Psychology Module 2 (Chapters 1 - 2)

• Psychology

The scientific study of behavior and mind, where mind refers to inner conscious experience and behavior is any observable action.

• Philosophy

A field that historically combined with physiology to form psychology; it provides foundational, speculative questions regarding the nature of the soul, knowledge, and mind.

• Physiology

A field that historically combined with philosophy to form psychology; it supplies empirical methodologies, mapping sensory systems, brain neuroanatomy, and biological mechanics.

• Inference Principle

The methodology that psychologists use to draw scientific inferences about unobservable mental states.

• Modern Psychological Monism

The modern conclusion that the mind is what the brain does; it is the sum of all neurochemical and electrical activity.

• Empiricism

The philosophical belief that the mind is a tabula rasa (blank slate) and that all knowledge comes from sensory experience and observation.

• Nativism

The belief that certain types of knowledge, capacities, skills, or abilities are innate, hard-wired into the brain at birth, and biological.

• Structuralism

A historical movement associated with Wilhelm Wundt and Edward Titchener aimed at breaking down immediate conscious experiences into their smallest basic units or constituent elements.

• Systematic Introspection

The primary method used in Structuralism to examine one's own conscious experience.

• Functionalism

A movement influenced by Charles Darwin that focuses on understanding the purpose and evolutionary utility of a behavior or mental process.

• Behaviorism

A movement associated with John B. Watson and B. F. Skinner that discards all references to the conscious mind to focus purely on objective, observable actions.

• Cognitive Revolution

A psychological movement that emphasizes studying internal mental contents by conceptualizing the mind as a computer information-processing system.

• Psychoanalysis

A perspective developed by Sigmund Freud, asserting that psychological distress and problems originate from unconscious conflicts and deterministic pathology.

• Humanistic Psychology

A movement led by Carl Rogers and Abraham Maslow emphasizing conscious awareness, personal free will, inherent goodness, and a drive toward self-actualization.

• Natural Selection

An evolutionary process requiring heritable individual variation, where adaptive traits lead to higher reproductive fitness and changes in a population's genetic makeup.

• Directional Selection

The mode of natural selection that operates when environmental pressure favors a phenotypic trait at one extreme.

• Genotype

The inherited genetic makeup that dictates physical characteristics.

• Phenotype

The observable physical characteristic of an organism.

• Ultimate Explanations

Explanations that address why a behavior exists by mapping its functional development to natural selection over deep time.

• Proximate Explanations

Explanations that describe the immediate triggers or causes of a behavior, split into functional and process-oriented types.

• Proximate Functional Explanation

An explanation pointing to the immediate, real-world problem a behavior solves, or the situational needs it meets.

• Proximate Process-Oriented Explanation

An explanation uncovering the biological, cognitive, or physiological mechanisms that physically produce a behavior.

• Basic Research

A primary area of psychological work focused on discovering fundamental principles governing the mind and behavior.

• Applied Psychology

An area of psychology aiming to solve practical, real-world problems through applied research and environmental manipulation.

• Translational Research

A specific type of applied research that bridges the gap by developing practical solutions directly from foundational findings.

• Clinical Psychology

A specialized branch focused on identifying, diagnosing, preventing, and relieving severe psychological distress and dysfunction.

• Counseling Psychology

A branch focused on helping healthy populations navigate temporary, ongoing life stressors and developmental transitions.

• Psychiatrist

A medical doctor (M.D. or D.O.) specializing in mental illness who evaluates physical causes and focuses primarily on pharmacotherapy (prescribing medications).

• Behavioral Genetics

The subfield that studies and links individual variations in behavior to genetic factors.

• Cognitive Psychology

The subfield focusing on mental information processing, including attention, perception, memory, and language.

• Developmental Psychology

The subfield that tracks changes in thoughts and behaviors across the human lifespan.

• Behavioral Neuroscience

The subfield mapping biological components and brain regions to their corresponding behavioral outcomes.

• Social Psychology

The subfield studying how the social environment shapes individual thoughts, feelings, and actions.

• Operational Definitions

Explicit statements defining exactly how a variable will be measured to prevent subjectivity in research.

• Naturalistic Observation

A descriptive method involving observing and recording behavior as it occurs naturally in genuine environments without manipulation.

• Participant Observation

A strategy where a researcher embeds themselves directly into the group being studied.

• Case Study

An intensive, detailed analysis targeting a singular individual or unique circumstance, often suffering from low generalizability.

• Survey

An efficient approach engineered to rapidly gather large quantities of descriptive data regarding populations' opinions, perspectives, or attitudes.

• Sample

A smaller subset selected from a population to statistically reflect the characteristics of the entire parent population.

• Sampling Error / Bias

The discrepancy that occurs if sample characteristics do not equal population characteristics, making conclusions invalid for the general population.

• Hawthorne Effect

A phenomenon where research subjects alter their behavior simply because they are aware they are being monitored.

• Independent Variable (IV)

The variable that the researcher actively manipulates to determine its causal effect.

• Dependent Variable (DV)

The outcome or behavior that is measured in response to the manipulation of the Independent Variable.

• Confounding Variable

An uncontrolled, extraneous variable that can invalidate causal conclusions in an experiment.

• Internal Validity

The degree to which an experiment accurately isolates the independent variable as the sole cause of observed changes, free of confounding variables.

• External Validity

The extent to which research findings can be generalized to real-world settings and diverse populations.

• Inclusion Criteria

Essential participant attributes required to address a research question meaningfully.

• Exclusion Criteria

Attributes that disqualify an individual from participating because they would interfere with addressing the research question.

• Placebo Effect

A psychological and chemical phenomenon occurring when a participant's positive expectations lead to real symptom relief.

• Mean

A measure of central tendency calculated by summing all scores and dividing by the total number of scores.

• Median

A measure of central tendency representing the exact middle score when data is ordered sequentially.

• Mode

A measure of central tendency representing the most frequently occurring value in a dataset.

• Standard Deviation (SD)

A statistic that quantifies the spread of data or the typical distance a score falls from the central mean.

• Normal Distribution

A symmetrical, bell-shaped curve where the mean, median, and mode are completely identical.

• Correlation Coefficient ($r$)

A metric ranging from $-1.0$ to $+1.0$ indicating the strength and direction of a relationship between two variables.

• Causation Fallacy

The mistaken belief that correlation implies causation, ignoring that a third variable may be responsible.

• Statistical Significance ($p < 0.05$)

A threshold indicating that an observed effect has less than a 5% probability of occurring by chance alone.