PSYCH100: EXAM 1

When you are asked to describe in as much detail as you can what you are experiencing, you are being asked to _____.

introspect

Wilhelm ____ created the first psychology laboratory

Wundt

Which perspective focuses on uncovering the fundamental mental components of perception, consciousness, thinking, emotions, and other kinds of mental states?

structuralism

Compared to structuralist, a _____ would be most interested in the function of the emotion of fear in preparing us to deal with emergency situations.

functionalist

Functionalism concentrates on what the mind does and how ______ functions.

behavior

What was the movement founded by William James?

functionalism

Hermann Ebbinghaus and Max ______ led the gestalt movement.

Wertheimer

A gestalt psychologist interested in perception would suggest that

the whole is different from the sum of its parts.

The cognitive perspective _____.

focuses on how people think, understand, and know about the world

A psychologist taking the humanistic perspective to study how people change during college would be most interested in which of the following?

The student's striving to reach his or her full potential.

Which perspective in psychology focuses on nurture over nature?

Behavioral

Gestalt psychologists have made substantial contributions to our understanding of:

perception

What group was barred from many psychology graduate programs in the early 1900s?

What are the five perspectives in psychology that are most practiced today?

Cognitive

Neuroscience

Behavioral

Psychodynamic

Humanistic

Which psychological perspective examines how the brain and the nervous system affect behavior?

Neuroscience perspective

Which perspective is being practiced when a psychologist focuses on the activities a person is engaging in, and not the thoughts or feelings the person has?

Behavioral

Someone taking the nature side of the nature versus nurture debate is arguing for the importance of ______.

inheritance

The cognitive perspective would most likely compare the human brain to a:

computer

Which perspective in psychology takes the view of both nature and nurture?

cognitive

The ______ perspective in psychology considers how the body's functioning affects hopes and fears.

neuroscience

Each theoretical perspective has a position somewhere on the "nature vs. nurture" debate. Which of the following perspectives would likely emphasize nurture more than nature?

humanistic

behavioral

what is an example of correlational research?

SAT scores are related to GPA (research is diff than an experiment, which has more than one condition)

Scores in bowling go up as ability goes up. This is an example of _____.

a positive correlation

True or false: Deception in psychological research is not acceptable.

false

A psychologist has identified a question of interest for a scientific research study. Which of the following would be part of the process of formulating an explanation?

Develop a hypothesis

List the steps in the scientific method in the correct order.

1. identify a question

2. develop a hypothesis

3. test the hypothesis

4. communicate findings

Before it can be conducted, all psychological research is subject to review by

an independent panel

____ are broad explanations and predictions concerning phenomena of interest.

theories

_____ stem from theories

hypotheses

Which of the following are disadvantages of using college students in psychological research?

College students are a relatively homogeneous sample; results may not apply to a more general population.

Bias is least likely when conducting drug studies that involve _____.

both a double-blind procedure and a placebo

When a researcher wants to correlate tension with depression, she develops tests that measure these two emotional states. The tests are her _________ of the variables she is interested in.

operational definitions

There are many different ways to define alcoholism, each of which has advantages and disadvantages. Thus, it is not surprising that there may be many _________ this concept.

operational definitions of

True or false: A disadvantage of theories is they do not provide a unified, coherent framework with which to understand phenomena.

false

_________ research is research that uses existing data.

Archival

Which of the following is an example of archival research?

A study examining ethnic differences in neighborhoods using census data.

What type of research methodology involves watching and documenting people's behavior, without changing the situation?

Naturalistic observation

When using naturalistic observation, we can sample typical behavior in a situation...

but lose control of other factors

College students often participate in psychological research, limiting the ____ of such work.

generalization

In ______ research, a sample of people complete questionnaires about their thoughts, feelings, and/or behavior.

survey

One pitfall of survey research is that if a sample of a(n) ______ is not representative, the results will be inaccurate.

population

a ____ study is an in-depth analysis of an individual or small group of people.

case (not easily generalizable to the general population)

Behaviors, events or other characteristics that can change or vary in a study are called

variables

The change that an experimenter deliberately produces in an experiment is the experimental

manipulation/treatment

Why is random so important for determining cause and effect?

It allows the researcher to be more confident that the outcomes are due to the independent variable, not other participant characteristics.

Random assignment is a procedure in which ____ are assigned to either the treatment or control group on the basis of chance.

participants

Why does deception pose a risk to ethical research?

It makes it harder to get informed consent from participants.

what are the four key safeguards outlined by the American Psychological Association to protect human subjects?

1. Participants must be informed about the nature of procedures before the experiment

2. Participants have a right to privacy regarding their behavior

3. Participants must be protected from physical and mental harm

4. Participants must be participating completely voluntarily

Dr. Langley unintentionally transmits his expectations to his participants in an experiment. Which of the following best describes what type of bias is occurring?

Experimental bias

what are some benefits of using a double-blind procedure?

• Minimizing the impact of experimenter expectations

• Minimizing the impact of participant expectations

When a friend taps you on your shoulder from behind and you turn to greet him or her, what type of neuron activated your muscles so you could turn around?

Motor (efferent) neuron

The dendrite is the part of the neuron that:

receives information (chemical messages from other cells)

A sensory or _____ neuron transmits information from the perimeter of the body to the central nervous system.

afferent

the ____ relays sensory information about the senses.

thalamus

Voluntary movement is controlled largely by the _____ area of the brain.

motor

Speech becomes halting, laborous, and often ungrammatical in ______ aphasia.

broca's

Wernicke's ____ produces difficulties with understanding others' speech and language.

aphasia

____ convey info within nervous system

neurons

The _____ stores a neurotransmitter until it is released.

terminal button

Neurons are physically held in place by the ____ cell

glial

______ communicate information from the brain and nervous system to muscles and glands.

motor (efferent) neurons

____ carry electrical messages

axons

The ______ helps to increase the velocity with which electrical impulses travel through axons.

myelin sheath

Injuries to the association areas of the brain can create language difficulties know as:

aphasia

What does the all-or-none law indicate?

That neurons are either on or off. There are no intermediate states.

During a resting potential, the inside of the neuron is ________ charged relative to the outside

negatively

During an action potential, the electrical charge within the axon changes briefly from:

negatively to positively charged

After a(n) ______ has passed through a section of the axon, the cell membrane cannot admit positive ions for a few milliseconds.

action potential

The speed of the action potential:

depends on the size of the axon and thickness of the myelin sheath.

It is possible that ______ are at the root of empathy and even the development of language in humans.

mirror neurons

Which part of the brain's core is responsible for relaying sensory information?

Thalamus

When absorbed by receptor sites, what type of message does a neurotransmitter deliver?

Either an excitatory or inhibitory message

A neurotransmitter is absorbed by receptor sites located on the ______.

post synaptic membrane

The is ______ the space between two neurons where the axon of a sending neuron communicates with the dendrites of a receiving neuron by using chemical messages.

synapse

Chemicals that carry messages across the synapse to the dendrite (and sometimes the cell body) of a receiver neuron are called

neurotransmitters.

Chemical messages that make it more likely that a receiving neuron will fire and an action potential will travel down its axion are called ______ messages.

excitatory

Binding to an enzyme, which degrades a neurotransmitter, prevents that transmitter from

activating a receptor site.

What part of the neuron conveys electrical impulses from its start to its end?

The axon

The neurotransmitter _____ is involved in muscle movement and cognitive functioning.

acetylcholine

The neurotransmitter ______ plays a role in memory.

glutamate

Substances such as Valium and alcohol permit the neurotransmitter ______ to operate more efficiently.

GABA

A deficiency of dopamine in the brain causes

Parkinson's disease.

_____ is a neurotransmitter that has been linked to sleep, eating, mood and pain.

serotonin

The primary means for transmitting messages between the brain and the rest of the body is the ______.

spinal cord

Which of the following is the primary inhibitory neurotransmitter?

Gamma-amino butyric acid (GABA)

the ___ division of the peripheral nervous system specializes in the control of voluntary movements and also communicates information to and from the sense organs.

somatic

As you are walking to your car in a dark parking garage at the mall, you hear a loud bang and are suddenly startled. What part of the nervous system was activated by hearing the "bang?"

Sympathetic division

The ______ division of the nervous system plays a crucial role during emergencies.

autonomic