Psychology Comprehensive Review: Thinking, Intelligence, Introduction to Psychology, and Memory

Vocabulary flashcards covering core concepts in Cognition, Language, Problem Solving, Intelligence, Methods of Psychology, Historical Perspectives, Subfields, and Memory Systems from PSYC lecture notes.

Cognition

The process of thinking, including how we integrate, organize, and utilize conscious cognitive experiences such as perception, knowledge, problem-solving, judgment, language, memory, and planning.

Concept

A mental category or grouping of objects, events, or activities that share common characteristics or attributes.

Artificial Concept

A concept formed by learning specific, strict rules or features that define it, such as a triangle being defined by having $3$ sides and $3$ angles.

Natural Concept

A concept formed through direct or indirect real-world experience, defined by a general and flexible set of characteristics (e.g., birds, fruit, snow).

Prototype

The single best example or representation of a category or concept (e.g., imagining a Golden Retriever when thinking of a dog).

Schema

A mental collection of related concepts that organizes information to allow the brain to work more efficiently by automatically making assumptions.

Role Schema

A set of mental expectations and assumptions about how individuals in specific social roles are expected to behave.

Event Schema (Cognitive Script)

A mental representation of a routine set of behaviors or sequential actions, such as the steps involved in boarding an airplane.

Lexicon

The complete set of words and vocabulary belonging to a given language.

Grammar

The set of structural rules governing the organization of words to convey meaningful information in a language.

Phoneme

The basic, smallest distinctive sound unit of a spoken language (e.g., the word "bat" consists of $3$ phonemes).

Morpheme

The smallest unit of language that carries individual meaning (e.g., prefixes like "pre-" or words like "bat").

Semantics

The linguistic process by which meaning is derived from morphemes, words, and sentences.

Syntax

The rule system determining how words are properly organized into grammatical sentences.

Pragmatics

The practical and social aspects of verbal and nonverbal communication, including conversational turn-taking and cultural niceties.

Intonation

The speech rhythm, pitch, and emphasis used during communication that adds subtle layers of meaning, such as conveying sarcasm.

Critical Period

A specific developmental window early in life when the brain's capacity to naturally acquire language is at its peak.

Overgeneralization

The improper application of a general language rule to an irregular exception (e.g., a child saying "mouses" or "gooses").

Algorithm

A step-by-step problem-solving procedure or formula that guarantees a correct solution if followed exactly.

Heuristic

A general problem-solving framework or mental shortcut used to make efficient decisions.

Mental Set

A problem-solving barrier where a person persistently approaches a problem using a rigid method that worked previously but is ineffective for the current issue.

Functional Fixedness

A cognitive bias limiting a person to perceiving an object only in terms of its intended or traditional design use.

Anchoring Bias

The tendency to fixate disproportionately on a single initial piece of information when making decisions or estimating value.

Hindsight Bias

The false belief after an outcome has occurred that one foresaw or predicted it all along.

Confirmation Bias

The cognitive habit of actively searching for, interpreting, and remembering information that aligns with pre-existing beliefs while ignoring disconfirming evidence.

Representative Bias

The tendency to make faulty assumptions about an individual or event based on how closely they resemble a stereotypical category.

Availability Heuristic

Evaluating the frequency or likelihood of an event based on how easily recent or vivid examples come to mind.

g (General Factor)

Charles Spearman's concept of a single, underlying general intellectual ability factor that influences performance across all cognitive tasks.

Crystallized Intelligence

Raymond Cattell's term for accumulated knowledge, facts, and the ability to retrieve information gained through experience and education.

Fluid Intelligence

Raymond Cattell's term for the innate ability to reason abstractly, see complex relationships, and solve novel problems independently of acquired knowledge.

Triarchic Theory of Intelligence

Robert Sternberg's intelligence model dividing mental ability into three distinct domains: Practical (street smarts), Creative (innovation), and Analytical (academic evaluation).

Emotional Intelligence

The capacity to accurately identify, understand, manage, and regulate emotions in oneself and others, alongside showing empathy.

Cultural Intelligence

The capability to understand, relate to, and adapt effectively to the values, customs, and behaviors of different cultural groups.

Divergent Thinking

The creative process of generating multiple unique possibilities, ideas, or solutions to an open-ended problem.

Convergent Thinking

The cognitive process of narrowing down thoughts to arrive at a single, correct, or established solution to a problem.

Standardization

The method of testing where administration, scoring, and evaluation are kept uniform to guarantee reliable score comparison across test-takers.

Norming

Administering a test to a large, representative population to collect comparative baseline data across specific demographic groups.

Intelligence Quotient (IQ)

A standardized score derived from intelligence tests, where the population mean is set at $100$ with a standard deviation of $15$.

Range of Reaction

The theory stating that genetics set the upper and lower boundaries for an individual's potential intelligence, while environmental opportunities determine where within that range they fall.

Flynn Effect

The observed historical trend of rising average performance on standardized IQ tests worldwide over successive generations.

Method of Tenacity

A nonscientific way of acquiring knowledge by holding onto beliefs simply because they have always been believed or are backed by superstition, regardless of opposing facts.

Method of Intuition

Accepting information as facts based entirely on personal gut feelings or hunches without an objective validation process.

Method of Authority

Acquiring information by accepting answers provided by an assumed expert or authority figure in a field.

Rational Method

Seeking truth or establishing knowledge through logical reasoning by drawing conclusions from premise statements.

Method of Empiricism

Answering questions and acquiring knowledge through direct sensory observation or personal physical experience.

Scientific Method

A systematic approach to knowledge acquisition that combines formulation of testable hypotheses, planned observations, data collection, and continuous theory refinement.

Psychology

The scientific study of human and animal mental processes and observable behaviors.

Latent Construct

An internal psychological state or mental process—such as thoughts, feelings, or perceptions—that cannot be directly observed or measured.

Structuralism

An early school of psychology led by Wilhelm Wundt and Edward Titchener focused on breaking down conscious experience into its basic mental components using introspection.

Introspection

An experimental technique where trained subjects examine and describe their own conscious mental experiences as objectively as possible.

Functionalism

An early psychological perspective spearheaded by William James that examined how mental activities help an organism adapt and function within its environment.

Psychoanalytic Theory

Sigmund Freud's perspective attributing personality and mental health disorders to unconscious drives, repressed desires, and early childhood experiences.

Freud's Mental Iceberg

A structural model dividing the human mind into the conscious level (thoughts, perceptions), preconscious level (memories, stored knowledge), and unconscious level (fears, irrational wishes, immoral urges).

Gestalt Psychology

A psychological school emphasizing that sensory experiences are organized as a unified whole that is qualitatively different from the individual parts.

Behaviorism

A major perspective in psychology focused strictly on observing, measuring, and controlling external, overt behavior rather than unobservable conscious states.

Humanism

A psychological approach emphasizing human potential, personal growth, free will, and the drive toward self-actualization.

Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs

A motivational pyramid proposed by Abraham Maslow ranging from basic physiological needs at the base, up through safety, social, esteem, to self-actualization at the top.

Cognitive Revolution

A mid-20th century shift back to prioritizing research on internal mental functioning, inspired by advancements in linguistics, computer science, and neuroscience.

Feminist Psychology

An approach re-evaluating psychological research to remove historical male/Western biases, highlight female contributions, and study gender differences accurately.

Biopsychology

The study of how biological factors—including nervous system structures, genetics, and hormones—interact to produce behavior and cognitive processes.

Evolutionary Psychology

A subfield examining how universal human behaviors and mental processes evolved over time as natural adaptations for survival and reproduction.

Sensation

The physiological detection and entry of physical environment stimuli (sights, sounds, smells, touch) through sensory receptors.

Perception

The brain's psychological process of selecting, organizing, and interpreting sensory information based on experience, culture, and focus.

Developmental Psychology

The scientific study of biological, cognitive, moral, and social changes occurring across the human lifespan.

Five-Factor Model of Personality (OCEAN)

A framework identifying five broad personality dimensions: Openness, Conscientiousness, Extroversion, Agreeableness, and Neuroticism.

Industrial-Organizational (I-O) Psychology

The application of psychological concepts, principles, and research to improve performance, selection, safety, and well-being in workplace settings.

Forensic Psychology

A branch of applied psychology dealing with questions, mental competency assessments, and legal testimony within the judicial system.

Memory

The active cognitive system that encodes, stores, and retrieves sensory and learned information over time.

Paradox of Memory

The reality that the same adaptive cognitive mechanisms that make memory highly efficient also leave it vulnerable to distortion and errors.

Reconstructive Nature of Memory

The process by which the brain actively rebuilds past memories by combining stored information with current knowledge, expectations, and logic.

Attention

The initial cognitive process that acts as a filter to focus selective mental resources on specific environmental information.

Self-Reference Effect

The robust memory enhancement occurring when information is processed in a way that relates it directly to oneself.

Sensory Memory

A high-capacity, extremely brief initial storage system that holds raw sensory input for a fraction of a second to a few seconds.

Iconic Memory

Visual sensory memory that retains an exact visual image for roughly $1$ second before fading or being replaced.

Echoic Memory

Auditory sensory memory that holds heard sounds and speech for a duration of $2$ to $4$ seconds.

Short-Term Memory (STM)

The active memory system that holds a limited capacity ($7 \times 2$ or $7 \frac{+}{-} 2$ items) of un-rehearsed information for up to $30$ seconds.

Chunking

Organizing separate pieces of information into smaller, meaningful groups or acronyms to bypass short-term memory capacity limits.

Maintenance Rehearsal

The simple repetition of information in its original form to extend its duration in short-term memory.

Elaborative Rehearsal

A deeper memory strategy that connects new information to existing long-term knowledge by focusing on its meaning (semantics).

Serial Position Effect

The tendency to recall items presented at the beginning and end of a list more accurately than those presented in the middle.

Primacy Effect

The tendency to recall items at the start of a list due to extra rehearsal that transfers them into long-term memory.

Recency Effect

The tendency to recall items at the end of a list because they are still actively present in short-term memory.

Long-Term Memory (LTM)

The relatively permanent and virtually limitless storehouse of the memory system.

Declarative Memory (Explicit Memory)

The division of long-term memory involving conscious, intentional recollection of factual information and personal experiences.

Episodic Memory

A subtype of explicit declarative memory that stores personal autobiographical events and daily life experiences tied to specific times/places.

Semantic Memory

A subtype of explicit declarative memory containing general world facts, ideas, concepts, and vocabulary.

Procedural Memory (Implicit Memory)

Non-declarative long-term memory responsible for motor skills, habits, and conditioned responses that perform automatically without conscious thought.

Highly Superior Autobiographical Memory (HSAM)

An extraordinary condition in which individuals possess the ability to recall near-complete autobiographical detail for almost every day of their lives.

Hippocampus

A brain region within the limbic system crucial for consolidating short-term information into permanent long-term memory storage.

Long-Term Potentiation (LTP)

The persistent strengthening of synapses based on repetitive stimulation, marked by greater neurotransmitter release and dendrite growth.

Recall

A memory retrieval method requiring an individual to pull information out of long-term storage with minimal or no external cues.

Recognition

A memory retrieval process requiring an individual to correctly identify previously learned information when presented among choices.

Encoding Specificity

The principle stating that memory retrieval is enhanced when the context and environmental cues present during retrieval match those present during encoding.

State-Dependent Learning

Enhanced memory retrieval occurring when an individual's internal emotional or physiological state matches their state at the time of learning.

The Forgetting Curve

Hermann Ebbinghaus's model showing that memory decay occurs rapidly shortly after learning and then levels off over elapsed time.

Proactive Interference

A memory retrieval failure where previously learned older information blocks or interferes with the recall of newly learned information.

Retroactive Interference

A memory retrieval failure where newly acquired information blocks or interferes with the recall of older stored memories.

Anterograde Amnesia

The inability to form new long-term declarative memories following brain trauma or damage.

Retrograde Amnesia

The loss of access to events or memories that occurred prior to brain injury or trauma.