AP Psych final

Ivan pavlov

Pavlov is famous for classical conditioning. He studied dogs and noticed they began salivating before food arrived because they associated certain cues, like a bell or lab assistant, with food. His work showed that learning can happen through association.

Key study: Pavlov’s dogs
Branch: Behaviorism / learning

Important terms connected to him:
Unconditioned stimulus = food
Unconditioned response = salivation naturally caused by food
Neutral stimulus = bell before learning
Conditioned stimulus = bell after learning
Conditioned response = salivating to the bell

Mary Ainsworth

Ainsworth studied attachment between infants and caregivers. She created the Strange Situation experiment, where a baby’s reaction to a caregiver leaving and returning was observed.

Attachment types:

• Secure attachment: child is upset when caregiver leaves but comforted when they return.

• Avoidant attachment: child seems emotionally distant and avoids caregiver.

• Anxious/ambivalent attachment: child is very distressed and may resist comfort.

• Disorganized attachment: child shows confused or fearful behavior.

Branch: Developmental psychology

Solomon Asch

Asch studied conformity, which is when people change their behavior or answer to match a group. His famous study involved line lengths. Participants often gave the wrong answer because everyone else in the group did.

Key idea: People may conform even when they know the group is wrong.

Branch: Social psychology

Albert Bandura

Bandura is known for observational learning and social learning theory. He believed people can learn by watching others, not just through rewards and punishments.

Famous study: Bobo doll experiment
Children watched adults act aggressively toward a doll, then copied the aggressive behavior.

Key idea: We learn by modeling others.

Branch: Learning / social-cognitive psychology

Noam Chomsky

Chomsky argued that humans are born with an innate ability to learn language. He disagreed with behaviorists who believed language was only learned through reinforcement.

Key idea: Language acquisition device — the brain is naturally prepared to learn language.

Branch: Cognitive psychology / language

Hermann Ebbinghaus

Ebbinghaus studied memory using nonsense syllables. He created the forgetting curve, which shows that we forget information quickly at first, then forgetting slows down over time.

Key idea: Rehearsal helps memory last longer.

Branch: Cognitive psychology / memory

Erik erikson

Erikson created the 8 stages of psychosocial development. Each stage has a conflict a person must resolve.

Infancy	0–1 yr	Trust vs. Mistrust	Reliable care → trust; neglect → mistrust
2. Toddler	1–3 yrs	Autonomy vs. Shame & Doubt	Independence → autonomy; overcontrol → shame
3. Preschool	3–6 yrs	Initiative vs. Guilt	Taking initiative → confidence; criticism → guilt
4. School Age	6–12 yrs	Industry vs. Inferiority	Success in school/tasks → competence; failure → inferiority
5. Adolescence	12–18 yrs	Identity vs. Role Confusion ⭐	Develop personal identity; failure → role confusion
6. Young Adult	18–40 yrs	Intimacy vs. Isolation	Form close relationships or experience loneliness
7. Middle Adult	40–65 yrs	Generativity vs. Stagnation	Contribute to society/family or feel unproductive
8. Older Adult	65+ yrs	Integrity vs. Despair	Reflect with satisfaction or regret

Sigmund freud

Freud founded psychoanalysis. He believed unconscious thoughts, childhood experiences, and inner conflicts affect behavior.

Personality parts:

• Id: instinctual desires; wants pleasure now.

• Ego: realistic part; balances id and superego.

• Superego: moral conscience.

Key methods: free association, dream analysis
Branch: Psychodynamic psychology

Lawrence Kohlberg

Preconventional Morality (Children)

• Stage 1: Obedience & Punishment – Avoid punishment.

• Stage 2: Self-Interest (Instrumental) – Do what's rewarded or benefits you ("What's in it for me?").

Conventional Morality (Most adolescents & adults)

• Stage 3: Good Boy/Good Girl – Seek approval; want others to think you're "good."

• Stage 4: Law & Order – Follow rules and laws to maintain social order.

Postconventional Morality (Few adults reach this)

• Stage 5: Social Contract – Laws are important but can be changed to protect people's rights.

• Stage 6: Universal Ethical Principles – Follow personal moral principles (justice, equality, human rights), even if they conflict with laws.

Elizabeth Loftus

Loftus studied memory distortion and false memories. She showed that memories can be changed by misleading questions.

Example: People estimated higher speeds when asked how fast cars were going when they “smashed” instead of “hit.”

Key idea: Eyewitness testimony can be unreliable.

Branch: Cognitive psychology / memory

Abraham Maslow

Maslow created the hierarchy of needs. He believed people must satisfy basic needs before reaching higher psychological growth.

Order:

1. Physiological needs

2. Safety

3. Love/belonging

4. Esteem

5. Self-actualization

Branch: Humanistic psychology

Jean Paiget

• Branch: Developmental Psychology

• Known for: 4 Stages of Cognitive Development

• Believed children actively build knowledge using schemas, assimilation, and accommodation.

Stage	Age	Key Characteristics
1. Sensorimotor	Birth–2 yrs	Learn through senses & movement; develop object permanence (objects still exist when out of sight).
2. Preoperational	2–7 yrs	Symbolic thinking, language develops; egocentrism (can't see others' perspectives); lack conservation.
3. Concrete Operational	7–11 yrs	Logical thinking about concrete objects; understand conservation, reversibility, classify objects.
4. Formal Operational	12+ yrs	Abstract thinking, hypothetical reasoning, problem-solving, scientific thinking.

Carl Rogers

Rogers was a major humanistic psychologist. He believed people need acceptance, empathy, and genuineness to grow.

Key idea: Unconditional positive regard — accepting someone without judgment.

Therapy style: client-centered therapy

Branch: Humanism

Stanley Milgram

Milgram studied obedience to authority. Participants were told to give electric shocks to another person. Many obeyed, even when they thought they were hurting someone.

Key idea: People may obey authority even when it conflicts with morals.

Branch: Social psychology

David Rosenhan

Rosenhan studied psychiatric diagnosis. In his famous study, healthy people pretended to hear voices and were admitted to mental hospitals. Once inside, they acted normal, but staff still interpreted their behavior as symptoms.

Key idea: Labels can strongly affect how people are treated.

Branch: Abnormal psychology

Hans Selye

Selye studied stress and created the General Adaptation Syndrome.

Stages:

1. Alarm: body reacts to stress.

2. Resistance: body tries to cope.

3. Exhaustion: body becomes worn down.

Branch: Health psychology

BF skinner

Skinner studied operant conditioning, which is learning through consequences.

Key ideas:

• Reinforcement increases behavior.

• Punishment decreases behavior.

• Used the Skinner box with rats or pigeons.

Branch: Behaviorism

Roger sperry

Sperry studied split-brain patients. He researched people whose corpus callosum had been cut to reduce seizures.

Key idea: The left and right hemispheres have different strengths.

Branch: Biological psychology / neuroscience

David Wechsler

Wechsler created intelligence tests, including the WAIS and WISC.

Key idea: Intelligence includes different abilities, not just one score.

Branch: Testing / intelligence

Young HelmHoltz

The Young-Helmholtz theory explains color vision. It says the eye has three types of cones: red, green, and blue.

Key idea: Different combinations of cone activation allow us to see colors.

Branch: Sensation and perception

Wilhelm Wundt

Wundt is often called the father of psychology. He created the first psychology laboratory in 1879.

He studied conscious experience using introspection, where people reported their thoughts and sensations.

Branch: Structuralism / early psychology

Phineas Gage

Phineas Gage survived an accident where a metal rod went through his frontal lobe. Afterward, his personality changed.

Key idea: The frontal lobe is important for personality, impulse control, and decision-making.

Branch: Biological psychology

Paul Brocs

Broca discovered Broca’s area, a part of the brain involved in speech production.

Damage causes Broca’s aphasia, where a person understands language but struggles to speak.

Branch: Biological psychology / language

Absolute Threshold

The minimum amount of stimulation needed to detect something 50% of the time.

Example: The quietest sound you can hear half the time.

Amygdala

A brain structure in the limbic system involved in fear, aggression, and emotional memory.

PTSD

Post-traumatic stress disorder. A disorder that can happen after trauma. Symptoms include flashbacks, nightmares, avoidance, anxiety, and hypervigilance.

OCD

Obsessive-compulsive disorder. A disorder involving unwanted thoughts called obsessions and repetitive behaviors called compulsions.

Example: Fear of germs → repeated handwashing.

Assimilation

Using an existing schema to understand new information.

Example: A child calls a zebra a “horse” because it fits their horse schema.

Accomidation

Changing a schema because new information does not fit.

Example: The child learns that zebras are different from horses.

cerbellum

8. Cerebellum

Part of the brain involved in balance, coordination, and movement.

cerebral cortex

The outer layer of the brain. It handles higher thinking, language, memory, perception, and voluntary movement.

double blind study

An experiment where neither the participants nor the researchers know who is in the treatment or placebo group.

forgetting curve

Ebbinghaus’s idea that memory fades quickly at first, then more slowly over time.

free association

A psychoanalytic technique where a person says whatever comes to mind. Freud used it to reveal unconscious thoughts.

extinction

When a learned response weakens or disappears.

Classical conditioning example: Bell rings many times without food → dog stops salivating.

Operant conditioning example: Behavior no longer gets rewarded → behavior decreases.

ID

Freud’s instinctual part of personality. It follows the pleasure principle and wants immediate satisfaction.

Humanism

A psychological approach that focuses on free will, personal growth, self-worth, and human potential.

Major people: Maslow and Rogers.

Hypothesis

A testable prediction.

Example: “Students who sleep 8 hours will score higher than students who sleep 4 hours.”

Locus of control

A person’s belief about what controls their life.

Internal locus: “My actions affect outcomes.”
External locus: “Luck, fate, or other people control outcomes.”

Neurotransmitter

Chemical messengers that carry signals between neurons.

Examples:

• Dopamine: reward, movement

• Serotonin: mood

• Acetylcholine: memory, muscle movement

• GABA: calming

• Glutamate: learning and memory

Limbic system

A group of brain structures involved in emotion, memory, and motivation.

Includes: amygdala, hippocampus, hypothalamus.

Psychoanaylsis

Freud’s theory and therapy method focused on the unconscious mind, childhood experiences, and internal conflict.

depressent

A drug that slows down the central nervous system.

Examples: alcohol, sedatives, tranquilizers.

REM sleep

A sleep stage where dreaming is most vivid. Brain activity is high, eyes move rapidly, and muscles are mostly paralyzed.

Schema

A mental framework used to organize and interpret information.

Example: Your idea of what a “school” is.

Schizophrenia

A severe psychological disorder involving distorted thinking, hallucinations, delusions, disorganized speech, and sometimes flat affect.

Serial position effect

The tendency to remember the first and last items in a list best.

Primacy effect: remember the beginning.
Recency effect: remember the end.

Social loafing

People put in less effort when working in a group than when working alone.

working memory

The part of memory that temporarily holds and manipulates information.

Example: remembering a phone number long enough to type it.

systematic desentiation

A therapy for phobias that gradually exposes someone to a feared object while they stay relaxed.

Example: Fear of dogs → look at pictures, watch dogs, stand near a dog, pet a dog.

unconsious

Thoughts, memories, and desires outside awareness that may still influence behavior.

Freud focused heavily on this.

validity

Whether a test measures what it is supposed to measure.

Example: A math test should measure math ability, not reading ability.

traits

Stable personality characteristics.

Examples: introversion, kindness, openness, anxiety.

sterotype

A generalized belief about a group of people.

Example: assuming someone acts a certain way because of their group identity.

G factor

Spearman’s idea of a general intelligence factor that influences performance on many mental tasks.

Homestatis

The body’s tendency to maintain internal balance.

Example: sweating when hot, shivering when cold.

Flashbulb memory

A vivid memory of an emotional or important event.

Important: It feels very accurate, but it can still be wrong.

SSRI

Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor. A type of antidepressant that increases serotonin availability in the brain.

Examples: Prozac, Zoloft, Lexapro.

Top down processing

Using prior knowledge or expectations to interpret sensory information.

Example: Reading messy handwriting because you know the context.

bottom up processing

Processing that starts with sensory details and builds up to perception.

Example: Seeing lines and colors before recognizing a face.

webers law

The idea that the noticeable difference between two stimuli depends on a proportion, not a fixed amount.

Example: Adding 1 pound to 10 pounds is noticeable, but adding 1 pound to 100 pounds may not be.

schedules of reinforcement

Fixed Ratio

Reward after a set number of responses.

Example: A coffee shop gives a free drink after 10 purchases.

Variable Ratio

Reward after an unpredictable number of responses.

Example: Gambling or slot machines.

Strongest schedule because people keep trying.

Fixed Interval

Reward after a set amount of time.

Example: Weekly paycheck.

Variable Interval

Reward after an unpredictable amount of time.

Example: Checking your phone for notifications.

parts of the brain

Frontal Lobe

Decision-making, planning, personality, impulse control, voluntary movement.

Parietal Lobe

Touch, pressure, pain, temperature, spatial awareness.

Occipital Lobe

Vision.

Temporal Lobe

Hearing, language comprehension, memory.

Brainstem

Basic survival functions like breathing and heartbeat.

Thalamus

Sensory relay station.

Hypothalamus

Hunger, thirst, body temperature, hormones.

Hippocampus

Memory formation.

Amygdala

Fear and emotion.

Cerebellum

Balance and coordination.

hemisphrers of the brian

Left Hemisphere

Usually stronger in language, logic, speech, and analytical thinking.

Right Hemisphere

Usually stronger in spatial skills, facial recognition, creativity, and emotional tone.

Corpus Callosum

Connects both hemispheres so they can communicate.

sleep cycle

Sleep goes through stages in cycles about every 90 minutes.

NREM-1

Light sleep. You may feel like you are falling.

NREM-2

Sleep spindles. Body slows down.

NREM-3

Deep sleep. Hard to wake up. Important for physical recovery.

REM Sleep

Dreaming, rapid eye movement, brain activity increases, body is mostly paralyzed.

hans selyes stress cycle

1. Alarm

Body detects stress. Fight-or-flight activates.

2. Resistance

Body tries to cope and stay alert.

3. Exhaustion

Long-term stress drains the body and increases risk of illness.

classical conditioning identifying key parts

Example: Pavlov’s dogs

Before conditioning:

• Food = unconditioned stimulus

• Salivation to food = unconditioned response

• Bell = neutral stimulus

During conditioning:

• Bell + food together

After conditioning:

• Bell = conditioned stimulus

• Salivation to bell = conditioned response

Parts of the neuron

Dendrites

Receive messages.

Cell Body / Soma

Contains the nucleus and keeps the neuron alive.

Axon

Sends messages away from the cell body.

Myelin Sheath

Speeds up neural impulses.

Axon Terminals

Release neurotransmitters.

Synapse

Gap between neurons.

Parts of the eye

Cornea

Protective outer covering that helps focus light.

Pupil

Opening where light enters.

Iris

Colored part that controls pupil size.

Lens

Focuses light onto the retina.

Retina

Contains rods and cones.

Rods

Detect black, white, and motion; useful in dim light.

Cones

Detect color and detail; work best in bright light.

Optic Nerve

Carries visual information to the brain.

Blind Spot

Where the optic nerve leaves the eye; no rods or cones there.

Fovea

Central point of sharpest vision.

types of intelligence tests

Wechsler Tests

Common intelligence tests. Includes WAIS for adults and WISC for children.

Stanford-Binet

Another major intelligence test based on IQ.

Achievement Tests

Measure what you have learned.

Example: final exam, SOL, AP test.

Aptitude Tests

Predict future performance.

Example: SAT or ACT.

Crystallized Intelligence

Learned knowledge.

Fluid Intelligence

Ability to solve new problems and think logically without relying on learned facts.

Bystandard effect

People are less likely to help when others are present.

Reason: Diffusion of responsibility — everyone assumes someone else will help.

Zimbardo

Zimbardo conducted the Stanford Prison Experiment. College students were assigned as guards or prisoners. The “guards” became cruel, showing how social roles and situations affect behavior.

Key idea: Situations can strongly influence behavior.

Branch: Social psychology

Theories of emotion

James-Lange Theory

Body reaction comes first, then emotion.

Example: I tremble, so I feel afraid.

Cannon-Bard Theory

Body reaction and emotion happen at the same time.

Example: I feel fear and my heart races at the same time.

Two-Factor Theory

Emotion = physical arousal + cognitive label.

Example: My heart is racing, and I label it as fear because I’m in danger.