Psych Exam 2

The youtube video about the twin boys with one of them being more feminine is an example of what?

the nature/nurture debate

How we study genetic influences on behavior?

evolutionary psychology, animal studies, human twin studies, longitudinal temperament studies (won’t be talked about)

evolutionary psychology:

study of behaviors and similarities of humans across cultures

evolutionary psychology has been used to explain what?

attraction, what characteristics people are interested in the opposite sex

according to evolutionary psychological bar plots….

women have greater parental investment than men, they need a man who has and will share resources

cross-culturally women want older men, why?

status and wealth increase with age, older men are more reliable

what’s a problem with evolutionary psychology?

all averages, they aren’t 100% true for everyone

in the youtube video about animals choosing either a “boy” or “girl” toy to play with, what was significant?

on average the boy animal spent more time with boy toys, while girl with girl toys; goes against what was found out about gender identity

heritability:

the proportion of variation across the population that we can attribute to genes

in the youtube video what did Susan Kane talk about?

introversion and how there’s nothing wrong with being an introvert

what emotions have some of the highest heritability rates?

positive & negative emotions; shows people are born into the world able to experience higher states of happiness than others

heritability of psychological disorders:

bipolar = .86, schizophrenia =.63, alcoholism = .54, major depression = .45, bulimia = .04

the way you think about nature & nurture should be how you think about a blizzard….

both hot & cold air make the blizzard. You cannot have one without the other

conduct disorder:

behavioral disorder of childhood that occurs at the average age of 10; associated with aggressive & antisocial behavior such as animal cruelty, stealing, gangs

conduct disorder environmental influence:

history of maltreatment/abuse; biggest prediction of this is family abuse

conduct disorder genetic influence:

low MAOA, high serotonin in brain

monoamine oxidase activity (MAOA):

metabolizes neurotransmitters that are highly involved in psychological function such as serotonin, when low it means brain isn’t breaking down serotonin as quickly = more serotonin in brain

authoritative parent:

highly accepting, high expectations yet appropriate (best one)

authoritarian parent:

high expectations, but rejection, not getting a say on what you want in life (leads to emptiness)

indulgent parent:

no discipline (main one leading to drug abuse)

neglecting parent:

people who hate being parents, unwantedness (worst one)

role of parents is _____ than that of peers

greater

4 theories of sibling differences:

competition for resources, social comparison, parental comparison, non-shared environment

competition of resources theory:

resources are scarce in families, so you need to get your parent's’ attention, leads to you finding something you’re good at that your siblings aren’t and pursuing that (usually in larger families)

social comparison theory:

we want to be good at something so we can say to our siblings we’re better than them, we gain self esteem when we downward compare & lose self esteem when we upward compare

parental comparison theory:

when parents compare one kid to another other than comparing the kid to the average; example is extraversion, one kid might be labeled extraverted by parent just because they’re more talkative than other child

non-shared environment theory:

not experiencing the same events although growing up in the same family; is parents are divorced and one kid stays with one parent more than the other

2 theories of gender role acquisition:

social learning theory & gender schema theory

social learning theory:

we learn social behavior by observing and imitating & being rewarded or punished (youtube video: kid imitating his father getting ready for work)

4 steps to social learning theory:

imitate; be rewarded; reflect/observe yourself; make decisions based on that (very passive theory, you only think about your behavior after you did it)

gender schema theory:

children form concepts of gender & children behave based on these concepts

4 steps to gender schema theory:

child is actively thinking; looks at the environment; they are aware there are 2 genders; then they determine which gender is which and act that out

developmental psychology:

branch of psychology that studies physical, cognitive, and social change throughout the life span

issues in developmental psychology:

prepared vs. unprepared (how unprepared humans are at birth), stability vs. change (does our personality change as years go by), continuity vs. stages (when we change is it in stages or gradual)

what preparations are infants born with?

reflexes & facial expressions

the 7 up series is an example of what?

stability vs. change

the 7 up series: Paul

at 7 didn’t want to get married because of cooking, he seems sad and empty; throughout years he has self esteem problems; ends up getting married; illustrates the stochastic model of developmental continuity versus change

the 7 up series: Nick

he was born into an environment and needed to find another environment that fit his abilities (born on farm, went to study physics) good example of person-environment transaction

basic characteristics of development:

decrease in egocentricity, move from concrete to abstract, increased capacity for symbolism

cognition:

all the mental activities associated with thinking, knowing, remembering, and communicating

schema:

a concept or framework that organizes and interprets information; understanding of world that allows us to navigate

assimilation:

interpreting one’s new experience in terms of one’s existing schemas

accommodation:

adapting one’s current understandings (schemas) to incorporate new information

how do parents play a role in accommodation:

help us believe we aren’t as helpless as we really are; zone of proximal development

piaget:

french psychologist, saw children developing in stages, each stage builds on previous stages, development is not continuous

cognitive development stage 1: sensorimotor

ages 0-2; children experience the world through senses & action; object permanence & stranger anxiety

cognitive development stage 2: preoperational

ages 2-6; children are able to use words & representational images but lack logical reasoning; pretend play, egocentrism, language development (youtube: older child able to reason with amount of water in cup, younger child couldn’t)

cognitive development stage 3: concrete operational

ages 7-11; children can think logically about concrete events, math, complex games; child is very much into rules of games because it’s a new capacity they have

cognitive development stage 4: formal operational

age 12+, youth can think abstractly, who am I? potential for mature reasoning

social development:

encompasses the changes in feeling, interpersonal thought, and behavior across the lifespan

Freud’s social development stage: oral

sexual: child seeks pleasure by breast feeding, sucking them, psychological: child is helpless & doesn’t understand it’s a separate being developmental arrest: very important to create illusion that world is at their command (borderline personality disorder)

Freud’s social development stage: anal

sexual: control of body & muscles, using the bathroom; psychological: there is a me & there is a you, developmental arrest: you need ‘superhero’ part, if not you get narcissism

Freud’s social development stage: phallic stage

sexual: pleasure of genitals, psychological: separate from parents, not all powerful, want to have kids with their parents, developmental arrest: if you can’t let go of attachment to your parent than you struggle in relationships

what’s the difference between boys & girls in Freud’s phallic stage:

boys, want to get rid of their father to have kids with their mother, girls want to get rid of their mother to have kids with their father

psychoanalytic theory:

peoples constant self hatred is due to their subconscious ego; vice versa

Freud’s social development stage: latency

crisis leads to identification with the same sex parent, leading to gender development & identity; boys & girls play with their same sex peers until puberty

Freud’s social development stage: genital

freud’s final phase, masculinity & femininity now set in place as males seek to identify with their fathers role & females with their mothers in order to seduce the other

harlow’s theory:

indirectly tested freud’s theory (youtube: monkey with cloth vs. milk, monkey chose comfort over feeding)

attachments:

refers to an enduring emotional tie between child & caretaker, involves desire of the child to be close to the caretaker, sense of security, feelings of distress when caretaker is absent

harlow’s isolation of monkeys experiment:

partially isolated: what you see in zoos, repetitive circling, blank staring; total social deprivation, 6 months = emotional shock when reintroduced, 12 & 24 months = inability to relate to other animals

what was the stranger situation experiment (youtube video):

when mother leavers her child (12-18 months) alone in a room of toys with stranger, child ends up rejecting stranger and longs for mother

erikson’s 8 stages of development: 1, trust vs. mistrust:

ages 0-1, Erikson thought the most important thing from this early stage is trust

erikson’s 8 stages of development: 2, autonomy vs. shame:

ages 1-2, once you feel safe than you can start exploring because now you have that safety locked in to go back too

erikson’s 8 stages of development: 3, initiative vs. guilt:

ages 3-5, once you start to explore the world you want to start exploring certain things and playing certain games

erikson’s 8 stages of development: 4, competence vs. inferiority:

ages 6-puberty, once you start taking initiative than you find out you’re good at some things

erikson’s 8 stages of development: 5, identity vs. role:

ages teens-20s, starting to look at all the things you’re good at and get an identity, I’m athletic = identity; I statement

erikson’s 8 stages of development: 6, intimacy vs. isolation:

ages 20s-40s, once you have an identity you ask the questions of whose right for me given who I am

erikson’s 8 stages of development: 7, generativity vs. stagnation:

ages 40s-60s, start creating either children or something else

erikson’s 8 stages of development: 8, integrity vs. despair:

age 60+, end of life and reflect on if you did good or not

Kohlberg’s moral research states:

as moral development progresses, the focus of concern moves from the self to the wider social world

Kohlberg’s moral ladder (bottom to top):

preconventional level, conventional, postconventional level

Kohlberg’s preconventional level:

morality of self interest

Kohlberg’s conventional level:

morality of law & social interest, only care what others think about you

Kohlberg’s postconventional level:

morality of abstract principles; thinking in a nuance way

problem with Kohlberg:

women are less moral to him, he set up the research specifically for a male world according to Carol Gilligan

human consciousness seems to be a product of:

our attentional capacity, our capacity for meaning, & our unconscious

freud’s idea on consciousness:

your conscious mind is driven by this huge part of unconscious mind (this is untestable)

meditation findings:

studies show those who have meditated for years are able to use their attention to achieve more intense levels of consciousness; no decrease in cortical thickness with age

meditation is more beneficial in what aspect?

interpersonal relationships

we only dream during what kind of sleep?

REM sleep

dream theory: #1 information processing:

we either dream to re-organize our brain OR to test out ideas in a safe environment OR to problem solve

dream theory: #2 physiological functioning:

our brain is just randomly firing images all over the place and we make a narrative with it

dream theory: #3 dreams are meaningful:

our dreams are trying to tell us something about our life that’s important; meaningful

freud’s dream theory:

dreams are about: wish fulfillment & discharge otherwise unacceptable feelings

manifest dream content:

remembered story line of dream

latent dream content:

underlying meaning to dream, it was very wild; would need therapist to help figure out true meaning

hypnosis:

social interaction in which one person suggests to another that certain perceptions, feelings, thoughts, or behaviors will spontaneously occur

dissociation:

split consciousness; part that is a hypnotized person & other part is person that’s watching the hypnotized person and knows it’s not true

hidden observer:

“other person” watching hypnotized person

hypnotized pain is ____ than pain reported by hidden observer?

less

conscious mind vs. unconscious mind:

conscious = serial processing, slow, accurate; unconscious = parallel processing, fast, less accurate

implicit social cognition:

mental operations, related to the self or other people, that happen automatically & occur without awareness

associative learning:

learning that two events occur together

classical conditioning:

2 stimuli (natural & neutral/conditioned) by pairing the natural stimulus with the neutral stimulus, the neuteral creates the same effect as natural

classical conditioning: unconditioned stimulus

natural stimulus; food in Pavlov’s example, naturally triggers response

classical conditioning: unconditioned response

unlearned, naturally occurring response to unconditioned stimulus; example salivation of Pavlov’s dogs

classical conditioning: conditioned stimulus

have to be trained, nothing to do with food (ex: ringing bell)

classical conditioning: conditioned response

same response as unconditioned response

how to use classical conditioning to treat phobias:

break connection between stimulus & response, due this by exposure therapy, to allow stimulus of clown be connected with relaxation in youtube video

classical conditioning 5 concepts:

acquisition, extinction, spontaneous recovery, generalization, discrimination