AP PSYCH Part 2

Concept

• mental groupings based on shared features that come from experience

  • Ex: fruit

• come in 3-level concept hierarchies

  • superordinate: broad→fruit

  • intermediate: basic→apple (most children learn first)

  • subordinate: specific→granny smith

• help simplify the world, allow us to organize, generalize & associate experience, objects and situations

• play a role in language, memory and learning, when we see something new we try to relate it to previous concepts

• 2 main categories

  • concrete: formal concepts

    • defined by set of rules or characteristics

  • natural: abstract concepts

    • imprecise, develop out of everyday experiences

Prototype

• the ideal example of a concept

  • generic image that represents a typical example from your experience

    • Ex: animal→dog

• we tend to make judgements based on our prototype

Which measure of central tendency would be used to represent the most common response for a group of participants

• mean: numerical data, normal distribution

• median: numerical data, skewed/outliers

• mode: categorical (nominal data)

  • Ex: names, colors, brands, (non-numerical, looking for frequency)

  • what appears most frequently in a data set

• range: numerical data, spread of data/variability

  • difference between highest & lowest values

  • shows how diverse/consistent a data set is

Schemas

• building blocks of intellectual development/mental frameworks that make organization and meaningful action possible

  • clusters of related concepts that provide generalizations/categorizations of things

  • develop from our experiences and act as a filter as we encode new information

• schemas are helpful and provide context

  • identify social roles in certain contexts

  • provide quick generalizations→stereotypes

• organize past experiences→help us understand and interact with future situations (provide a framework)

People form and modify schemas through

Assimilation (happens first)

• taking in new information but not changing the schema

• placing new information into an existing schema

  • past experiences→teach us how to respond to new experiences

Accommodation

• taking in new information and changing the schema to incorporate the new information

• changing an existing schema or creating a new schema

Algorithm vs. Heuristic

Algorithm

• address problems by attempting all possible solutions until the correct one is found

  • pro: if followed correctly→accurate solution

  • con: can’t solve problems that require subjective values/have too many unknowns & time consuming

• in questions look for guaranteed methods

Heuristic

• address problems by using mental shortcuts to make judgments

  • pro: fast & efficicent, simplify problem solving

  • con: do not guarantee a solution, are more error-prone than algorithms

    • Ex: decide who is oldest child by looking for the tallest

• In questions look for educated guesses/judgments

Types of heuristics

• representative heuristic

  • can lead to errors in judgment when decisions are made according to prior expectations or stereotypes

    • matches a prototype

• availability heuristic

  • can lead to errors in judgment when decisions are made by recalling the first or most vivid example that comes of mind

    • based on how quickly it comes to mind

      • Ex: who does more chores, you or your sibling→you do dishes

Influences on Decision making

• Decision making can be influenced by prior experiences that were successful (mental set) or by circumstances surrounding a decision (framing)

  • mental set: approach new problems the same way that worked before

    • expertise backfires

  • framing: way the issue is presented/worded or structured

    • people react to how something is phrased rather than what is said

      • ex: 90% survival rate, vs 10% death rate

What hinders decision making

Gambler’s fallacy: false belief that you can predict a chance event based on past chance events

Sunk-cost fallacy: a bad decision based on money, time, or effort that has already been spent

Executive Functions

• cognitive processes that allow individuals to generate, organize, plan and carry out goal-directed behaviors and critical thinking

  • self regulation: delaying gratification to motivate

• linked to prefrontal cortex

Creativity

• way of thinking that includes generating novel ideas

• making new & original ideas that are useful

  • alternative uses test: list as many possible uses for a common object

    • (# of alternatives, how unique/across categories, detailed)

• creativity may be enhanced with expertise, imagination, a venturesome personality, intrinsic motivation & a creative environment

Research Methods and Design

• Experiment: manipulate independent variable (ex: environment) and random assignment of participants to control & experimental groups to measure differences in the dependent variable (ex: creativity)

Non experimental methodologies

• Case Study: in-depth analysis of previous case

  • ex: surveys & naturalistic observation of a famous creative person

• Correlation: study investigating the strength & direction of the relationship between creativity & personality characteristics

• Meta-analysis: statistical method that combines results of several specific creativity studies

Divergent vs. Convergent thinking

Divergent thinking

• generating/considering many different ideas/solutions to a problem

• thinking breaks off in different directions

Convergent thinking

• using logic/knowledge to narrow down options to find the known solution or a single correct answer

Functional Fixedness

• failing to solve a problem because you are stuck on the object’s common use

  • creative thinking is hindered by functional fixedness

Different types of memories

• Explicit Memories (declarative memories)

  • Memories we recall with conscious awareness

  • Episodic

    • memories specific to our unique personal experiences

    • something you can tell me all about

  • Semantic

    • information we know, specific facts/conceptual understandings

    • know something requires something else

  • Prospective

    • remembering to remember; memory of an intent to perform a specific action

      • ex: recall details of memory (birthday party)

    • knowing the need to do something

  • Stored all over the brain, storage requires hippocampus

• Implicit Memories (non-declarative memories)

  • Memories we recall without conscious awareness

  • Procedural

    • knowing how to do something

  • Classically conditioned responses

    • learned associations that evoke emotion/physiological responses

  • Primed responses

    • exposure to one thing unconsciously influences future thoughts or behaviors

      • ex: explain how to walk up stairs

    • given many examples of one thing (bread, juice milk) you associate the next word so_p with soup

Multistore Memory Model: Baddeley & Hitch

Revised to refer to “short term memory” as “working memory”

• working memory contains a limited amount of info that can be temporarily maintained & used for many cognitive tasks

  • C.T.: remembering, solving, imagining, learning

Working Memory Model

Central Executive Boss

• does planning & decision making

• directs components of cognitive tasks to the visuo-spatial sketchpad and auditory loop

  • prefrontal cortex

Phonological Loop

• information comes in as a verbal input

• information you’re manipulating in your head/saying to yourself over and over again

  • broca’s area

Visuo-Spatial Sketchpad

• information comes in as visual input

• maintain a visual memory of it & associating relationships with other visual memories

  • parietal lobe (spatial perception)

  • occipital lobe (visual cortex)

Long Term Memory works with these (integrates with working memory) to address the cognitive task/solve the problem

Multistore Memory Model

• Memory consists of three stores: sensory, short term, long term

• Sensory memory briefly stores whatever is coming in through hour auditory/visual senses

• If we pay attention to what is in our sensory memory, it will be transferred to short-term memory & stored, without rehearsal, for about 15-30 seconds

• From there, we can encode it into our long-term memory, perhaps using effortful processing to increase our chances of retrieving it later

Sensory Memory

• Iconic Memory (“eye”-conic)

  • brief memory for visual inputs-decays quickly

• Echoic Memory (“echo”/sound)

  • brief memory for auditory inputs-decays quickly, but not as quickly as iconic memory

If we pay attention to anything in our sensory memory, it transfers to our short term memory

Short Term Memory

• Temporary storage of information we attend to from our sensory memory

  • Capacity: Magic number 7 (plus or minus 2)→5,9

  • Duration: 15-30 seconds

If we repeat the information we can keep it for a while, and might have a chance of encoding it into our long term memory

Long Term Memory

• Can be retrieved back to short term memory to work with later on

Levels of Processing Model of Memory

Craik & Lockhart propose that memory recall is a function of depth of processing

• Encoding

  • how you encode information will directly affect your ability to later retrieve it

The 3 levels of processing:

• Structural processing (shallow)

  • shallow processing leads to a less long-lasting memory

• Phonemic

• Semantic (deep)

  • deep processing leads to a longer-lasting memory

Shallow Processing: Structural

• Encoding using basic visual qualities of the word/concept (physical features)

  • ex: the word has 5 letters

• Shallowest level of processing

Phonemic Processing

• encoding using the basic auditory (sound) qualities the word/concept

  • ex: baker rhymes with shaker

• shallow level of processing

Semantic Processing

• Encoding the meaning of the word

  • ex: relate to personal experiences, existing semantic memories

• Deep level of processing

Shallow vs. Deep Processing

Shallow Processing

• Structural & Phonemic

  • Focus on physical features

• Maintenance rehearsal

  • Stays in short term memory for longer

• Less durable/long-lasting long term memory

Deep Processing

• Semantic

  • build meaning (semanticity)

• Effortful processing

  • long term effort

• Encodes into long term memory

  • more durable long term memory

DRY MIX

Dependent-Reaction-Y-axis

Measured-Independent-X-axis

Experimental vs. Control group

• Experimental group is exposed to independent variable

• Control group is exposed to “placebo” or no treatment at all

Population vs. Sample

Sample: random selection of sample from the population

• can be used to generalize for the whole population

• must be random assignment (even when assigning control/experimental groups)

Ethical Guidelines

• must be followed

• approval for research is usually done by an Institutional Review Board

Mnemonic Devices

• Used to encode information in a way that aids in retrieval by connecting new information to something familiar

Method of Loci

• A mnemonic device that relies on spatial relationships between loci (ex: locations on familiar route/rooms in a familiar building) to encode & later retrieve info

Correlational Studies

unlike experimental, cause and effect cannot be inferred (only experiment can have “cause & effect”)

• observe relationship btwn. variables without manipulation

• variables are not controlled

• random assignment to conditions is not utilized

Hemispheric Specialization

• Language (for most) is a task represented by the left hemisphere

Self Reference Effect

• relate each word to yourself personally

• leads to better retention than shallower levels of processing

How the 3 measures of central tendency vary btwn. normal distributions and skewed distributions

• mean leans to right or left

• outlier

Capacity & Duration Comparison Memory Model

Sensory

• Fleeting storage of information that we receive from our senses

  • Capacity: unlimited

  • Duration:

    • Iconic <1 second

    • Echoic: <4 second

  • Studies: Sperling’s partial report

    • “whole report” could only list 4-5 letters

    • “partial report” given a tone, could accurately report all letters from cued row

    • indicates iconic memory held all letters, but it’s fleeting

Short Term/Working

• Temporarily heightened availability of information about a small number of recent events and thoughts

  • Capacity:

    • 7±2 digits

    • 6 letters

    • 5 words

  • Duration

    • <12 seconds without rehearsal

  • Studies

    • Digit Span Tests

      • ~50% participants could correctly recall 7 digits (around 5-9)

Long-Term

• Includes both explicit and implicit memories

  • Capacity: Unlimited

  • Duration: Stable across lifetime

  • Studies: Ebbinghaus’s forgetting curve (decay memory)

    • nonsense syllables (prevent encoding/tying to already know), tested different time intervals

    • very rapid loss or recall in 1st hour, followed by slightly slower loss

    • after 24 hrs, only 1/3rd is stored relatively permanently

Fleeting Iconic Memory: Change Blindness

• Change blindness: our inability to detect small visual changes in our environment

• Iconic Memory: lasts less than a second but holds a lot of info in that time

• By the time we are asked to recall, our iconic memory likely has faded

Ebbinhaus’s Digit Study

• Correlational Study

  • tested himself, not randomized participants

  • no control groups/gereralizability

  • just observed how memory behaved

Ebbinghaus’s Forgetting Curve

• Independent Variable: # of digits presented

• Dependent Variable: Success rate of recall

Explicit Memories: Where are they stored?

Karl Lashley Rat Experiment

• rats learn maze then destroyed different regions of their cerebral cortex

• most rats had a memory of a part of the maze

• Study shows: memories are distributed throughout the cortex

Explicit Memories: What are the biological processes to form these memories?

Case Study

• unusual cases that presented themselves

Henry Molaison Study

• Removal of portions of the hippocampus in the limbic system prevented new memory formation

• implicit memories were not affected

Patient R.B. (died 1986)

• after stroke couldn’t form new memories

• no other cognitive impairment

• autopsy showed damage to hippocampus

Shows: Areas of the hippocampus are essential for new explicit memory formation

Anterograde Amnesia (can’t form future)

• Hippocampus Damage

• Inability to form new memories

• Problem moving information from short term into long term memory

• Case studies: R.B. & Henry Molaison

Retrograde Amnesia (retro→can’t remember past)

• Damage to some part of the cortex

• Inability to recall old memories

• Problem: retrieving explicit memories from long term to working memory

• Experiment: Lashley’s experiment with rats

Global Amnesia

Having both Retrograde (past) & Anterograde (future) Amnesia

Hippocampi & Explicit Memory

• Hippocampi: we have two, one in each hemisphere

• In charge of explicit memory

• Possible neurogenesis

• Sloppy librarian analogy

  • librarians don’t know all the knowledge

  • they place the knowledge all over the library (cerebral cortex)

  • but not the whole book→when give memory back it’s a mishmash of pages

  • assemble memories through associated themes/schema

• Witness stand analogy

  • conscious mind only hears what it thinks is the finished product/right information

  • biases: experiences and emotions that influence how your mind remembers things

Cognitive Biases

Confirmation bias

• we don’t want what really happened from our memory

• we want the memory that will support what we are thinking now

Hindsight bias

• our current cognitive & emotional needs will go back in time & rewrite a memory

Overconfidence

• our mind is convinced that what it produces is correct

Recognition vs. Recall

Recognition

• Like a multiple-choice question

• The other questions sometimes give you clues/something to recognize

• Sometimes the clues can introduce a bias

Recall

• Like a free-response question

• Write down everything you know, much more difficult

• Less susceptible to factors that would influence the accuracy of memories

Memory Retrieval Factors

• Mood Congruent

  • our emotions often influence which memory is retrieved

• Context-Dependent

  • The setting (clues such as sights & smells) help retrieval

• State-Dependent

  • The memory pathways are only active in the right state

Retrieving Information

• cognitive skill

• can be trained & improved with practice

• no one can retrieve information that wasn’t encoded

  • encoding is what happens during studying

Distributed vs. Massed Practice

Strategies to help with retrieval

Retrieval Practice

• Neurons that fire together wire together

  • Long-term potentiation

• Asking yourself what you learned & trying to retrieve it will make it easier to retrieve next time

Testing Effect

• The more often you take a test or work with certain types of questions the better you become

• You might not actually retrieve correct content, but the skill of taking a test can help

• Also, the skill of answering certain types of questions can help retrieve the content

Metacognition

• Thinking about your own thinking

• Noticing what might be blocking information from appearing

• Noticing what happens before the “a-ha moment”

Incubation

• Sometimes when you want an answer or a solution, it is best to give your mind enough time to find the answer when it’s ready

Forgetting

Evolutionary

• adaptation: forget info that will not increase survival

Biological

• neural pathways rearrange/disconnect from old connections as the brain learns new things & changes (plasticity)

Psychodynamic

• one part of our mind trying to protect other parts from info that’s upsetting (repression)

Social

• we forget because we are not in the right social situation to retrieve (context dependent retrieval)

Cognitive

• our mental indexing system has become disorganized, contents smudged/mixed together (proactive & retroactive and memory confabulation)

Humanistic

• All people can and want to remember. No one has a bad memory, there are just barriers to a person using their memory to the fullest potential.

Behavioral

• We forget because the association between stimuli (ex: sound of child’s toy & reflexive release of dopamine) has been disconnected.

Types of Amnesia

• Infantile Amnesia

  • we can’t remember much before age 5

• Psychogenic Amnesia

  • memory problem without physical cause or trauma (from mind)

• Source Amnesia

  • difficulty remembering where you learned something

• Anterograde Amnesia

  • difficulty encoding/inability to encode new memories (hippocampus)

• Retrograde Amnesia

  • event that just happened blocks/prevents retrieval of old memories

    • ex: trauma to head

Amnesia vs. Interference

Amnesia: associated with storing & retrieving info

• can/can’t you remember

Interference: associated with processing info

• is what you’re currently thinking of corrupted by info processed at a different time

• Retroactive Interference

  • new info corrupts, intertwines with/blocks info processed at an earlier time

    • self-consistency bias

• Proactive interference

  • old info prevents, corrupts, or intertwines with current/recent info

    • “can’t teach an old dog new tricks”

Memory Reconstruction

• Frontal lobe asks hippocampi to remember something

  • Hippocampi doesn’t retrieve what they encoded based on a precise process (not an algorithm)

  • They rebuild or reconstruct it based on what they think it should be (heuristics) “wings it” each time

• Reconstructive memory, related to memory confabulation, (our mind blends inaccurate perceptions & images from several experiences & gives it to us as what it believes is a true record of what happened.)

Field Experiment

• cross btwn. naturalistic observation and a laboratory experiment

  • reduces Hawthorne effect (act strangely due to feeling of being observed)

  • reduces demand characteristic (cues of a study revealing its true purpose to participants, influencing response)

  • you could not tell them exactly what the study is about (single blind)

    • if you deceive a subject you must offer debriefing

Eyewitness Testimony

• can’t trust eyewitness testimony’s reconstruction & confabulation to be accurate

• can’t trust your own either

False Memories

• can be implanted because of the concepts of memory reconstruction & confabulation

Binet-Simon Test

• test of where a “normal” child’s abilities “should be” at

• became first test to classify mental abilities

Lewis Terman (don’t need to remember name)

• Revised system of comparing mental age & chronological age so that the “average” intelligence would always be 100.

  • Mental Age: the average level at which the child should be operating at their age

  • Chronological age: compare with actual age of the child)

Two Factor Theory

• we actually do have one general intelligence level

  • g for general mental ability

  • standard across all types of intellectual domains

• however, we also might have specific mental abilities that fall outside of g→s

• factor analysis

  • factors that are similar occur together and can be grouped into one thing

Multiple Intelligences vs. Two kinds of G

Multiple Intelligences

• not how smart you are but how are you smart

• Intelligence is based on unrelated domains

  • different than g, could be smart in one area and dumb in the other

  • like physical traits, has lots of factors that can exist independently of one another

Two Kinds of G:

• Fluid Intelligence (Gf)

  • speed, youth, processing power, lack of knowledge

  • flexible and fast way to process information

• Crystallized intelligence (Gc)

  • slower, can use experience to compensate/find short cuts in problem solving

Triarchic theory of intelligence

• intelligence isn’t determined by a test but by how a person interacts with their environment

• Triarchic theory (3 most important parts of intelligence)

  • Practical: how well can a person function in their environment? Realistic

  • Creative: how well can a person handle new situations? Experiential

  • Analytical: how well can a person find the answer? Academics

General mental ability (g-factor/general intelligence)

• reflects a person’s ability to learn and adapt to new situations

• the higher the g the better a person does in different challenges

Reciprocal determinism

• a persons behavior affects their environment, and their environment effects them=loop

One General Intelligence vs. Multiple Intelligences Theory

One General Intelligence

• high-g=do better

• talent is inherent. it allows for quicker acquisition of knowledge and skills

Multiple Intelligences

• s for special intelligence, an ability that is unrelated to other abilities

• performance and ability are domain specific

• It takes acquired skills and knowledge to demonstrate talent

How to measure intelligence/success in cultures

Individualistic Cultures“western”

• values freedom, competition & individuality

• success is making it on your own

• intelligence is based on individual achievement

Collectivistic Cultures “eastern”

• values cooperation, connection & harmony

• success is improving the group

• intelligence is based on how well you can work with others (group cohesion)

Operational definition

• taking an abstract concept and assigning a number/definition to it

Hypothesis

• If independent variable, then dependent variable

• A hypothesis is easier to test if it is numerically measurable

Types of variables in an experiment

Independent variable: what the researcher or participant does

Dependent variable: what the researcher or participant gets (result)

Confounding variable: anything that affects the dependent variable that is not the independent variable (culture, beliefs about one self)

Construct Validity

• the culture of the test-maker & test-taker can affect how the test is taken/made

Confirmation bias

tendency to search for, interpret, favor and recall information in a way that confirms or supports one’s prior beliefs or values

Structured Interview

• allows for the classification of an experience or concept without trying to reduce it to a number (qualitative research)

  • most scientific research methods are quantitative but converting certain things to numbers introduces confounding variables

Stereotype Threat vs. Stereotype Lift

Stereotype threat

• unconscious process of one’s performance being reduced to match what society believes

• members of a group who think of their group membership before a task may unconsciously conform negatively to what society thinks of their group

• stereotype threat is a confounding variable for cognitive tests

• we control this confounding variable by using the single blind technique (won’t tell the people taking the test what its about so they don’t have biases)

Stereotype Lift

• unconscious process of one’s performance being improved to match what society believes

• members of a group who think of their group membership before a task may unconsciously conform positively to what society thinks of their group

• still confounding variable

Central Tendency

• leaning toward the middle

• Mean: numeric average found by dividing the sum by the number of scores

  • the only measure of central tendency that is greatly affected by extreme scores or outliers

• Median: the middle score in an array of scores in order

• Mode: the score that appears most often in a set of scores

Bell Curves

Diagram

Skews

• Positive skew

  • outliers to the right pull it to the right/drag

  • mean pulled to the right

• Symmetrical Distribution

  • mean median & mode are the same

• Negative skew

  • tail of bell curve pulled to left

  • outliers to the left

Standard Deviation

a number that tells how much the scores in a set differ from the mean

Intelligence Tests needed traits

• Standardization

  • Against what is an individual score compared? Their age? Other scores?

• Reliability

  • Is the score stable over time if all other variables remain the same?

• Validity

  • Does the test actually measure what it says it measures

  • 4 types of validity

Types of validity

• Content validity: the extent to which a test measures the intended content/covers all important parts of the content

  • ex: only covering one unit on the test would be low content validity

• Construct validity: whether a test truly measures the theoretical concept it claims to measure

  • similar to operationalization. how can an abstract idea be translated into something that can be measured?

• Criterion validity:

  • does it correlate to an outside measure?

    • ex: if a test score says someone’s a genius but they repeatedly use a fork to drink soup they have low criterion validity

• Predictive validity:

  • how well a test predicts future performance

  • only works for large sets of data and can only predict a trend

    • standardized tests do not have predictive validity for individuals

Types of Tests

Achievement: measures how much you learned in the unit

• AP

Predictive: measure what will happen based on data collected

• SAT

Aptitude: attempts to measure a person’s ability. Ability is not stable or static.

• Jean Piaget’s idea of children being measured individually

• Lev Vygotsky’s ideas that ability is context & socially dependent

Epigenetics

• long term environmental pressure changes our genetic expression (not genes themselves)