ap psych unit 1b

What is consciousness?

Varying levels of awareness of thoughts, feelings, behaviors, and events in internal/external world

What are some levels of consciousness?

Sleep, awake, hypnosis, psychoactive drugs, meditation, daydreaming

What perspective emerged studying the structure of consciousness in the 1960s?

Humanist

What are receptors used for?

To detect stimulus from sensory organs 

What are the 7 different senses?

Vision, smell, taste, touch, hearing, balance, movement

Also olfaction (smell), gustation (taste), audition (hearing), vestibular (balance) and kinesthetic (movement)

What are the internal and external factors that influence perception?

Internal - prior expectations (top down)

External - sensory info (bottom up)

What is absolute threshold?

The minimum amount of energy a sense organ can detect at least 50% of the time

What is the just noticeable/difference threshold?

Smallest change in energy the sense organ can detect at least 50% of the time 

What is sensory adaptation?

Continuous stimulation = less sensitive receptors

What is sensory habituation?

Frequent stimulation = less sensitive receptors

What is the Weber-Fechner Law?

Amount of difference needed to detect change depends on the original intensity

What is subliminal/subthreshold?

Energy that cannot be detected by a sense organ W

What is accomodation?

Visual stimuli are focused on the retina by the lens changing shape

What do rods do?

See in low light, black and white, peripheral vision, movement and shapes

What do cones do?

Color vision, detail, centered in the fovia

Where does transduction occur? 

Retina

What is the blind spot?

The place where the optic nerve connects to the eye so there are no rods or cones

What is the order in which light waves go through the eye?

First cornea, then pupil (size controlled by iris), then lens, then retina 

How does the retina work?

First rods and cones, then bipolar cells, then ganglion cells 

What is the trichromatic theory?

3 types of cone receptors respond to primary wavelengths

What is the opposing-process theory?

Explains afterimages as a result of ganglion cells in the retina being turned on/off by opposing colors (red v. green, yellow v. blue)

Wha is color vision deficiency/colorblindness?

Damage or irregularities to one or more cones or ganglion cells - ex. dichromatism or monochromatism

What is sensory interaction?

Sensory systems work together (ex. mcgurk effect)

What is the cochlea?

Converts sound waves into electrical impulses; snail shaped, like the retina to light waves

In what order do sound waves go through the ear?

(Pinna), (eardrum w/ ossicles, eustachian tube), then (cochlea w/ fuzzy basilar membrane/hair cells, semi-circular canals)

What does wavelength/frequency of a light wave determine? Amplitude?

Hue/color // Brightness 

What is blindsight?

When someone has primary vision damage they can still respond to visual stimuli without being aware of seeing them 

What is prosopagnosia?

Face blindness

What is the fovea?

Located in center of retina - provides sharpest vision, has cones

What does frequency/wavelength of a wave determine?

Pitch - higher frequency = higher pitch (or the other way - shorter wavelength = higher pitch)

What does amplitude of wave determine?

Volume/brightness of a sound

Where is the auditory cortex located?

Temporal lobes near your ears 

What is conductive deafness?

Hearing impairedness because no sound waves travel from outer to inner ear - physical obstruction in outer ear

What is sensorineural deafness?

Hearing impairedness in inner ear b/c nerve damage = no transduction = treat using cochlear implant

Wha tis the place theory of audition?

Different pitches come from stimulating different areas in the basilar membrane - best explains high pitches

What is the frequency theory of audition?

Different pitch comes from different RATES of neural impulses going up auditory nerve - best for lower pitches 

What is the volley theory of audition?

Neurons take turns firing for high frequency sounds to overcome refractory periods

What is the perceptual set?

Your expectations prep you to perceive things a certain way

What is schema?

Preconceived ideas your brain uses to perceive/interpret new information

What are context effects?

Environmental influence on the way you perceive a stimulus

What is attention?

Interaction of sensation and perception

What is selective attention?

Tendency to focus on one part of environment while ignoring other stimuli - ex. cocktail party effect

What is inattentional blindness?

If you’re focused on something else then you don’t notice something unexpected in your visual field

What is change blindness?

Individuals don’t notice changes in visual stimulus even when visible

What is transduction?

Sensory stimuli → neural signals (retina in eyes, cochlea in ears)

What is bottom-up processing?

Taking sensory cues to perceive something

What is top-down processing?

You know what it is so you interpret it that way - previous context clues

What is priming?

Previous exposure puts something into your preconscious so it influences response to a later stimulus

What is the McGurk Effect?

Visual cues can influence auditory processing

What are the different taste receptors?

Sweet, sour, salty, bitter, umami, oleogustus

What is synesthesia?

One sensory pathway leads to automatic stimulation of another - ex. tasting colors, seeing sounds, etc. 

What are the three types of tasters?

Supertasters, medium tasters, nontasters - determined by # of receptors on the tongue

What is the only sense not processed in the thalamus?

Smell/olfaction

What chemical messengers are used for smell?

Pheromones

Where are the receptors for kinesthesis?

Muscles, tendons, ligaments

What is kinesthesis?

Sense of one’s body movements - allows body to move in coordinated ways without having to look at the body parts moving

What is the vestibular system?

Balance, gravity, accelerations of heads

Where are the receptors for the vestibular system?

Semi-circular canals 

What are the three touch receptors?

Pressure, pain receptors (nociceptors), and temperature (activate warm + cold = hot)

What is the gate control theory?

Emotional/psychological factors affect whether the gate is open or closed - involves either attention OR sensation

What is the phantom limb sensation?

Embodied cognition - pain where a lost limb used to be

What is the circadian rhythm?

internal 24-hr clock - messed up by jet lag & shift work 

What is the suprachiasmatic nucleus?

Regulates circadian rhythm 

What are NREM stages 1-3?

1. light sleep, hypnogogic jerks

2. memory, sleep spindles

   1. deep sleep, repairing/regrowing tissues, delta waves

What is REM sleep?

paradoxical sleep - mimics brain waves of wakefulness but asleep, dreaming, memory

What are k=complexes?

Waves observed in sleep on an EEG

What is REM rebound?

after sleep deprivation or stress the body wants to keep going back to REM sleep 

What is the physiological theory of dreaming? hint. physiological = body

Dreaming is to develop/reserve neural pathways, dreams are meaningless/random pons activity

What is the activation-synthesis theory of dreaming? hint. synthesis = putting things together

Dreaming is brain making sense of random action potentials, the way it organizes things into stories is meaningful.

What is the consolidation theory of dreaming?

Dreaming is to process the day’s information - brain goes through them in changing iterations W

What is insomnia?

Inability to fall asleep, stay asleep, wake up too early - must last for 3 months or more to be diagnosed

What is narcolepsy?

Brain can’t regulate sleep-wake cycles = excessive daytime sleepiness & sudden sleep attacks

What is REM sleep behavior disorder?

Acting out dreams during REM

What is sleep apnea?

Interruptions in breathing during sleep 

What is somnambulism?

sleepwalking