Psychology Flashcards

Flashcards for ATSI Psychology and other psychology topics.

WEIRD

Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich, and Democratic countries, from which 96% of psychology research participants originate, despite only representing 12% of the world's population.

Decolonising Methodologies

Book by Professor Linda Smith that discusses the differences between Western individualistic vs Indigenous collectivist cultures in research.

Confirmation Bias

The tendency to seek and interpret information in a way that confirms preexisting beliefs.

Naive Realism

Individuals believing that the world is what they individually interpret with their own perception and subjectivity.

Pseudoscience

Practices, beliefs, or claims presented as scientific but lacking empirical evidence, systematic observation, peer review, and the scientific method.

Occam's Razor

The simplest explanation is more likely to be correct.

Structuralism

An approach using introspection to map the structures of consciousness; pioneered by Edward Titchener and Wilhelm Wundt.

Functionalism

An approach using observation to discover the function of thoughts in adapting to one’s environment; associated with William James.

Behaviorism

An approach focusing on studying general learning principles/conditioning based on observable inputs/outputs; associated with John B Watson.

Psychoanalysis

An approach focusing on conscious/unconscious related processes influencing personality disorders; associated with Sigmund Freud.

Cognitivism

The study of mental processes (decision making, memory, perception) of people interpreting the same stimuli differently.

Psychological Assessment

The process of developing and using different tests, measures, and methods to understand cognitions, emotions and behaviour.

OCEAN

A model of personality traits: Openness to experience, Conscientiousness, Extraversion, Agreeableness, Neuroticism.

Simple Learning

Habituation, sensitisation- often is involuntary, doesn’t last long and is one biological system

General Learning

• Action/consequence (operant conditioning), event/consequence (classical conditioning) 

Specialised Learning

Imitation, Think/test/revise (cognitive learning), insight, language learning, imprinting

• limited to certain species

• usually time-constricted to certain developmental phases

Fluid Intelligence

Reasoning quickly on the fly, dependent on short-term memory, based on genetics, and less trainable.

Crystallized Intelligence

Applying long-term memory and prior knowledge, based on environment.

Validity

Whether the measurement of a construct achieves its set measure.

Reliability

If the results are consistent.

Standardization

If the process of measurement, scoring, and interpretation are consistent.

Fairness

If the process is fair, equal and unbiased.

Practicality

If the measure is feasible to administer.

Ethicality

If informed consent has been obtained.

Learning

The process of acquiring new information.

Habituation

Occurs when a repeated stimulation produces a smaller response each time.

Sensitization

Occurs when a repeated stimulation produces a greater response each time.

Insight Learning

Creating solutions to a problem.

Classical Conditioning

Action predicts a consequence.

Operant Conditioning

Event predicts a consequence.

Thorndike's Law of Effect

When a chance-based action leads to a positive consequence, the action will be more likely to occur in the future.

Shaping

A process where a behavior is incrementally reinforced by rewarding successive approximations of the desired behavior.

Extinction

An action that no longer relates to a consequence, leading to a reduction in behaviour.

Conditioned Stimulus

An event that triggers a learned reaction.

• The stimulus that you teach to react to

• The bell

Unconditioned Stimulus

A natural trigger, automatic.

• The meat

Conditioned Response

The learnt reaction.

• The drooling at the bell

Unconditioned Response

The natural reaction.

• The drooling at the meat

Intermittent reinforcement

• actions are not consistently followed by consequences

Fixed interval

occurs after a set time regardless of inputs

Variable Ratio

Reinforcement is delivered after an unpredictable number of responses (e.g., after 1, 4, 5, and 9 responses).

• Gambling

Fixed Ratio

occurs only after a fixed amount of inputs and a random time

Variable Interval

Fixed inputs random time- not predictable

Forensic Psychology

An umbrella term for the intersection between psychological theories, research, and knowledge with law in the civil and criminal justice system.

Criminal Psychology

Focuses on the study of crime and delinquency (theories of behaviour, reoffending, risk factors).

Investigative Psychology

Focuses on the criminal investigative process (profiling, eyewitness memory, lie detection).

Police Psychology

Focuses on the wellbeing and work of police officers.

Legal Psychology

Focuses on legal proceedings (witness testimony, jury decision- making, determining insanity).

Correctional Psychology

Focuses on offender rehabilitation and reintegration.

Cognitive Interview

A process that discourages the use of close-ended questions and encourages non-leading questions to improve eyewitness testimony.

Superior (Neuroanatomy)

Towards the head.

Inferior (Neuroanatomy)

Towards the feet.

Anterior (Neuroanatomy)

Front of the body.

Posterior (Neuroanatomy)

Back of the body.

Dorsal (Neuroanatomy)

Superior brain.

Ventral (Neuroanatomy)

Inferior brain.

Rostral (Neuroanatomy)

Anterior brain.

Caudal (Neuroanatomy)

Posterior brain.

Medial (Neuroanatomy)

Closer to the mid of the brain.

Lateral (Neuroanatomy)

Closer to the sides of the brain.

Frontal Lobe

Involved in motor function, problem solving, spontaneity, memory, language, initiation, judgment, impulse control, and social and sexual behavior.

Parietal Lobe

Deals with touch, pain, taste, and spatial perception.

Temporal Lobe

Involved with sensory input organisation.

Occipital Lobe

Deals with visual perception.

Personality

Refers to the enduring patterns of thought, feeling motivation, and behaviour that are expressed in different circumstances.

Temperament

The constellation of inborn traits that determine a child’s unique behavioral style and the way they experience/react to the world.

Nomothetic Approach

Identifies common ‘universal’ traits on a scale that can be compared to the average of the wider population to ascertain a personality.

Idiographic Approach

Focuses on the individual- how their unique characteristics create a complex and ungeneralizable personality.

Topographic Model (Freud)

Suggest a conscious mind, unconscious and preconscious that impact the body.

Drive Model (Freud)

Importance of key drives and their conflict with social norms (self- preserving: hunger, thirst, temperature or species-preserving: libido or death drive in conflict later).

Structural Model (Freud)

id (pleasure), superego (morals), ego (self).

Id

Concerned with the pleasurable, doesn’t understand ‘no’, impulsive, immediate gratification.

Superego

Concerned with the ideal, internalised moral principles from parents, responsible for self-imposed standards of behaviour.

Ego

Concerned with the actual, Works on the ‘reality principle’- balances the superego and id.

Defense Mechanisms

Unconcious mental processes that are used by the ego to shield one’s ego to protect from dangers.

Social Cognitive Theory

Emphasises personality development through experiences and patterns in response.

Schemas

A mental outline or framework of some aspect of experience based on memory.

Humanist Theory

Focuses on ‘phenomenology’ or the human experience - Meaning of life, sense of self, reaching one’s potential.

Efficacy

The ability of an intervention to produce a desired effect under highly controlled circumstances.

Psychopathology

The patterns of thoughts, feels or behaviour that disrupt functioning (abnormal mental health).

Mental Health

A state of emotional or social wellbeing where individuals cope with stresses of life.

Mental Disorder

Clinically recognisable symptoms that cause distress and impair functioning (more extreme than Mental Health Problems).

Social Psychology

The scientific study of how individuals think, feel, and behave in a social context.

Stigma

The shared beliefs about undesirable attitudes (having a devalued identity).

Prejudice

A hostile or negative attitude towards people in a distinguishable group based on their membership in that group.

Attitudes

Favourable or unfavorable evaluative reactions towards something.

Cognitive Dissonance

Feeling of discomfort caused by performing an action that is inconsistent with one’s attitudes.

Conformity

Having a change in behaviour or belief in accordance with others.

Nervous System

A network of cells that coordinate the functions of the body.

CNS

Consists of the brain and spinal cord.

PNS

Includes all of the nerves and ganglia outside the CNS.

Somatic Nervous System

Controls voluntary movement and sensory information, transmits signals between the CNS and skeletal muscles.

Autonomic Nervous System

Regulates involuntary functions such as heart rate, digestions, respiration, further divided into sympathetic and parasympathetic divisions.

Sympathetic Nervous System

Prepares the body for ‘flight or fight response’.

Parasympathetic Nervous System

Promotes the ‘rest and digest response’ to recover after stress.

Hypothalamus

Regulates psychological processes, including body temperature, hunger, thirst, sleep and the release of hormones from the pituitary gland.

Blood-Brain Barrier

Capillaries in the brain that prevent the passage of large or charged molecules, protecting the brain.

Grey Matter

Refers to the darker tissue of the brain and spinal cord composed of cell bodies and dendrites at the end of neurons.

White Matter

Contains mainly of axons covered in myelin, facilitates communication and transmission of signals.

Thalamus

Regulates and processes sensory information to control consciousness, sleep and alertness.

Neuron

Facilitate all the information and message flow in and out of the brain.