General Psychology: Chapters 1–5 Key Terms

Comprehensive vocabulary flashcards covering key terms and definitions across Chapters 1 through 5 of General Psychology, including research methods, biological foundations, sensation and perception, and developmental psychology.

Psychology

Refers to the scientific study of the mind and behavior.

Nature-Nurture Debate

Explores whether human behavior and mental processes are shaped more by biological factors (nature) or environmental experiences (nurture). Nature includes genetics, brain chemistry, and inherited traits, while nurture includes upbringing, culture, learning, and life experiences; most modern psychologists agree that behavior results from an interaction between both.

Metacognitive thinking

Refers to the ability to think about your own thinking. It involves being aware of how you learn, recognizing what you understand or don't understand, and using strategies to monitor and improve your thinking.

Critical thinking

The active application of a set of skills to information for the understanding and evaluation of that information, involving maintaining an attitude of skepticism, recognizing internal biases, making use of logical thinking, asking appropriate questions, and making observations.

Psychoanalytic/Psychodynamic Perspective

Focuses on the role of a person’s unconscious, as well as early childhood experiences, and dominated clinical psychology for several decades.

Behaviorism/Learning Perspective

Focuses on observable behavior and how it is shaped by learning, emphasizing conditioning, reinforcement, punishment, and environmental influences while asserting that behavior changes because of experiences, not internal thoughts or feelings.

Humanistic/Positive Perspective

A perspective within psychology that emphasizes the potential for good that is innate to all humans.

Cognitive Perspective

Focuses on mental processes such as thinking, memory, problem solving, language, and decision making, explaining behavior by examining how people process, store, and use information.

Sociocultural Perspective

Examines how social factors and cultural norms influence behavior and mental processes, emphasizing the role of family, community, society, culture, and social expectations in shaping how people think and act.

Neuropsychology/Behavioral Genetic Perspective

Focuses on the biological foundations of behavior, including the brain, nervous system, hormones, and genetics, explaining behavior through brain functioning, neurotransmitters, heredity, and the interaction between genes and environment.

Evolutionary Perspective

Explains behavior and mental processes in terms of adaptation and survival, focusing on how traits and behaviors may have developed because they helped humans survive, reproduce, or solve problems in ancestral environments.

Theory

A well-developed set of ideas that propose an explanation for observed phenomena.

Hypothesis

A testable prediction about how the world will behave if an idea is correct, often worded as an if-then statement.

Survey

A list of questions to be answered by research participants—given as paper-and-pencil questionnaires, administered electronically, or conducted verbally—allowing researchers to collect data from a large number of people.

Experimental group

The group designed to answer the research question; experimental manipulation is the only difference between the experimental and control groups, so any differences between the two are due to experimental manipulation rather than chance.

Control group

Serves as a basis for comparison and controls for chance factors that might influence the results of the study—by holding such factors constant across groups so that the experimental manipulation is the only difference between groups.

Independent variable

Variable that is influenced or controlled by the experimenter; in a sound experimental study, the independent variable is the only important difference between the experimental and control group.

Dependent variable

Variable that the researcher measures to see how much effect the independent variable had.

Random sample

Subset of a larger population in which every member of the population has an equal chance of being selected.

Random assignment

Method of experimental group assignment in which all participants have an equal chance of being assigned to either group.

Experiment

A test, trial, or tentative procedure; an act or operation for the purpose of discovering something unknown or of testing a principle, supposition, etc.

Correlation

Relationship between two or more variables; when two variables are correlated, one variable changes as the other does.

Illusory correlation

False correlations.

Placebo Effect

Occurs when people's expectations or beliefs influence or determine their experience in a given situation, where simply expecting something to happen can actually make it happen.

Social desirability bias

A type of response bias in which people tend to answer questions in a way they believe will be viewed favorably by others rather than giving completely honest answers.

Institutional Review Boards (IRBs)

Committee of administrators, scientists, and community members that reviews proposals for research involving human participants.

Neuron

Cells in the nervous system that act as interconnected information processors, which are essential for all of the tasks of the nervous system.

Synapse/Synaptic Cleft

A synapse is the point where one neuron communicates with another cell, and the synaptic cleft is the tiny physical gap between them where that communication happens.

Axon

Major extension of the soma.

Myelin sheath

Fatty substance that insulates axons.

Neurotransmitters

Chemical messenger of the nervous system.

Central nervous system

Made up of billions of neurons and controls our thoughts, responses, and movements; divided into the central nervous system (CNS) and the peripheral nervous system (PNS).

Frontal lobes

Part of the cerebral cortex involved in reasoning, motor control, emotion, and language; contains motor cortex.

Parietal lobes

Part of the cerebral cortex involved in processing various sensory and perceptual information; contains the primary somatosensory cortex.

Occipital lobes

Part of the cerebral cortex associated with visual processing; contains the primary visual cortex.

Temporal lobes

Part of cerebral cortex associated with hearing, memory, emotion, and some aspects of language; contains primary auditory cortex.

Cerebellum

Hindbrain structure that controls our balance, coordination, movement, and motor skills, and it is thought to be important in processing some types of memory.

Corpus callosum

Thick band of neural fibers connecting the brain’s two hemispheres.

Plasticity

Nervous system's ability to change.

Peripheral nervous system

Connects the brain and spinal cord to the muscles, organs and senses in the periphery of the body.

Autonomic nervous system

Controls our internal organs and glands.

Brain stem

The region of the brain that acts as the body’s automatic control center; regulates vital involuntary functions such as breathing, heart rate, blood pressure, and swallowing, and serves as the main communication pathway between the brain and the spinal cord.

Sensation

What happens when sensory information is detected by a sensory receptor.

Perception

Way that sensory information is interpreted and consciously experienced.

Sensory adaptation

Not perceiving stimuli that remain relatively constant over prolonged periods of time.

Absolute threshold

Minimum amount of stimulus energy that must be present for the stimulus to be detected $50\%$ of the time.

Difference threshold

The smallest difference between two stimuli that a person can detect.

Selective Attention

Concentrating on certain information while filtering out other stimuli in the environment.

Inattentional blindness

Failure to notice something that is completely visible because of a lack of attention.

Depth perception

Ability to perceive depth.

Binocular cues

Cue that relies on the use of both eyes.

Binocular disparity

Slightly different view of the world that each eye receives.

Monocular cues

Cue that requires only one eye.

Perceptual constancy

The ability to recognize that an object stays the same despite changes in its appearance.

Figure-ground

Segmenting our visual world into figure and ground.

The Bodily Senses

Senses that provide information about touch, body position, movement, balance, and internal bodily states.

The Chemical Senses

The senses of taste (gustation) and smell (olfaction), which detect chemicals in foods, drinks, and the environment.

Zygote

Structure created when a sperm and egg merge at conception; begins as a single cell and rapidly divides to form the embryo and placenta.

Embryo

Multi-cellular organism in its early stages of development.

Fetus

When the organism is about nine weeks old.

Teratogens

Biological, chemical, or physical environmental agent that causes damage to the developing embryo or fetus.

Rooting Reflex

The newborn’s response to anything that touches their cheek, the baby naturally turns the head in that direction and begins to suck.

Pruning

Neural connections are reduced.

Cognition

Thinking, including perception, learning, problem solving, judgment, and memory.

Sensorimotor Stage

First stage in Piaget’s theory of cognitive development; from birth through age $2$, a child learns about the world through senses and motor behavior.

Object Permanence

Idea that even if something is out of sight, it still exists.

Preoperational Stage

Second stage in Piaget’s theory of cognitive development; from ages $2$ to $7$, children learn to use symbols and language but do not understand mental operations and often think illogically.

Conservation

Idea that even if you change the appearance of something, it is still equal in size, volume, or number as long as nothing is added or removed.

Egocentrism

Preoperational child’s difficulty in taking the perspective of others.

Concrete Operational Stage

Third stage in Piaget’s theory of cognitive development; from about $7$ to $11$ years old, children can think logically about real (concrete) events.

Formal Operational Stage

Final stage in Piaget’s theory of cognitive development; from age $11$ and up, children are able to deal with abstract ideas and hypothetical situations.

Attachment

Long-standing connection or bond with others.