Barron's AP Psychology Flashcards

Wilhelm Wundt

(1832-1920) set up the first psychological laboratory in an apartment near the university at Leipzip, Germany. Trained subjects in introspection. Subjects were asked to accurately record their cognitive reactions to simple stimuli.

Introspection

Technique used by Wilhelm Wundt who asked subjects to accurately record their cognitive reactions to simple stimuli. Through this process, Wundt hoped to examine basic mental processes.

William James

(1842-1910) Published "The Principles of Psychology", the science's first textbook. Established the Theory of Functionalism: How mental processes function in our lives.

Functionalism

Theory described by William James; Examines how the mental processes described by Wilhelm Wundt function in our lives

Max Wertheimer

(1880-1943) Gestalt psychologist; Argued against dividing human thought and behavior into discrete structures. Gestalt psychology tried to examine a person's total experience because the way we experience the world is more than just an accumulation of various perceptual experiences. Gestalt theorists demonstrated that the whole experience is often more than just the sum of the parts of the experience.

Sigmund Freud

(1856-1939) Believed he discovered the unconscious mind-a part of our mind over which we don't have conscious control that determines, in part, how we think and behave. Proposed that we must examine the unconscious mind through dream analysis, word association, and other psychoanalytic therapy techniques if we are truly understand human thought and behavior. Has been criticized for being unscientific and creating unverifiable theories.

Margaret Floy Washburn

(1871-1939) First woman to earn a Ph.D in psychology (1894)

John Watson

(1878-1958) Declared that psychology must limit itself to observable phenomena, not unobervable concepts like the unconscious mind, if it is to be considered a science.

Ivan Pavlov

(1849-1936) Performed pioneering conditioning experiments on dogs; these experiments led to the development of the classical conditioning model of learning.

B.F. Skinner

(1904-1990) Expanded the basic ideas of behaviorism to include the idea of reinforcement and punishment- environmental stimuli that either encourage or discourage certain responses; helped establish and popularize the operant conditiong model of learning; skinner's intellectual influence lasted for decades

Mary Whiton Calkins

(1863-1930) Student of William James; became president of american psychological association (1905); completed her doctoral studies but harvard refused to award her a Ph.D because, at the time they didn't grant doctoral degrees to women

Humanist Perspective

the humanists, including theorists abraham maslow (1908-1970) and carl rogers (1902-1987), stressed individual choice and free will. this contrsts with the deterministic behaviorists who theorized that all behaviors are caused by past conditioning. Humanists believe that we choose most of our behaviors and that these choices are guided by physiological, emotional, or spiritual needs.

Psychoanalytic Perspective

Described by Sigmund Freud; psychoanalysts believe the unconscious mind-a part of our mind that we don't have conscious control over or access to-controls much of our thoughts and actions; psychoanalysts would look for impulses or memories pushed into the unconscious mind through repression;psychoanalysts think we must examine our unconscious mind through dream analysis, word association and other psychoanalytic therapy techniques in order to understand human thought and behavior.

Biopsychology Perspective

biopsychologists explain human thought and behavior strictly in terms of biological processes. neuroscientists believe that human cognition and reactions might be caused by effects of our genes, hormones, and neurotransmitters in the brain or by a combination of all three.

Evolutionary Perspective

evolutionary psychologists examine human thoughts and actions in terms of natural selection. Natural selection in this context refers to the idea that some psychological traits might be advatageous for survival and that these traits would be passed down from the parents to the next generation. similar to the bipsychology perspective

Behavioral Perspective

Behaviorists explain human thought and behavior in terms of conditioning (learning). Behaviorists look strictly at observable behaviors and what reaction organisms get in response to specific behaviors. dominant school of thought in psychology from the 1920s through the 1960s.

Cognitive Perspective

cognitive psychologists examine human thought and behavior in terms of how we interpret, process and remember environmental events. cognitive psychologists believe that the rules or methods we us to view the world are important to understanding why we think and behave the way we do.

Social-Cultural Perspective

social-cultural psychologists look at how our thoughts and behaviors vary from people living in other countries. sociocultural psychologists emphasize the influence culture has on the way we think and act. for example, social-cultural psychologists are interested in the emphasis some cultures place on the value of the group (collectivism) or the individual (individualism)

Hindsight Bias

Tendency upon hearing about research findings (and many other things) to think that they knew it all along. After an event occurs, it is relatively easy to explain why it happened. The goal of scientific research, however, is to predict what will happen in advance.

Applied Research

Research that psychologists conduct to solve practical problems. such as investigating how people can best resolve personality conflicts at work. Research that has clear, practical applications.

Basic Research

Research that explores questions that are of interest to psychologists but are not intended to have immediate, real-world applications.

Hypothesis

A statement that expresses a relationship between two variables.

Theory

Aims to explain some phenomenon and allows researchers to generate testable hypotheses with the hope of collecting data that supports the theory.

Operations Definitions

An explanation of how variables are measures.

Validity

When research measures what the researcher set out to measure; it is accurate. A related concept is reliability.

Reliability

When research can be replicated and it is consistent. If the researcher conducted the same research in the same way, the researcher would get similar results.

Sampling

The individuals on whom research is conducted are called participants or subjects, and the process by which the participants are selected is called _____.

Population

The group from which a sample is selected. This includes anyone or anything that could possibly be selected to be in the sample.

Random Selection

A method of selection a sample from a population. Every member of the population has an equal chance of being selected. It increases the likelihood that the sample represents the population and that one can generalize the findings to a larger population.

Stratified Sampling

A process that allows a researcher to ensure that the sample represents the population on some criteria, such as age or race.

Experiment

The only research that can show a casual relationship. Allows the researcher to manipulate the independent variable and control the confounding variables. It compares at least two groups: an experimental group and a control group that differ based on the independent variable.

Confounding Variables

Any difference between the experimental and control conditions (such as time of day), except for the independent variable, that might affect the dependent variable.

Assignment

The process by which participants are put into either an experimental group or a control group.

Experimenter Bias

The unconscious tendency for researchers to treat member of the experimental and control groups differently to increase the chance of confirming their hypothesis.

Double-Blind Procedure

Method followed by such that neither the participants nor the researcher are aware of who is in the experimental or control groups while the experiment is going on. This controls experimenter bias and participant bias.

Participant Bias

Tendency for subjects to behave in certain ways based on their perception of an experiment.

Hawthorne Effect

Being selected to be in a group of people to participate in an experiment will affect the performance of that group, regardless of what is done to those individuals. Just selecting a sample of people and including them in an experiment will affect performance of the sample, as the chosen participants will try to please the researcher. Control groups help to control for the Hawthorne effect.

Correlation

A statistical measure of a relationship between two variables. Does not mean causation.

Scatter Plot

A graph of correlated data. The closer the points come to failing on a straight line, the stronger the correlation.

Survey Method

Often used to gather opinions or attitudes and for correlation research. Involves asking people to fill out a questionnaire.

Naturalistic Observation

Research method that involves observing participants in their natural habitats without interacting with them. The goal is to get a realistic and rich picture of the participants' behavior. Cannot establish cause and effect relationship between variables.

Case Study

A research method used to get a full and detailed picture of one participant or a small group of participants. Clinical psychologists often use this to present informations about a person suffering from a particular disorder. Allows researchers to get the richest possible picture of what they are studying, but the focus on a single individual or small group means that the findings cannot be generalized to a larger population.

Descriptive Statistics

Ways of describing a set of data. Three common measurements are the mean, median and mode.

Measures of Variability

A type of descriptive statistical measure that attempts to depict the diversity of the distribution. Examples are range, variance and standard deviation.

Normal Curve

A bell-shaped curve that represents a distribution of scores that is normally distributed. Approximately 68 percent of scores in this fall within one standard deviation of the mean, approximately 65 percent of scores fall within two standard deviations of the mean and almost 99 percent of scores fall within three standard deviations of the mean.

Inferential Statistics

Statistics that can determine whether or not findings can be applied to the larger population from which the sample was selected.

Statistical Significance

Scientists have decided that 5% is the cutoff for statistically significant results. This means that in an experiment design, there must be less than a 5% chance that the results occurred by chance.

APA Ethical Guidelines for Human Research

Any type of academic research must first propose the study to the ethics board or institutional review board (IRB) at the institution. Guidelines include: Coercion, Informed consent, Anonymity/confidentiality, Lack of risk, and Debriefing procedures.

APA Ethical Guidelines for Animal Research

Ethical psychological studies for animals must meet the following requirements: Have a clear scientific purpose, Care for and house animals in a humane way, Acquire animal subjects legally, Design experimental procedures that employ the least amount of suffering feasible.

neuroanatomy

the study of the parts and function of neurons

neurons

individual nerve cells that make up our entire nervous system

dendrites

rootlike parts of the nerve cell that stretch out from the cell body; grow to make synaptic connections with other neurons

cell body (soma)

contains the nucleus and other parts of the cell needed to sustain its life

axon

wirelike structure ending in the terminal buttons that extends from the cell body

myelin sheath

a fatty covering around the axon that speeds neural impulses

terminal buttons

also called: end buttons, terminal branches of axon, synaptic knobs

the branched end of the axon that contains neurotransmitter

neurotransmitters

chemicals contained in terminal buttons that enable neurons to communicate

synapse

the space beween the terminal buttons of one neuron and the dendrites of the next neurons

action potential

the local voltage change across the cell wall as a nerve impulse is transmitted

function of acetylcholine

motor movement

lack of acetylcholine

Alzheimer's disease

function of dopamine

motor movement and alertness

lack of dopamine

Parkinson's disease

overabundance of dopamine

schizophrenia

function of endorphins

pain control; involved in addictions

function of serotonin

mood control

lack of serotonin

associated with clinical depression

afferent neurons

neurons that take information from the senses to the brain

interneurons

in the brain or spinal cord, neurons that take messages and send them elsewhere in the brain or spinal cord

efferent neurons

neurons that take information from the brain to the rest of the body

Central Nervous System

consists of the brain and spinal cord; nerves encased in bone

compare: Peripheral Nervous System

Peripheral Nervous System

consists of nerves not encased in bone

Divided into two categories: somatic and automatic nervous system

compare: Central Nervous System

Somatic Nervous System

controls voluntary muscle movements

compare: Autonomic Nervous System

Autonomic Nervous System

controls the automatic functions of our body

divided into two categories: sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous systems

compare: Somatic Nervous System

Sympathetic Nervous System

part of the Autonomic Nervous System

mobilizes our body to respond to stress

compare: Parasympathetic Nervous System

Parasympathetic Nervous System

part of the Autonomic Nervous System

slowing body down after a stress response

compare: Sympathetic Nervous System

Phineas Gage

a railroad worker involved in an accident that damaged the front part of his brain

lesioning

the removal or destruction of part of the brain

example: frontal lobotomy

frontal lobotomy

type of lesioining that was used to treat mentally ill patiens

electroencephalogram (EEG)

detects brain waves, used in sleep research

Computerized Axial Tomography (CAT)

a sophisticated 3D X ray of the brain

Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI)

a sophisticated 3D magnetic field image of the brain

Portion Emission Tomography (PET)

measures how much of a certain chemical parts of the brain is using

Functional MRI

combination of MRI and PET

hindbrain

structures in the top part of the spinal cord, controls basic biological functions that keep us alive

medulla

part of hindbrain

controls blood pressure, heart rate, and breathing

pons

part of hindbrain