AP Psychology - Vocabulary Semester 1 Final

culture

the enduring behaviors, ideas, attitudes, technology, and traditions shared by a large group of people and transmitted from one generation to the next

Bio-Psycho-Social Perspective

emphasizes that biological, psychological (cognitive), and sociocultural factors combine and interact to produce behavior - including psychological disorders

Triangulation

comparison of at least two views or explanations of the same thing

Metacognition

thinking about thinking, assumptions, methods, goals

Schema

a concept or framework that organizes and interprets information

Framing

the way an issue or a question is posed; how an issue is framed can significantly affect decisions and judgments; 90% chance of living vs 10% chance of dying

Emotion

a response of the whole organism, involving 1) physiological arousal, 2) expressive behaviors, and 3) conscious experience

Reciprocity

the mutual or cooperative interchange of favors

Relative Deprivation

the perception that one is worse off relative to those with whom one compares oneself

Subjective Well-Being

self-perceived happiness or satisfaction with life, used along with measures of objective well-being (ex. physical/economic indicators) to evaluate people's quality of life

Adaptation-level Phenomenon

our tendency to form judgments (of sounds/lights/income) relative to a neutral level defined by prior experience

intrinsic motivation

a desire to perform behavior effectively for its own sake

Drive-Reduction Theory

the idea that a physiological need creates an aroused state (drive) that motivates an organism to satisfy the need

Homeostasis

A tendency to maintain a balanced or constant internal state; the regulation of any aspect of body chemistry, such as blood glucose, around a particular level

The Halo Error

overall evaluation on appearance or friendliness; one trait

Approach-approach conflict

occurs when we face 2 attractive alternatives and selecting one means losing the other

avoidance-avoidance conflict

occurs when we must choose between two undesirable alternatives

approach-avoidance conflict

involves being attracted to and repelled by the same goal

Displacement (defense mech.)

defense mechanism that redirects anger towards a safer outlet

Projection

defense mechanism by which people disguise their own threatening impulses by attributing them to others

Psychosexual stages

the childhood stages of development (oral, anal, phallic, latency, genital) during which, according to Freud, the id's pleasure-seeking energies focus on distinct erogenous zones

Trait

a characteristic of behavior or a disposition to feel and act, as obsessed by self-report inventories and peer reports

spotlight effect

overestimating others noticing and evaluating our appearance, performance, and blunder (as if we presume a spotlight shines on us)

passive-aggressive

a defense mechanism where the individual indirectly and unassertively expresses aggression towards another

Reciprocal Determinism

researched by Albert Bandura; the interacting influences between personality and environmental factors

External Locus of control

researched by Julian Rotter; the perception that chance or outside forces beyond one's personal control determine's one's fate

learned helplessness

researched by Marlin Seligman; the hopelessness and passive resignation an animal or human learns when unable to avoid repeated aversive events

The Big 5 Factors (OCEAN)

openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, neuroticism (emotional stability)

Regression

a defense mechanism in which an individual faced with anxiety retreats to a more infantile psychosexual stage, where some psychic energy remains fixated

Freud's Iceberg Model

consciousness, preconscious, unconscious/superego, ego, ID

Congruence

consistency between self-perceptions and experience

Self-efficacy

researched by Albert Bandura; beliefs concerning one's ability to perform the behaviors needed to achieve desired outcomes; your personal control

Working memory

a newer understanding of short-term memory that adds conscious, active processing of incoming auditory and visual information, and of information retrieved from long-term memory

Automatic Processing

unconscious encoding of incidental information, such as time, space, and frequency, and of well-learned information, such as word meanings

Spacing effect

the tendency for distributed study/practice to yield better long-term retention than is achieved through massed study or practice

serial position effect

our tendency to recall best the last (recency effect) and first (primary effect) items in a list

imagery

1. thoughts you can hear, see, smell, taste, or feel; includes memories, dreams, daydreams, plans, visions, fantasies

2. mental pictures, a powerful aid to effortful processing, especially when combined with semantic encoding

iconic memory

a momentary sensory memory of visual stimuli; a photographic or picture-image memory lasting no more than a few tenths of a second

long-term potentiation

an increase in a cell's firing potential after brief, rapid stimulations; a neural basis for learning and memory

explicit memory

retention of facts/experiences that one can consciously know and 'declare' (aka declarative memory

priming

the activation, often unconsciously, of certain associations, thus predisposing one's perception, memory, or response

proactive interference

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

retroactive interference

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

misinformation effect

occurs when misleading information has corrupted one's memory of an event

autobiographical memory

recollections of personally experienced events that make up the stories of our lives

overlearning

refers to continued rehearsal past the point of initial learning, and it significantly improves performance on memory tests

concept

a mental grouping of similar objects, events, ideas, or people

prototype

a mental image or best example of a category. Matching new items to this provides a quick and easy method for sorting items into categories (as when comparing feathered creatures to a prototypical bird, such as a robin)

algorithm

a methodical, logical rule or procedure that guarantees solving a particular problem. Contrasts with the usually speedier—but also more error-prone—use of heuristics

Heuristic

a simple thinking strategy that often allows us to make judgments and solve problems efficiently; usually speedier but also more error-prone than algorithms

confirmation bias

a tendency to search for information that supports our preconceptions and to ignore or distort contradicting evidence

functional fixedness

cognitive bias that limits a person to use an object only in the way it is traditionally used

Anchoring

the tendency to be influenced by a suggested reference point, pulling our response towards that point

loss aversion

researched by Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky; losing $100 produces a feeling of negativity that is more intense than the feelings of elation produced by a gain of $100

convergent thinking

conventional thinking; thinking directed toward a single correct solution

divergent thinking

thinking that produces many alternatives or ideas; creativity

script

a schema that unfolds in a regular or standardized order

Means-Ends Analysis

identify differences between the present situation and the desired goal, then make changes that will reduce the differences

Linguistic Determinism

Whorf's hypothesis that language determines the way we think

displacement (language)

language allows us to communicate about events and objects that are not physically present

Surface Structure

consists of the symbols that are used and their order

Deep Structure

the underlying meaning of the combined symbols

Language Acquisition Device (LAD)

an innate biological mechanism that contains the general grammatical rules common to all languages

Semantic Drift

the tendency for words' meaning to morph gradually over time to the point that the distance between the original meaning and the current one can be quite striking; silly used to mean blessed

semantic broadening

the development over time of a words' meaning into one more general; bird once referred to small birds but now refers to all birds

semantic narrowing

the development over time of a words' meaning into one more specific; hound used to refer to all dogs but now only refers to a subset of them

semantic overlap

the range that words share in common in contrast to how they are specifically different; intelligence, skill, and wisdom share a common core and have their own exact definition

Esperanto

the most successful of the many artificial languages; created by Ludwig Zamenhof

critical-age hypothesis

the ability to acquire language flawlessly decreases sharply after puberty; referred to extensively by the Chomskyan school as evidence that the ability to learn language is innately specified

Pidgin

-a makeshift, reduced version of a language used by people with little need or inclination to master the language itself, usually for purposes of trade

-if used as an everyday language, it can form grammar and become a real language, a creole

-Derek Bickerton observed this process among the children of migrant workers in Hawaii, thus supporting Chomsky's theory that grammar is innate

Creole

the result of the expansion of a reduced version of a language (a pidgin) into a full language

habituation

decreasing responsiveness with repeated stimulation. As infants gain familiarity with repeated exposure to a visual stimulus, their interest wanes and they look away sooner

Maturation

biological growth processes that enable orderly changes in behavior, relatively uninfluenced by experience

Assimilation

interpreting one's new experience in terms of one's existing schemas

Accomodation

adapting one's current understandings (schemas) to incorporate new information

object permanence

the awareness that things continue to exist even when not perceived

conservation

the principle that properties such as mass, volume, and number remain the same despite changes in the forms of objects; Piaget believed this to be a part of concrete operational reasoning

theory of mind

people's ideas about their own and others' mental states—about their feelings, perceptions, and thoughts, and the behaviors these might predict

attachment

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

critical period

an optimal period shortly after birth when an organism's exposure to certain stimuli or experiences produces proper development

imprinting

Konrad Lorenz; the process by which certain animals form attachments during a critical period very early in life

cross-sectional study

a study in which people of different ages are compared with one another

longitudinal study

research in which the same people are restudied and retested over a long period

authoritarian parents

assertion of parental power without warmth; rejecting relationship

authoritative parents

demanding, but caring; good child-parent communication

indulgent parents

warm towards child, but lax in setting limits

neglecting parents

indifferent and uninvolved with child

zone of proximal development

the difference between what a child can do independently and what the child can do with assistance from adults or more advanced peers

The Expectancy-Violation Procedure

Renee Bajilargeon; used to research infants; we look at the unusual because we are surprised and curious

temperament

a person's characteristic emotional reactivity and intensity

Heritability

The proportion of variation among individuals that we can attribute to genes. The heritability of a trait may vary, depending on the range of populations and environments studied.

interaction

the interplay that occurs when the effect of one factor (such as environment) depends on another factor (such as heredity)

testosterone

the most important of the male sex hormones. Both males and females have it, but the additional testosterone in males stimulates the growth of the male sex organs during the fetal period, and the development of the male sex characteristics during puberty

gender role

a set of expected behaviors, attitudes, and traits for males or for females

gender identity

our sense of being male, female, or some combination of the two

gender-typing

the acquistion of a traditional masculine or feminine role