AP Psych

all ap psych terms

Behavioral Conditioning

Behavioral Conditioning

focus on consequences, how you behave knowing there's consequences

Cognitive Approach

focus on thoughts, difficult to measure

Biological Approach

focus on the scientific, chemical aspects of the brain and its pathways

Humanistic Approach

focus on each individual, taking life context into account, valuing free will

SocioCultural Approach

focus on how macro and micro cultures affect a person

Survey

gather lots of surface level data

Case Study

gathers deep data of specific groups/individuals

Naturalistic Observation

gathers authentic data when people don't know they're being watched

Cross-sectional

comparing groups, one point in time

Longitudinal

follows one groups over a long period of time

Experimental Method

only way to find causational relationship

Placebo effect

belief in the independent variable even when they weren't given it

Confounding variable

a factor other than the factor being studied that might influence a study's results

participant bias

people behave how they think they are wanted to behave

researcher bias

conduct research to skew results in a way they want or think should happen

hawthorne effect

people perform their best when they know they are being watched

descriptive vs inferential stats

organize and describe vs make predictions

nominal vs ordinal data

nominal - represent 2 or more distinct categories
ordinal - rank variables according to rank or order

interval vs ratio data

Interval data include numbers begin from an arbitrary starting point, no absolute zero, such as body temperature. Ratio data uses a scale where zero means none, like tumor size.

dichotomy vs trichotomy data

2 vs 3+ groups

Psychology

study of the soul/ mind - what is the mind made of?

Wilhelm Wundt

founder of psychology, his student (tichenesen) came up with structuralism

Structuralism

study of the mind by seeing what its made of (breaking it down)

William James

other founder, created functionalism

functionalism

study of the mind by seeing what it does

Psychodynamic (psychoanalytic) approach

focus on unconscious by freud

Classical Conditioning

focus on reflexes, how you react to somthing

reciprocal determinism

genetics are not destiny - environments affect people and their reactions affect the environment

hereditary

what you're conceived with

environment

what you grew up with

epigenetics

slow change; environmental pressures can change gene activity with changes metabolic processes and then affects the next generation

polygenic

many genes make up a trait

diathesis

psychological disorders may have genetic predispositions and can occur after an environmental trigger

maturationism

child development is genetic but the "when" is environmental

plasticity

brain changes and arranges itself based on environment

Endocrine system

glands use hormones to communicate with the body

hypothalamus

key to primitive urges - fear, hunger, anger, sexual desire - controls pituitary gland to regulate other hormones

hormones

recieves information and gives orders

pineal gland

produces melatonin which activates the sleep process

thyroid gland

regulates metabolism

adrenal gland

produces adrenaline - short bursts during flight or fight response

pancreas

produces insulin

ovary

produces estrogen and protesterone which controls reproduction and sexual desire

testes

produces testosterone which controls competition and sexual arousal

oxytocin

facilitates childbirth

cortisol

stress hormone that also helps with threats

leptin vs grelin

turn off/on hunger

central nervous system

brain and spinal cord

Brain

communicates and coordinates actions of the body; vessels carry nutrients and oxygen; protected by skull; fluid that surrounds acts as shock absorber

layers of the brain membrane (inner to outer)

pia mater, arachnoid, dura mater

spinal cord

transmittes messages from the brain; multiple columns of nerves, protected by the vertebrae

peripheral nervous system

bundle of nerves outside CNS

somatic system

sensory nerves that control voluntary movement and somatosensory organs

autonomic system

controls involuntary movements like breathing and heart rate

sympathetic system

emergency response to help with alertness in events

parasympathetic

calms down and relaxes body after an emergency

glial cells

½ of the nervous systems volume, don’t help with processing of information, only protect and provide nutrients for neuron

schwann cell

type of glial neuron that forms mylin sheath of the neuron

dendrites

recieve chemical information from adjacent neurons (made of soma - cell body, and the nucleus)

axon

long bundle of fibers that carries info away from the cell body - usually has a myelin sheath covering

nodes of ranvier

gaps between the myelin sheath that promotes action potential

axon terminal

end of the neurons that houses the neurotransmitters

synapse

space between adjacent axons

sensory neurons (afferent)

receives information from sensory receptors throughout the body and sends it to the brain (approaches the brain)

motor neurons (efferent)

sends information from the brain to the body (exit the brain)

mirror neuron

activated when we see others do an active (yawning)

neural transmission

how neurons send messages between adjacent neurons

resting potential

state when there’s more positive ions on the outside than on the inside of the neuron (environment outside is positive charge from K+ and Na+ and inside the neuron its negative)

permeability

process where positive and negative come together

action potential (firing threshold)

neuron fires impulse since positive charges sweep down the axon

“all or none”

once electrical impulse reaches intensity level, it will fire

refractory period

cell cannot fire again, need to wait to get intensity

reuptake

excess of neurotransmitters left in the synapse is recollected

neurotransmiters

chemicals in axon terminals that stimulate or slow the firing of messages (excitatory or inhibitory)

acetylcholine

enables muscle action, learning, memory - deterioation leads to alzheimers

dopamine

influence movement, learning, attention, emotion - oversupply leads to schizophrenia, undershupply leads to tremors and decreased mobility in Parkinson’s disease

seratonin

affects hunger, mood arousal, sleep - undersupply linked to depression

endorphins

linked to pain control and pleasure during great bodily stress - associated with OCD

epinephrine

associated with energy and sympathetic nervous system - high emotion situations, like adrenaline, connected to forming memories

norepinephrine

associated with sympathetic nervous system - increases alertness, blood pressure, heart rate, release glucose to support flight or fight

glutamate

major excitatory neurotransmitter involved in memory - oversupply overstimulates brain leads to migraines and seizures

GABA - Gamma-aminobutyric acid

major inhibitory neurotransmitters - undersupply linked with seizures, tremors, and insomnia

agonist (opiates - endorphines, L-Dopa - dopamine)

drug that mimics the neurotransmitter (produces and enhanced effect for whatever that transmitter does)

antagonists (Botox - acetylcholine, alcohol - glutamate)

drug that blocks the neurotransmitter from being released by terminal or attaching to receptor site (stops the transmitters actions)

Reuptake inhibitor (SSRIs - serotonin)

blocks neurotransmitter from getting absorbed back into axon terminal and produces more of neurotransmitter at synapse next time neuron fires

Major Brain Regions

forbrain, midbrain, hindbrain

hindbrain

essential for survival

medulla oblongata; Pons; cerebellum; reticular formation

medulla oblongata

autonomic functions(respiration, blood pressure, reflexive behavior)

Pons

autonomic functions (sleep cycles - falling asleep, communication between cerebellum and forebrain, bladder control)

cerebellum

“little brain” helps with balance and coordination, posture, implicit memory formation

reticular formation

attention, arousal, consciousness, sleep cycles - waking up

midbrain

not essential for survival, hidden inside brain

limbic system

emotional brain - thalamus, hypothalamus, amygdala, hippocampus

thalamus

sesory and motor relay station, routes signals to forebrain to be interpreted

hypothalamus (under thalamus)

maintains homeostasis (balance), regulates pituitary gland’s hormones (sex drive, flight or fight, social bonding, reward pathways

amygdala

processes emotional reactions - fear and aggression

hippocampus

memory formation, learning, emotional regulation

forebrain (cerebral cortex)

higher level thinking and processing - four lobes each divided into left and right hemisphere

frontal lobe

prefrontal cortex - thinking, planning, developing, motor cortex controls movement, broca’s areas - produces speech,

parietal lobe

somatosensory cortex - gets signals from skin, association areas - works together with other lobes