Psychology Sem 1

Intelligence

the ability to learn from experience, solve problems, and use knowledge to adapt to new situations.

General Intelligence

according to Spearman and others, underlies all mental abilities and is therefore measured by every task on an intelligence test.

Factor Analysis

a statistical procedure that identifies clusters of related items (called factors) on a test; used to identify different dimensions of performance that underlie a person’s total score.

Fluid Intelligence (Gf)

our ability to reason speedily and abstractly; tends to decrease with age, especially during late adulthood.

Crystallized Intelligence (Gc)

our accumulated knowledge and verbal skills; tends to increase with age.

Cattle-Horn-Carroll (CHC) Theory

the theory that our intelligence is based on g as well as specific abilities, bridged by Gf and Gc.

Savant Syndrome

a condition in which a person otherwise limited in mental ability has an exceptional specific skill, such as in computation or drawing.

Grit

in psychology, passion and perseverance in the pursuit of long-term goals.

Emotional Intelligence

the ability to perceive, understand, manage, and use emotions.

Intelligence Test

a method for assessing an individual’s mental aptitudes and comparing them with those of others, using numerical scores.

Achievement Tests

a test designed to assess what a person has learned.

Aptitude Tests

a test designed to predict a person’s future performance; the capacity to learn.

Mental Age

a measure of intelligence test performance devised by Binet; the level of performance typically associated with children of a certain chronological age. Thus, a child who does as well as an average 8-year-old is said to have a mental age of 8.

Stanford-Binet

the widely used American revision (by Terman at Stanford University) of Binet’s original intelligence test.

Intelligence Quotient (IQ)

defined originally as the ratio of mental age to chronological age multiplied by 100 (thus, ma/ca × 100). On contemporary intelligence tests, the average performance for a given age is assigned a score of 100.

Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale (WAIS)

the most widely used intelligence test; contains verbal and performance (nonverbal) subtests.

Psychometric

the scientific study of the measurement of human abilities, attitudes, and traits.

Standardization

defining uniform testing procedures and meaningful scores by comparison with the performance of a pretested group.

Normal Curve

a symmetrical, bell-shaped curve that describes the distribution of many types of data; most scores fall near the mean (about 68 percent fall within one standard deviation of it) and fewer and fewer scores lie near the extremes. (Also called a normal distribution.)

Flynn Effect

the rise in intelligence test performance over time and across cultures.

Reliability

the extent to which a test yields consistent results, as assessed by the consistency of scores on two halves of the test, on alternative forms of the test, or on retesting.

Validity

the extent to which a test or experiment measures or predicts what it is supposed to.

Content Validity

the extent to which a test samples the behavior that is of interest.

Construct Validity

how much a test measures a concept or trait.

Predictive Validity

the success with which a test predicts the behavior it is designed to predict; it is assessed by computing the correlation between test scores and the criterion behavior.

Cohort

a group of people sharing a common characteristic, such as from a given time period.

Growth Mindset

a focus on learning and growing rather than viewing abilities as fixed.

Fixed Mindset

the view that intelligence, abilities, and talents are unchangeable, even with effort.

Stereotype Threat

a self-confirming concern that one will be evaluated based on a negative stereotype.

Memory

the persistence of learning over time through the encoding, storage, and retrieval of information.

Recall

a measure of memory in which the person must retrieve information learned earlier, as on a fill-in-the-blank test.

Recognition

a measure of memory in which the person identifies items previously learned, as on a multiple-choice test.

Relearning

a measure of memory that assesses the amount of time saved when learning material again.

Encode

the process of getting information into the memory system — for example, by extracting meaning.

Store

the process of retaining encoded information over time.

Retrieve

the process of getting information out of memory storage.

Parallel Processing

processing multiple aspects of a stimulus or problem simultaneously.

Sensory Memory

the immediate, very brief recording of sensory information in the memory system.

Short-term memory

briefly activated memory of a few items (such as digits of a phone number while calling) that is later stored or forgotten.

Long Term Memory

the relatively permanent and limitless archive of the memory system; includes knowledge, skills, and experiences.

Working Memory

a newer understanding of short-term memory; conscious, active processing of incoming sensory information and information retrieved from long-term memory.

Central Executive

a memory component that coordinates the activities of the phonological loop and visuospatial sketchpad.

Phonological Loop

a memory component that briefly holds auditory information.

Visuospatial Sketchpad

a memory component that briefly holds information about objects’ appearance and location in space.

Neurogenesis

the formation of new neurons.

Long-term potentiation

an increase in a nerve cell’s firing potential after brief, rapid stimulation; a neural basis for learning and memory.

Explicit/declarative memories

retention of facts and experiences that we can consciously know and declare.

Effortful Processing

encoding that requires attention and conscious effort.

Automatic processing

unconscious encoding of incidental information and of well-learned information (such as word meanings).

Implicit/nondeclarative memories

retention of learned skills or classically conditioned associations independent of conscious recollection.

Iconic Memory

a momentary sensory memory of visual stimuli lasting no more than a few tenths of a second.

Echoic Memory

a momentary sensory memory of auditory stimuli; sounds and words can still be recalled within 3–4 seconds.

Chunking

organizing items into familiar, manageable units; often occurs automatically.

Mnemonics

memory aids that use vivid imagery and organizational devices.

Spacing Effect

the tendency for distributed study or practice to produce better long-term retention than massed practice.

Testing Effect

enhanced memory after retrieving rather than simply rereading information.

Shallow Processing

encoding on a basic level, based on the structure or appearance of words.

Deep Processing

encoding semantically, based on the meaning of words; tends to yield the best retention.

Semantic

explicit memory of facts and general knowledge; one of the two conscious memory systems.

Episodic

explicit memory of personally experienced events; one of the two conscious memory systems.

Hippocampus

a neural center in the limbic system that helps process explicit memories for storage.

Memory Consolidation

the neural storage of a long-term memory.

Flashbulb memories

a clear memory of an emotionally significant moment or event.

Priming

the activation (often unconscious) of certain associations, predisposing one’s perception, memory, or response.

Encoding specificity principle

the idea that cues and contexts specific to a particular memory will be most effective for recall.

Mood congruent

the tendency to recall experiences consistent with one’s current mood.

Serial Position Effect

our tendency to best recall the last items in a list initially and the first items after a delay.

Interleaving

a retrieval practice strategy involving mixing the study of different topics.

Anterograde Amnesia

an inability to form new memories.

Retrograde amnesia

an inability to remember information from one’s past.

Proactive interference

the forward-acting disruptive effect of older learning on the recall of new information.

Retroactive interference

the backward-acting disruptive effect of new learning on the recall of old information.

Repress

in psychoanalytic theory, the basic defense mechanism that banishes anxiety-arousing thoughts, feelings, and memories from consciousness.

Reconsolidation

a process in which previously stored memories, when retrieved, are potentially altered before being stored again.

Misinformation effect

when a memory becomes corrupted by misleading information.

Source amnesia

faulty memory for how, when, or where information was learned or imagined.

Deja Vu

the eerie sense that “I’ve experienced this before”; cues from the current situation may unconsciously trigger retrieval of an earlier experience.

Acoustic Encoding

Auditory events your mind processes

Visual Encoding

Visual events your mind processes

Semantic Encoding

Facts/events that your mind processes

Procedural

How memories are ordered chronologically

Clustering

Tend to remember similar/related items in groups - like grouping things that are together in a list of things, not meaningfully similar like chunking

Conceptual Hierarchies

Multi-level classification system based on properties of items

Context Dependent Memory

We remember info when in the same/similar environment as learned in

State Dependent Memory

Recall best when in similar mental state

Primacy Effect

Remember the first in a list

Recency Effect

Remember the last mentioned/end of list

Tip of the tongue phenomenon

Difficulty retrieving info, often a word, while having the feeing of knowing it

Imagination Inflation

When we repeatedly imagine something, increased confidence that it did happen

Cryptomnesia

Accidental plagiarism because of prior exposure (eg making a song similar to one you’ve heard before)

Reality Monitoring Issues

When we don’t know if a memory is real or imaginary

Critical Thinking

thinking that does not automatically accept arguments and conclusions. Rather, it examines assumptions, appraises the source, discerns hidden biases, evaluates evidence, and assesses conclusions.

Meta-Analysis

a statistical procedure for analyzing the results of multiple studies to reach an overall conclusion.

Hindsight Bias

the tendency to believe, after learning an outcome, that one would have foreseen it. (Also known as the I-knew-it-all-along phenomenon.)

Peer Reviewers

scientific experts who evaluate a research article's theory, originality, and accuracy.

Statistically Significant

a statistical statement of how likely it is that a result (such as a difference between samples) occurred by chance, assuming there is no difference between the populations being studied.

Theory

an explanation using an integrated set of principles that organizes observations and predicts behaviors or events.

Hypothesis

a testable prediction, often implied by a theory.

Falsifiability

the possibility that an idea, hypothesis, or theory can be disproven by observation or experiment.

Effect Size

the strength of the relationship between two variables. The larger the ___ ___, the more one variable can be explained by the other.