously neutral stimulus. their research further revealed that this fear could be generalized to other similar objects.

learning

A process that produces a relatively enduring change in behavior or knowledge as a result of an individual’s experience.

conditioning

The process of learning associations between environmental events and behavioral responses.

classical conditioning

The basic learning process that involves repeatedly pairing a neutral stimulus with a response-producing stimulus until the neutral stimulus elicits the same response.

unconditioned stimulus (UCS)

The natural stimulus that reflexively elicits a response without the need for prior learning.

unconditioned response (UCR)

The unlearned, reflexive response that is elicited by an unconditioned stimulus.

conditioned stimulus (CS)

A formerly neutral stimulus that acquires the capacity to elicit a reflexive response.

conditioned response (CR)

The learned, reflexive response to a previously neutral stimulus.

higher order conditioning

Procedure in which a conditioned stimulus from one learning trial functions as the unconditioned stimulus in a new conditioning trial; also called second order conditioning.

extinction (in classical conditioning)

The gradual weakening and apparent disappearance of conditioned behavior.

spontaneous recovery

The reappearance of a previously extinguished conditioned response after a period of time without exposure to the conditioned stimulus

behaviorism

School of psychology and theoretical viewpoint that emphasizes the study of observable behaviors, especially as they pertain to the process of learning.

operant conditioning

The basic learning process that involves changing the probability that a response will be repeated by manipulating the consequences of that response. is a method of learning that uses rewards and punishment to modify behavior

positive reinforcement

A situation in which a response is followed by the addition of a reinforcing stimulus, increasing the likelihood that the response will be repeated in similar situations.

negative reinforcement

A situation in which a response results in the removal of, avoidance of, or escape from an aversive, or undesired, stimulus, increasing the likelihood that the response will be repeated in similar situations.

primary reinforcer

A stimulus or event that is naturally or inherently reinforcing for a given species.

conditioned/secondary reinforcer

A stimulus or event that has acquired reinforcing value by being associated with a primary reinforcer

positive punishment

A situation in which an operant is followed by the presentation or addition of an aversive stimulus; also called punishment by application.

negative punishment

A situation in which an operant is followed by the presentation or addition of an aversive stimulus; also called punishment by application.

operant chamber (skinner box)

B. F. Skinner invented this experimental apparatus to scientifically study the relationship between environmental events and active behaviors.

extinction (in operant conditioning)

A phenomenon that occurs when a learned response no longer results in reinforcement, and the likelihood of the behavior’s being repeated gradually declines.

schedules of reinforcement

The delivery of a reinforcer according to a preset pattern based on the number of responses or the time interval between responses.

latent learning

Tolman’s term for learning that occurs in the absence of reinforcement but is not behaviorally demonstrated until a reinforcer becomes available.

learned helplessness

A phenomenon in which exposure to inescapable and uncontrollable aversive events produces passive behavior.

memory

The mental processes that enable you to encode, retain, and retrieve information over time.

encoding

The process of transforming information into a form that can be entered into and retained by the memory system.

stage model of memory

A model describing memory as consisting of three distinct stages: sensory memory, short-term memory, and long-term memory.

sensory memory

The stage of memory that registers information from the environment and holds it for a very brief period of time.

short- term memory

The active stage of memory in which information is stored for up to about 20 seconds.

long-term memory

The stage of memory that represents the long-term storage of information.

maintenance rehearsal

The mental or verbal repetition of information in order to maintain it beyond the usual 20-second duration of short-term memory.

chunking

Increasing the amount of information that can be held in short-term memory by grouping related items together into a single unit

working memory

The temporary storage and active, conscious manipulation of information needed for complex cognitive tasks, such as reasoning, learning, and problem solving.

procedural memory

Category of long term memory that includes memories of different skills, operations, and actions.

episodic memory

Category of long-term memory that includes memories of particular events, including the time and place that they occurred.

semantic memory

Category of long-term memory that includes memories of general knowledge, concepts, facts, and names.

explicit memory

Information or knowledge that can be consciously recollected; also called declarative memory.

implicit memory

Information or knowledge that affects behavior or task performance but cannot be consciously recollected; also called nondeclarative memory.

clustering

Organizing items into related groups, during recall from long-term memory.

semantic network model

A model that describes units of information in long-term memory as being organized in a complex network of associations.

retrieval

The process of recovering information stored in memory so that we are consciously aware of it.

retrieval cue

A clue, prompt, or hint that helps trigger recall of a given piece of information stored in long-term memory.

retrieval cue failure

The inability to recall long-term memories because of inadequate or missing retrieval cues.

recall

A test of long-term memory that involves retrieving information without the aid of retrieval cues

cued recall

A test of long-term memory that involves remembering an item of information in response to a retrieval cue.

recognition

A test of long-term memory that involves identifying correct information out of several possible choices.

flashbulb memory

The recall of very specific images or details surrounding a vivid, rare, or significant personal event; details may or may not be accurate.

encoding failure

The inability to recall specific information because of insufficient encoding of the information for storage in long-term memory.

retroactive interference

Backward acting memory interference in which a new memory interferes with remembering an old memory.

proactive interference

Forward-acting memory interference in which an old memory interferes with remembering a new memory.

Alfred Binet

French psychologist who played a dominant role in the development of experimental psychology in France and who made fundamental contributions to the measurement of intelligence. intelligence can be defined by the comparison of the performance of children at the same idea The concept is that there are certain tasks that most six-year-olds can complete. He asserted that children who could not complete those tasks were below average.

Howard Gardner theory of multiple intelligences

they described intelligence as different mental abilities that operate independently, instead of as one general intelligence that can be measured as a single score. the learning process should be tailored to an individual's strengths in their multiple intelligences. By recognizing and developing these intelligences, individuals can enhance their ability to learn and understand information.

Robert Sternberg

Their best known for their intelligence theory, which states that there are three aspects to intelligence. These are creative, analytical, and practical intelligence

David Wechsler

was a psychologist who became well known for their inventions of intelligence tests that evaluate cognitive abilities in adults and children. The theory they had regarding intelligence was that it is an effect rather than a cause and that non-intellectual factors contribute to its development.

mental image

A mental representation of objects or events that are not physically present.

functional fixedness

The tendency to view objects as functioning only in their usual or customary way.

mental set

The tendency to persist in solving problems with solutions that have worked in the past.

availability heuristic

A strategy in which the likelihood of an event is estimated on the basis of how readily available other instances of the event are in memory.

representativeness heuristic

A strategy in which the likelihood of an event is estimated by comparing how similar it is to the prototype of the event.

language

A system for combining arbitrary symbols to produce an infinite number of meaningful statements.

confirmation bias

The tendency to seek out evidence that confirms an existing belief while ignoring evidence that might contradict or undermine that belief.

intelligence quotient (IQ)

A measure of general intelligence derived by comparing an individual’s score with the scores of others in the same age group.

achievement test

A test designed to measure a person’s level of knowledge, skill, or accomplishment in a particular area.

aptitude test

A test designed to assess a person’s capacity to benefit from education or training.

reliability

The ability of a test to produce consistent results when administered on repeated occasions under similar conditions.