Introductory Psychology CLEP

Psychology

Scientific study of human behavior and mental processes.

Answers philosophical questions about human nature.

Uses methods borrowed from other disciplines.

Wilhelm Wundt

German. Set up first psychology lab. Was a Structuralist.

Studied how people sense and perceive world around them.

Structualists

Believed that consciousness was made of basic elements. combined in different ways to produce different perceptions.

They wanted to discover the form or elements of mental experience.

introspection

Technique favored by structuralists for examining mental experience. Involves reporting one's own conscious thought and feelings. It fell out of favor, too subjective, not usable on children or animals.

Edward Titchener

Set up first American psychology lab, was a structuralist.

Functionalists

Believed mental experiences were adaptive, or functional for people. Believed behavior and consciousness allowed people & animals to adjust to environments.

William James

a most notable functionalist.

Current state of the study of psychology

psychologists study both the structure and functions of behavior. both are methods, are of many that are used to study psychology.

Approaches to understanding human behavior

Biological, Psychodynamic, Behavioral, Cognitive Approach, Humanistic

Biological approach

Focus on physiological and biochemical processes might produce psychological phenomena.

Psychodynamic approach

Thoughts, feelings and behaviors stem from the interaction of innate drives and restrictions on those drives. Most important drives according to Sigmund Freud are that of sexual and aggression.

[we have drives]+[society, limitations]=[conflicts]

how we approach conflicts determines personality.

The reason for much of your behavior are unconscious and rooted in childhood.

Behaviorist approach

Explains behavior in terms of learned responses to predictable patterns of environmental stimuli.

Pavlov (and his dogs) = classical conditioning

Skinner = operant conditioning

They study animals in order to understand people more often than the other approaches. They don't believe in expectations, feelings or thoughts.

Cognitive approach

reaction against behaviorism.

Focuses on explaining behavior in terms of expectations, feelings, and thoughts.

Humanistic approach

They believe that people are not machines based on genetic code, stimuli, or calculations, but instead humans have the desire for optimal growth & development (i.e. self-actualization).

They believe people are basically good and focus on positive aspects of development.

experiments

cause and effect relationships

independent variables

The "cause" & always involves treating subjects in at least two different ways

experimental group

exposed to cause

control group

not exposed to cuase

dependent variable

the "effects" of the cause

placebo effect

different behavior because the subject knows they are being tested/getting special treatment

placebo

fake special treatment

blind study

subjects unaware if they are reciving special treatment or not

double blind study

both experimenter and experimetee are unaware of who has recivied special treatment

correlational studies

assessing the relationship between two variables

positive relationship

high score in one variable results in/correlates to a high score in another variable (+1)

negative relationship

high score in one variable results in/correlates to low scores in another variable (-1)

correlation coefficient

(+/-)1, the higher the absolute value = more correlation, +/- indicates type of relationship, 0 is no relationship

surveys

participants fill out questionaries that ask about variables, researchers determine patterns

case studies

in-depth analysis of only one person (Freud used these a lot).

naturalistic observation

studying behavior as it occurs in real life settings

must be unobtrusive, and have inter-judge/inter-rater/inter-observer reliability (the confirmation of what is happening)

behavioral neuroscience

focused on communication between body parts, how behavior is influenced by it

nervous system

organization of neurons, transmitters, and brain structures that moves information throughout the body

neurons

pathways for communication (i.e. nerve cells)

sensory neurons

aka afferent neurons. They take in information and transmit to the spinal cord and brain.

motor neuorns

aka efferent neurons. They send information in opposite direction (away from brain)

interneurons

aka associasion neurons. They communicate with other neurons

cell body

keep cell alive and functioning, nucleus, etc.

dendrites

short fibers that take information from outside the cell

axons

fibers that pass information along to other nerve cells, gland or muscles

mylein sheaths

fats that surround axons and accelerates transmission of information

action potential

electrical impulse that activates nerves and sends messages

+outside, -inside cell

refractory period

the neuon has time to pump out sodium ions and fire again

neurotransmitters

chemicals contained within vesicles (sacs) that when released from the axon terminal cross the synaptic gap to next cells dendrites, continue relay

serotonin

controls arousal and sleep. low levels of this in the brain is typical of depression

agonists

drugs that mimic a neurotransmitter or make more by blocking reuptake

antagonists

drugs that block neurotransmitters receptor sites or inhibit release

CNS

brain, spinal cord, reflexive behavior and relays information. Central Nervous System.

PNS

sensory and motor neurons that connect the brain and spinal cord to the rest of the body. Divided into the SNS and ANS. Peripheral Nervous System.

Somatic Nervous System

allow you to operate in the external environment. carries info to CNS, carries info from CNS to muscles, etc. SNS

Autonomic Nervous System

regulates the internal environment, controlling glands, organs, etc. ANS.

ANS divisions

Sympathetic = fight or flight (prepares you for action)

Parasympathetic = rest and digest (slows your body down for rest)

Brainstem

spinal cord enters skull

controls breathing and heartbeat

thalamus

sits on top of brianstem and receives information on touch taste sight and hearing (not smell), sends info to higher brain regions

reticular formation

runs though both brainstem and thalamus and controls arousal and sleep (as well as filters incoming stimuli and sends info to other parts of the brain)

cerebellum

at the rear base of brainstem. adjustment of movements, coordination of voluntary movement

limbic system

sits near the cerebral cortex and comprises several component structures

hippocampus

processes memory

amygdala

influences fear and anger

hypothalamus

influences hunger, thirst, sexual behavior,

controls pituitary glad (a "master gland" which influences the release of hormones from other glands)

hormones

chemical messengers

this and the glads that produce this make up the endocrine system

cerebral cortext

the outer covering of the brain

primarily involved in motor, cognitive, and sensory processes

(divided into left and right hemispheres which are then each divided into four regions)

frontal lobes

coordinates movement and higher level thinking (such as planning and predicting) Also contains speech areas.

Broca's area

speech (when damaged a person can usually understand speech but not speak as easily as everyone else)

Wernicke's area

when damadged a person can physically speak but only with meaningless words

parietal lobes

involved in sense of touch, keep tabs on where hands and feet are (located on top of head behind frontal lobes)

temporal lobes

involve hearing (located just above and on either side of the ears)

occipital lobes

involve vision (located at the base of the skull)

sensation

transforming engery from outside stimulus to neural energy used for perception

perception

mentally creating an image of the outside world

psychophysics

area of psychology that addresses the topic of sensation, levels of intensity we detect stimuli, how sensitive we are to changes in stimulation, and how psychological factors influence our ability to sense stimuli

signal detection theory

our ability to notice a stimulus will vary based on psychological factors such as expectations, past experience, motivation

absolute threshold

minimum intensity necessary to detect a stimulus (detected 50% of the time it is present)

just noticeable difference

jnd/difference threashold is the smallest difference a person can detect

Weber's Law

the ability to differentiate between like differences deceases with increasing intensity or magnitude of the stimuli

sensory adaptation

less frequent firing results in diminishing stimulus. This allows us to attend to stimuli that matter and not to those that don't matter

feature detectors

detect specific stimuli, activate identification centers to understand more complex patterns

selective attention

too many stimuli to attend to so body is only aware of certain stimuli. reality is chosen organized and interpreted, not simply detected.

Gestalt Psychologists

discovered that the brain pieces together meaningful experiences out of fragments of sensation, mind fills in gaps in our sensations

Depth perception

allows to estimate distances between ourselves and objects we see (our retinas can only see 2D our brains do the rest) uses binocular cues and/or monocular cues

Binocular cues

requires both eyes, includes retinal disparity & convergence

retinal disparity

uses differences in images between right and left eye to gauge distance

convergence

extent to which eyes must turn toward the nose to gauge closeness of an object

Monocular cues

uses one eye only for depth perception (includes linear perspective, motion parallax, and texture gradients)

linear perspective

parallel lines appear to converge as they get farther away

closer together = farther away (like railroad tracks in the distance)

motion parallax

aka relative motion. apparent movement of stable objects as we move. fixation points are what you are looking at (these object move quickly when close to you and slowly when far away)

interposition = when an object partially blocks out another object and therefore looks closer than the object it is blocking out

texture gradients

objects closer have more texture, objects farther have blend together

critical period

time which exposure to stimuli is required in order for various perceptual skills to develop, even though many of these ideas are wired into our brains

general principle of sensation and perception

processing info about environment uses both a bottom up fashion (simple receptors to neural networks) and top down fashion (expectations, motives and cues down to raw data)

Consciousness

the state of being aware. reflecting on environment rather than just reacting to it (thinking, problem solving, learning and memory)

Circadian Rythm

rise and fall in predictable ways during the day, synchronized (these things have this: hormone levels, body temperature, wakefulness)

sleep

cycles through 5 stages every 90 minutes (stages named based on type and appearance of brain waves)

alpha waves

relatively slow and regular/awake stage

Stage 1

Slower breathing, irregular erratic brain waves. This sleep stage is 5 minutes long.

hypnogogic = drowsiness, floating or falling may be experienced

alpha waves are replaced by thetha waves

Stage 2

deeper relaxation and occasional bursts of brainwaves called sleep spindles and k-complexes. This sleep stage is 20 minutes long.

Stage 3

brain starts producing delta waves (large & slow), this is a transition to the next stage.

Stage 4

stronger more consistent delta waves.

Stages 3 and 4 are slow wave sleep, combined lasts 30 minutes (they are the hardest to wake someone during)

REM

After stage 4 sleep, they go to 3, 2, but then this stage for 10 minutes which is similar to stage 1 but breathing is more rapid and irregular, heart rate increases and eyes move back and forth

but, action/movement is blocked by brainstem.

rapid eye movement, sometimes called paradoxical sleep

They then go back through the cycle (stage 2, 3, ...)

Insomnia

difficulty falling or staying asleep

Narcolepsy

sudden and uncontrollable attacks of sleep during daytime/waking hours (sometimes falling directly into REM)

sleep apnea

when the person stops breathing intermittently during sleep, the lack of oxygen then wakes the sleeper (this can happen 100s of time per night)