AP Psychology Vocab

Behavior Genetics

The branch of genetics that examines the genetic and environmental contributions to personality characteristics and behavior

Behaviorism

A theoretical perspective that focuses on observable, quantifiable behavior and the relationships between behavior and environmental variables

Cognitive Perspective

The branch of psychology that deals with thought processes such as memory and language

Evolutionary Perspective

The study of evolution of behavior using the principles of natural selection

Functionalism

A movement in psychology led by William James in which consciousness was studied according to the functions it serves, rather than its structure

Gestalt

A school of psychology that believes individuals perceive objects and patterns as whole units and that the whole is more than the sum of its parts. They believed that behavior, perception, and all elements of the self must be viewed as a whole

Psychiatrist

Psychiatrists attend medical school first, then specialize in the mind, and often deal with the most serious mental disorders. They can prescribe drugs and are MDs

Psychodynamic Perspective

A neo-Freudian theoretical perspective that focuses on unconscious mental processes and the impact of early childhood experiences on later personality and behavior

Psychology

Psychologists may be involved in therapy, experimentation, or many other fields. They do graduate work in psychology and have master’s or doctoral degrees. Excepting some special cases, they cannot prescribe medication/

Psychology

The scientific study of behavior and mental processes

Structuralism

A movement in psychology, led by Wilhelm Wundt, that focused on analyzing conscious experience in terms of its fundamental structures.

Basic Research

Research that is conducted for the sake of knowledge itself, rather than to solve a specific or practical problem

Case Study

An in-depth study of a single person who has unusual characteristics. Case studies are often useful when a condition or characteristic is so rare that group experiments are not feasible

Clinical

The branch of psychology that deals with the diagnosis and treatment of psychological disorders

Confounding Variable

In an experiment, any variable other than the independent variable that creates differences between the experimental and control groups

Control Group

In an experiment, the group that does no receive the experimental treatment but is identical to that group in all other respects. Results from the experimental group are typically compared to those of the control group.

Correlation

The degree of relatedness between two sets of data

Data

Information gathered in the course of scientific study

Dependent variable

In an experiment, the variable that is measured to determine whether the independent variable had an effect

Double blind

A research design in which participants are given either the experimental treatment or a placebo, and neither the participants nor those administering the treatments know which participants are receiving with condition. This is commonly done in drug studies.

Ethics

In general, the scientific study of morality. In psychology, it refers to the codes of conduct for the profession, including research, teaching, and clinical work.

Experiment

A research design that features random assignment of subjects to experimental and control groups, at least on independent variable that is manipulated, and at least one dependent variable that is measured. It is the only research design in which cause-and-effect relationships can legitimately be determined.

Experimental condition or group

In an experiment, the group that is exposed to the independent variable

Independent Variable

The variable in an experiment that is manipulated by the experimenter to determine whether it has an effect on the dependent variable.

Informed consent

A procedure in which a potential research participant is fully informed of all risks and benefits of participating in the study before consenting to do so.

Observational Research

A way to do research in which careful, systematic observation in a natural environment is the main tool for data collection.

Operational definition

A concrete definition of a variable for the purposes of a particular experiment

Placebo

A treatment that resembles the experimental condition, but is intended to have no effect on the dependent variable. The most common example of this is a sugar pill used as a placebo in a drug study.

Population

The group of all possible individuals from which a sample could be chosen.

Pseudoscience

An activity that closely resembles science, but does not follow the principles of the scientific method.

Random assignment

In an experiment, every participant has an equal opportunity to be assigned to a particular group. Random assignment to groups is the hallmark of a “true experiment”

Random Selection

A method of sampling in which every member of a population has an equal chance of being selected for the sample

Representative

A sample that resembles the population of interest on variables that are identified as important.

Research design

A plan for how to conduct the scientific investigation, how the variables will be manipulated and/or measured, as well as how the data will be collected and analyzed.

Science

The pursuit of knowledge and understanding, using systematic methods of inquiry.

Skepticism

A philosophical approach that says that nothing can be known with absolute certainty. In general, it refers to a doubting or questioning attitude.

Survey

A method of research in which information is systematically gathered from a representative sample of a group on some variable of interest. The information can be gathered through interviews and/or the administration of questionnaires.

Theory

A coherent set of explanations for a phenomenon

Third Variable

A situation in which two variable are correlated, but neither one of them caused the other. They were both caused by another, different variable. If A and B are correlated, the C caused A and B

Bell Curve

Also called the normal curve. Many traits, including intellectual abilities, are said to be normally distributed, with roughly 68 percent of the distribution being within one standard deviation of the mean, and more than 90 percent being within two standard deviations of the mean.

Central Tendency

A general term for the midpoint, or center, of a distribution. Central tendency can be measured through the mean, median, or mode.

Descriptive Statistics

Statistics that provide information about the features of a particular sample.

Mean

The arithmetic average of all the scores in a distribution

Median

The middlemost score in a distribution

Mode

The most frequent score in a distribution

Negative (Inverse) Correlation

A relationship between two variables in which the values of one variable increase as the values of the other variable decrease

Percentile

The percentage of scores in a distribution that are below a particular score

Positive (Direct) Correlation

A relationship between two variable in which the values of one variable increase as the values of the other variable increase.

Standard deviation

A statistic that measures the variability, or degree of spread, of a distribution. It is calculated by taking the square root of the variance, or the average squared deviation scores from the mean.

Statistical significance

A condition in which the difference between the experimental and control group is so large that it is unlikely to have occurred by chance alone.

Variable

Anything that can take on any of a number of values

Variance

A statistic that measures the variability, or degree of spread, in the distribution. It is calculated by taking the average squared deviation of scores from the mean.

Z-score

A standardized score with a mean of 0 and a standard deviation of 1. Scores in the distributions of two different measures, such as measure of IQ and a measure of reading comprehension, are often converted to z-scores so that the distributions can be easily compared with one another.