AP Psych unit 5

Harry Harlow

development, contact comfort, attachment; experimented with baby rhesus monkeys and presented them with cloth or wire "mothers;" showed that the monkeys became attached to the cloth mothers because of contact comfort

Jean Piaget

Isolated 4 stages of cognitive development and identified key developmental phenomena in each stage.

Konrad Lorenz

researcher who focused on critical attachment periods in baby birds, a concept he called imprinting

Lev Vygotsky

psychologist who developed a theory of how Social learning tends to come before development. (opposite of Piaget)

Abraham Maslow

Humanistic psychologist who developed a theory of motivation that emphasized psychological (Hierarchy of Needs)-needs at a lower level dominate an individual's motivation as long as they are unsatisfied; self-actualization, transcendence

Erik Erickson

a theorist who believed that each stage of life had its own task to overcome. His psychosocial stages included the following: infancy, toddlerhood, preschool, elementary school, adolescence, young adulthood, middle adulthood, and late adulthood.

Lawrence Kohlberg

sought to describe the development of moral reasoning by posing moral dilemmas to children and adolescents, such as “Should a person steal medicine to save a loved one’s life?” He found stages of moral development.

Mary Ainsworth

developmental psychology; compared effects of maternal separation, devised patterns of attachment; "The Strange Situation": observation of parent/child attachment

Maturation

biological growth processes that enable orderly changes in behavior, relatively uninfluenced by experience. Ex: standing before walking, babbling before talking.

Habituation

is a psychological learning process wherein there is a decrease in response to a stimulus after being repeatedly exposed to it. This concept states that an animal or a human may learn to ignore a stimulus because of repeated exposure to it.

Rooting reflex

The tendency for an infant to move its mouth toward any object that touches its cheek.

Assimilate vs accommodate

Assimilation: Attempting to interpret new information within the framework of existing knowledge.

Accommodation: Making small changes to that knowledge in order to cope with things that don't fit those existing frameworks.

Attachment

an emotional tie with another person; shown in young children by their seeking closeness to the caregiver and showing distress on separation.

Imprinting

the process by which certain animals form attachments early in life, usually during a limited critical period.

Object permanence

the child's ability to understand that an object exists, even if we are not consciously aware of it. Babies reach this milestone around six to eight months.

Egocentrism

the tendency of an individual to focus their attention inward, concerned with how others will view themselves. At this stage of thinking, this age group is unable to understand other ways of thinking.

Theory of mind

a person's general understanding that the people around them each have their own unique beliefs, perceptions, and desires.

Conservation

a child's ability to recognize that the volume or amount of a substance or object does not change when its form or shape changes. This ability develops in the concrete operational stage around the age of 7 to 11 years old.

Adolescence

the transitory period from childhood to adulthood, generally beginning with puberty and extending into independent adulthood.

authoritarian parenting style

when parents merely impose rules and restrictions while expecting obedience. While they exert control, they do not explain or show reason. (e.g. "Don't interrupt" or "Why? Because I said so"). OUTCOME: children have poor communication skills and compare themselves with others

authoritative parenting style

the parents are nurturing, responsive, and supportive, yet set firm limits for their children. They attempt to control children's behavior by explaining rules, discussing, and reasoning. They listen to a child's viewpoint but don't always accept it. OUTCOME: children are socially competent, self-reliant, and socially responsible

permissive parenting style

parents are warm, but lax. They fail to set firm limits, to monitor children's activities closely or to require appropriately mature behavior of their children. OUTCOME: children raised by parents with this style tend to grow up without a strong sense of self-discipline.

uninvolved parenting style

parents are uninvolved in their child's life. children come to believe they are less important than other aspects of their lives. OUTCOME: children do not handle independence well, show poor self-control, are less competent socially.

Badura’s Bobo Doll experiment

study with the Bobo doll; showed that children who observed an adult being aggressive with an inflatable toy were more likely to show aggressive behaviors later on, compared to those who did not observe aggressive behavior.

Mirror Neurons

a type of brain cell that respond equally when we perform an action and when we witness someone else perform the same action.

Long-term potentiation

an increase in a cell's firing potential after brief, rapid stimulation; believed to be a neural basis for learning and memory.

Effects of modeled behavior

may teach a new behavior, influence the frequency of a previously learned behavior, or increase the frequency of a similar behavior.

Latent Learning

knowledge that only becomes clear when a person has an incentive to display it. For example, a child might learn how to complete a math problem in class, but this learning is not immediately apparent.

Insight learning

occurs when one suddenly realizes how to solve a problem. EX: when you are taking a test you happen upon a problem that you have no idea how to solve. Then all of a sudden, the answer comes to you.

Unconditioned Stimulus (UCS)

The stimulus that elicits an unconditioned response. EX: Pavlov began the experiment by giving the dogs their food. The food is the ______

Unconditioned Response (UCR)

The response elicited by an unconditioned stimulus without prior learning. EX: When Pavlov introduced to the food the dogs began to salivate, which is the _______

Conditioned Stimulus (CS)

A previously neutral stimulus that comes to elicit the conditioned response. Paired together with unconditioned stimulus. EX: Once Pavlovs dogs fully associate the food with the bell, then the dogs will salivate whenever the bell is rung. This makes the bell the ________

Conditioned Response (CR)

A response elicited by a previously neutral stimulus that has become associated with the unconditioned stimulus. If experiment is done right, Unconditioned response should be related/the same to conditioned response. EX: Pavlov's dogs, they had learned to associate the tone with being fed, and they began to salivate in anticipation of food. The dogs salivating is the ________

Acquisition

the learning period of a conditioned response (fear) when the unconditioned stimulus (noise) and the conditioned stimulus (violin) are being presented together. EX: imagine that you want to teach a rat to fear the sound of a cat hissing. You might start pairing the sound of a hissing cat with a loud bang. The loud bang will naturally lead to a fear response in the rat.

Extinction

Weakening of a conditioned association in the absence of an unconditioned stimulus or reinforcer. EX: Imagine that you taught your dog to shake hands. Over time, the trick became less interesting. You stop rewarding the behavior and eventually stop asking your dog to shake. Eventually, the response becomes extinct, and your dog no longer displays the behavior.

Spontaneous recovery

Reappearance of an extinguished conditioned response after a time delay. EX: Being afraid of something and then seeing it later brings fear.

Generalization

the tendency to respond in the same way to different but similar stimuli. EX: someone can have a negative or traumatic experience with a dog and then generalize that fear to other dogs.

Discrimination

negative behavior toward different groups. EX: Only ordering a dish at one restaurant because you know that other restaurants don't offer that same menu item.

Trial & error learning

when you try to solve a problem multiple times using multiple methods. EX: If someone is presented with five light switches, they might try each one until they find the correct one.

Skinner box

is a laboratory apparatus used to study animal behavior within a compressed time frame. EX: if a rat scratches the walls of the box, a loud noise or a bright light may shine, thus creating a negative consequence of the bad behavior.

Positive reinforcer

Any pleasant stimulus rewarded after a desired behavior. EX: after a dog successfully completes a trick, such as rolling over, we might present the dog with a tasty treat.

Negative reinforcer

is the idea of taking away an unwanted stimulus in order to encourage good behavior. EX: You take away your child's chores for the weekend because they kept their room clean all week.

Positive punishment

adding an aversive stimulus after an unwanted behavior to discourage a person from repeating the behavior. EX: Adding spankings and chores

Omission training (negative punishment)

a method in behaviorism used to stop undesirable behaviors. EX: A dog trainer stops a dog jumping up by getting it to sit when it is excited and then wait until they are told they can stand

Continuous reinforcement

Reinforcement schedule in which all correct responses are reinforced. EX: a reward given to an animal every time they display a desired behavior.

Partial reinforcement

Reinforcing a response only part of the times; results in slower acquisition of a response but much greater resistance to extinction than continuous reinforcement. EX: if a child expects a gift every time they get an A on their homework, they may lose excitement for gifts because the stimulus response becomes an expectation rather than a treat.

Fixed ratio

Rewards appear after a certain set number responses. EX: factory workers getting paid after every 10 cases of a product are completed.

Fixed interval

Rewards appear after a certain fixed amount of time, regardless of number of responses. EX: Weekly or monthly paychecks.

Variable ratio

Rewards appear after a certain number of responses, but it varies from trial to trial. EX: Slot machines, they pay off but you don't know when, extremely powerful reinforcement and it is addicting.

Variable interval

Rewards appear after a certain amount of time, but that amount varies from trial to trial. EX: random visits from the boss who delivers a praise