Studied by 18 people
Operational definition
A description of the specific procedure used to determine the presence of a variable
Validity
The extent to which an instrument measures or predicts what it is supposed to.
Russian physiologist Ivan Pavlov
Trained dogs to salivate in response to a sound, demonstrating stimulus - response learning.
Freud
Had a psychoanalytic perspective in which behavior is shaped by childhood experiences and the unconscious mind.
Reliability
Is consistency or repeatability of an experiment.
G Stanley Hall
Founded the American Psychological Association.
Descriptive Statistics
Numbers that summarize a set of research data obtained from a sample.
Participation
________ in a study should be voluntary, and not coerced or influenced as part of a grade, raise, or promotion.
Statistical significance
________ (p) is a measure of the likelihood that what happened between groups was not a coincidence, <0.05
American Psychological Association
Lists ethical principles and code of conduct for all psychologists.
Wundt
Studied the mind's structure and identified consciousness's basic elements- sensations, feelings, and images.
Nature nurture controversy
Whether our behavior is inborn or learned through experience.
standard deviation
How scores vary around the mean value.
Neuropsychologists
________ explore the relationships between brain /nervous systems and behavior.
scientific experiment
The manipulation of a variable and observation of the response.
modern psychology
Interaction with the seven approaches to explain behavior.
median
The middle score when the set of data is in order.
mode
The most frequent score in a set.
Roots of psychology
Can be traced to philosophy and physiology /biology over 2,000 years ago in ancient Greece.
Case Study
An in-depth examination of a group or individual.
Meta analysis
Combining the results of individual research studies to reach an overall conclusion.
Survey Method
Self-report data.
Clinical psychologists
________ treat people with both temporary psychological issues and chronic psychiatric disorders.
Social psychologists
Focus on how a persons mental life and behavior are shaped by interactions with others.
Humanists
Value feelings and believe people are naturally positive and growth-seeking.
Inferential statistics
Used to interpret data and draw conclusions.
Psychoanalytic theory
Explained mental disorders and personality through unconscious mind.
Demand characteristics
The clues participants discover about the purpose of the study, suggesting how they should respond.
Variability
Describes the dispersion of scores for a set of research data.
Double Blind procedure
A research design in which neither the experimenter nor the participants know who is in either treatment group.
Margaret Floy Washburn
First woman to complete her PhD in psychology.
Frequency polygon
A line graph that replaces the bars with single points and connects the points with a line.
Single blind procedure
A research design in which the participants don’t know which treatment group they are in.
Placebo effect
When participants experience “real” treatment, but isn’t.
Random Assignment
Gives every participant an equal chance of being selected for the treatment.
Sample
a subgroup of the population
Experimental group
receives the treatment
Control group
does not receive the treatment
Confounding variables
A factor other than the factor being studied, that might affect the study’s results.
Dopamine
Pleasure chemical of the brain that involves rewards and motivation.
Serotonin
Associated with mood and emotions.
Insomnia
________ is the inability to fall asleep and /or stay asleep.
Psychological dependence
The intense desire to achieve the drugged state in spite of adverse effects.
Electroencephalograms (EEGs)
Device that uses electrodes on the scalp to detect and record brain waves.
Positron emission tomography (PET)
Uses a radioactive dye injected into the bloodstream to detect neurological activity.
Pons
Transfers information between the cerebellum and other parts of the brain.
Glutamate
Involves thinking, memory formation and learning.
Psychoactive drugs
are drugs that affect the chemical and physical functioning of the brain, altering perception and behavior of user
Glial cells
are physical support for developing neurons, provide nutrition for and gets rid of waste.
Functional MRI (fMRI)
Measures blood oxygen levels to determine brain function.
Circadian rhythm
A sleep- wake cycle that repeats roughly every 24 hours.
Tay Sachs syndrome
________ produces progressive loss of nervous function and death in a baby.
Freud (dreams)
Analyzed dreams to uncover unconscious desires (many of them sexual) and fears disguised in dreams.
Stimulants
are psychoactive drugs that excite neural activity and speed up body functions
Unconsciousness
loss of responsiveness to the environment, resulting from disease, trauma, or anesthesia.
Cerebral cortex
Voluntary movement and higher-order processes.
endocrine system
consists of glands that secrete hormones into your blood.
Hypothalamus
Regulates variety of drives.
GABA
Slows/ calms the central nervous system
Lucid dreaming
the ability to be aware of and direct ones dreams, has been used to help people make recurrent nightmares less frightening.
Antagonists
Block a receptor site
Tolerance
decreasing responsivity to a drug.
Withdrawal symptoms
Intense craving for the drug and opposite effects of the drug usually induces.
Heritability
Differences in the appearance of several people due to differences in their genes
Agonists
Mimic a neurotransmitter.
Reflex
Automatic, involuntary response
Narcotics
Dull the senses and relieve pain
Depressants
Slow the activity of the central nervous system and provide relaxation.
Central nervous system
consists of the brain and spinal cord
Somatic nervous system
Voluntary movement from the brain to your muscles
Autonomic nervous system
Responsible for involuntary actions
Plasticity
Brain’s ability to constantly change both the structure and function of cells in the brain
Pineal Gland
Produces melatonin that helps regulate sleep.
Pituitary Gland
Primary gland in the endocrine system, regulated by the hypothalamus
Thyroid Gland
Produces hormones that regulate metabolism, found in the neck.
Adrenal Glands
Produce adrenaline hormones
Pancreas
Secretes hormones which regulate blood sugar that fuels all behavioral processes
Ovaries and Testes
gonads in females and males that produce hormones necessary for reproduction
Difference threshold
the minimum difference between any two stimuli that a person can detect 50 percent of the time—has been reached.
Subliminal stimulation
is the receipt of messages that are below one’s absolute threshold for conscious awareness.
signal detection theory
there is no actual absolute threshold because the threshold changes with a variety of factors, including fatigue, attention, expectations, motivation, and emotional distress.
Absolute threshold
the weakest level of a stimulus that can be correctly detected at least half the time.
Sensory adaptation
permits you to focus your attention on informative changes in your environment without being distracted by irrelevant data such as odors or background noises.
Transduction
refers to the transformation of stimulus energy to the electrochemical energy of neural impulses.
Perception
is the process of selecting, organizing, and interpreting sensations, enabling you to recognize meaningful objects and events.
Astigmatism
is caused by an irregularity in the shape of the cornea and/or the lens.
Bipolar cells
Rods and cones both synapse with a second layer of neurons in front of them in your retina.
Dark adaptation
When it suddenly becomes dark, your gradual increase in sensitivity to the low level of light
Blind spot
Where the optic nerve exits the retina, there aren’t any rods or cones, so the part of an image that falls on your retina in that area is missing.
Feature detectors
The thalamus then routes information to the primary visual cortex of your brain, where specific neurons
Parallel processing
Simultaneous processing of stimulus elements
Hearing
is the primary sensory modality for human language.
Amplitude
is measured in logarithmic units of pressure called decibels (dB).
Pitch
determine the highness or lowness of the sound
sound localization
The process by which you determine the location of a sound
frequency theory
the rate of the neural impulses traveling up the auditory nerve matches the frequency of a tone, enabling you to sense its pitch.
Somatosensation
as a general term for four classes of tactile sensations: touch/pressure, warmth, cold, and pain.
gate-control theory
Ronald Melzack and Patrick Wall’s ________ attempts to explain the experience of pain.
Kinesthesis
is the system that enables you to sense the position and movement of individual parts of your body.
vestibular sense
is your sense of equilibrium or body orientation.
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Flashcard (105)