Comprehensive Review Flashcards

Flashcards generated from lecture notes on Consciousness, Cognitive Development, Nervous System, Personality, Health, and Performance Psychology.

What is consciousness?

The constant moving stream of thoughts, feelings, and emotions.

What are the functions of consciousness?

Monitoring mental events, regulating thought & behavior, and attention.

What are the components of attention?

Orienting to sensory stimuli, controlling behavior and consciousness, maintaining alertness, and managing focus.

What is the conscious mind?

Mental events you are aware of.

What is the preconscious mind?

Mental events that can be brought into awareness.

What is the unconscious mind?

Mental events you are not aware of, including repressed feelings and memories.

What is the cognitive unconscious?

Processes that operate outside of awareness, such as riding a bike.

What is blindsight?

Inability to see objects placed before them.

What is amnesia?

Inability to recall certain memories.

What are the hindbrain & midbrain's role in consciousness?

Are important for arousal and sleep; damage to the reticular formation can lead to coma.

What is the role of the prefrontal cortex in consciousness?

Is key for conscious control for information processing.

What is the circadian rhythm?

A cyclical biological process, such as the daily cycle of light and dark.

What are the functions of sleep?

Memory consolidation, energy conservation, preservation from predators, and restoring bodily functions.

What is the psychodynamic view of dreams?

Dreams manifest the future and are often related to unresolved conflicts or desires.

What is the cognitive view of dreams?

Dreams are constructed based on the dreamer's thoughts, experiences, and memories.

What is the biological view of dreams?

Dreams play a role in consolidating memories and newly learned information.

What are altered states of consciousness?

Sleep, meditation, drug ingestion, hypnosis, and religious experiences.

What is human development?

Study of how people develop across the lifespan, influenced by nature (genetics) and nurture (environment).

What are the three big issues in human development?

Nature vs. Nurture, Stages vs. Continuous Development, and Critical/Sensitive Periods.

What are Piaget's four stages of cognitive development?

Sensorimotor, Preoperational, Concrete Operational, and Formal Operational.

What is Vygotsky's Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD)?

Learning occurs best just beyond current capabilities with help.

What is a critical period?

Window when development MUST happen.

What is a sensitive period?

Optimal window for development.

What are cross-sectional studies?

Snapshot at a single time point, comparing different age groups.

What are longitudinal studies?

Repeated observations of same individuals over time.

What are sequential studies?

Combines longitudinal and cross-sectional designs to minimize cohort effects.

What are the types of age?

Chronological, biological, psychological, social, functional.

What is Neuroplasticity?

Brain isn’t born, it’s built.

What are the three major stages of prenatal development?

Germinal, Embryonic, and Fetal.

What are teratogens?

Environmental agents that harm the embryo or fetus.

What are adaptive reflexes in infancy?

Rooting, sucking.

What is psychomotor speed?

Slowing with age, noticeable after 50-60.

What influences social development?

Attachment Theory (Bowlby), Parenting style, Culture, Temperament, Socialisation.

What are the types of attachment?

Secure, Avoidant, Ambivalent, and Disorganised.

What is the Strange Situation (Ainsworth)?

Measures attachment styles.

Describe the parenting style

Strict, Authoritarian.

What is the role of the nervous system?

Directly controls behavior and thoughts.

What is the Neuron Doctrine?

Neurons gather information from the body and transport it.

What is Action Potential?

Rapid rise in electrical potential along the axon.

What are the voltage-gated ion channels?

Sodium, Potassium, Calcium.

What are the ligand-gated ion channels?

Chloride, Calcium, Sodium.

What occurs during Synaptic Transmission?

Neurotransmitter released into the synaptic cleft binds to ligand-gated ion channels.

What is EPSP?

Excitatory postsynaptic potential (more positive).

What is IPSP?

Inhibitory postsynaptic potential (more negative).

What is the function of Acetylcholine (ACh)?

Neuromuscular junctions, memory, decision making.

What is the function of Glutamate and GABA?

Most common synapses; Glutamate is excitatory & GABA is inhibitory

What is the function of Dopamine?

Emotions, movements (Parkinson's).

What is the function of Serotonin?

Mood, hunger, pain.

Glia cells

Support and hold neurons; do not fire action potentials

What is the function of Astrocytes?

Form blood-brain barrier.

What is the function of Myelin Sheath?

Increases nerve pulse transduction speed.

What is the Central Nervous System (CNS)?

Brain and spinal cord.

What is the Peripheral Nervous System (PNS)?

Somatic and autonomic nervous systems.

What is the Spinal Cord?

Connects brain to the body; dorsal=sensory nerves, ventral=motor nerves.

What are Hindbrain structures and functions?

Medulla, pons, cerebellum (survival, motor coordination).

What are Midbrain structures and functions?

Tectum, reticular formation (sensory/motor integration, consciousness).

What is the function of the reticular formation?

Controls vital functions.

What are Forebrain structures and functions?

Thalamus, hypothalamus, cerebrum, limbic system (thinking, emotion, decision-making).

What is the function of the Cerebellum?

Motor control, balance, memory.

What is the Universal Cerebellar Transform?

Compares expectations vs. outcomes.

What is the function of the Reticular Formation?

Maintains consciousness and regulates activity states.

What creates myelin?

Oligodendrocytes (CNS) and Schwann Cells (PNS).

What is the function of Astrocytes?

Blood-brain barrier, ion regulation.

What is the function of Microglia?

Immune defense in brain.

What is the function of the Tectum & tegmentum?

Sensory processes, voluntary movements.

What is the function of the Substantia nigra?

Related to Parkinson's; dopaminergic neurons.

What is the function of the Pedunculi?

Fiber tracts (cortico-spinal, cortico-pontine, cortico-bulbar).

What is the function of the Thalamus?

Relays sensory information; switchboard for sensory information.

What is the function of the Hypothalamus?

Controls hormone system via pituitary gland.

What is the function of the Hippocampus?

Fundamental for memory, spatial memory and navigation (grid cells).

What is the function of the Amygdala?

Emotional learning; reward system and fear responses.

What is the function of the Cerebrum?

Involved in learning, remembering, thinking, consciousness, language, voluntary motor control, perception.

What is the Neocortex?

Largest part of cerebral cortex; six-layered structure; responsible for higher-level brain functions.

What are primary areas of the neocortex?

Motor, somatosensory, vision, auditory.

What is the Motor Cortex (M1)?

Frontal lobe (precentral gyrus); Initiates voluntary movement.

What is the Somatosensory Cortex (S1)?

Parietal lobe (postcentral gyrus); Processes touch.

What is the Visual Cortex (V1)?

Occipital lobe; Processes visual input from LGN.

What is the Auditory Cortex (A1)?

Temporal lobe; Tonotopic sound processing.

What is the function of Sensory Association Areas?

Turns simple sensory information into complex.

What is the function of Motor Association Areas?

Involved in motor planning.

What is the function of Polysensory Association Areas?

Receive information from more than one sensory system.

What were the effects of Phineas Gage's accident?

Frontal lobe damage -> personality change.

What is Broca's Area?

Left frontal lobe -> speech production.

What is Wernicke's Area?

Left temporal lobe -> speech comprehension.

What is the role of the Reticular Formation (RF) in sleep?

Controls arousal and wakefulness; inhibits thalamic relay neurons during sleep using GABA.

What is the role of the Thalamus in sleep?

Switches from tonic firing (awake) to burst mode (sleep); creates sleep spindles during NREM.

What is Cerebral Lateralisation?

Functional specialisation between hemispheres; contralateral control of body and sensory input.

What is Personality?

The scientific study of how and why people differ in characteristic patterns of thinking, feelings, and behaving.

What makes a good theory of personality?

Descriptive accuracy, explanatory power, predictive power, parsimony.

What are the major theoretical perspectives on personality?

Psychoanalytic, Behavioral, Humanistic, Cognitive, Trait.

What are major debates in personality theory?

Genes vs Environment, Stable vs Unstable, Quantitative vs Qualitative, Limited or infinite dimensions, Conscious or unconscious awareness, Types or traits?

What is the Id?

Instinctual energy, 'I want it now'.

What is the superego?

Internalized norms of society, 'You can’t have it'.

What is the ego?

Organised conscious mediator, 'You can have it later'.

Define Repression in psychoanalytic theory.

Psychological symptoms are often the return of the repressed.

What are Freud's psychosexual stages?

Oral, Anal, Phallic, Latency, Genital.

How does therapeutic change occur according to Freud?

Lengthy analysis aimed at conflict resolution; free association to discover repressed thoughts; interpretation of dreams.

What is Freud’s Contribution: The Unconscious Mind?

Human thought and behavior is shaped by unconscious processes.

What did Freud contribute in relation to Internal Conflict?

People experience internal conflict.

What did Freud contribute in relation to Early Childhood Experiences & Attachment?

Lasting impact of early childhood experiences on personality and mental health.