psych midterm 2025

Nature

our biological endowment, experience-independent change (i.e. genetic factors, maturational timetables, hormonal changes, reflexes, instincts)

Nurture

our environment including physical and social experience (i.e. environmental factors, learning, culture, effects of experience)

Empathy

a person's capacity to understand and share the feelings of another person, and is a key part of emotional and moral development

meta-analysis

- a method for combining the results from independent studies to reach conclusions based on all of them

- statistical method used to summarize average effect size and statistical significance across several research studies

Open Science

making science accessible to anyone from beginning to end so other researchers can test your data, understand your methods, and scrutinize for fraud

WEIRD participants

Western, Educated, and from Industrialized, Rich, and Democratic Countries

Correlational Studies

Measure a set of variables and see if they're related... correlation not causation

Latent variable

something that wasn't directly observed but can be related causing error or contributing to the results of a study

Independent variable (IV)

manipulated by the experimenter

Dependent variable (DV)

behavior measured by the experimenter

Experimental Studies

Tries to hold other factors constant so their isn't the presence of latent variables so that you can more reasonably draw conclusions and causations and test real hypotheses

genome

each person's complete set of hereditary information

epigenetics

the study of stable changes in gene expression that are mediated by the environment

methylation

a biochemical process that reduces expression of a variety of genes and is involved in regulating reactions to stress

neurotransmitters

chemicals involved in communication among brain cells

cumulative risk

the accumulation of disadvantages over years of development

Descriptive studies

the observational studies of psychology IN CONTEXT, describes the behaviors of children based on what is observed

Longitudinal studies

Follow same children over a long period of time

Cross-sectional studies

Test different children at different ages

Habituation

Show something to a baby over and over until the habituate to it... this means their looking time declines to half or less to get them bored, then show them something new and see if they notice it and look longer

Looking-while-listening procedure

Show a kid something and tell them to look at it to measure their looking time and accuracy

Headturn preference procedure

Kids turn their heads to a side screen and if they do so they can look at stuff longer, if they turn away it stops

fNIRS: functional near-infrared spectroscopy

Shines near-infrared light into the brain, through the skull, and it goes into the cortex to show neural activity

EEG: electroencephalogram

Records electrical activity and voltage fluctuations on the scalp

MEG magnetoencephalography

This measures the magnetic fields created by synchronous neuronal curves

Computational methods

Can build mathematical models to simulate a particular behavioral phenomenon

Reliability

the degree to which independent measurements of a behavior are consistent

interrater reliability

indicates how much agreement there is in the observations of different raters who witness the same behavior

test-retest reliability

the degree of similarity of a participant's performance on two or more occasions

validity

refers to the degree to which it measures what it is intended to measure

Internal validity

refers to whether effects observed within experiments can be attributed with confidence to the factor that the researcher is testing

External validity

the degree to which results can be generalized beyond the particulars of the research

Replicability

the degree to which subsequent studies using the same procedure yield the same results as the original study

clinical interview

a procedure in which questions are adjusted in accord with the answers the interviewee provides

Random assignment

a procedure in which each participant has an equal chance of being assigned to each group within an experiment

Microgenetic designs

a research method that studies change in detail by observing a system or individual repeatedly within a short period, capturing high-density data points to understand how and why changes occur

epigenesis

the emergence of new structures and functions during development

embryonic stem cells

embryonic cells, which can develop into any type of body cell

Ectopic pregnancies

pregnancy in which the fertilized egg implants and grows in an organ outside of the uterus (most often in a fallopian tube), preventing normal growth of the fetus and putting the expectant parent at risk of life-threatening injury

cephalocaudal development

the pattern of growth in which areas near the head develop earlier than areas farther from the head

Teratogens

chemicals and environmental effects that impact the baby during pregnancy (ex: alcohol, drugs, lead, etc.)

does learning happen in utero?

Yes!

- Babies preferred hearing the book they had heard in utero for 6 weeks

- Preferred the sound of their mother's voice, of their own native language, the taste of familiar foods

- newborns oriented to pictures of correct looking faces before any chance for learning or vision are present

phylogenetic continuity

humans share many characteristics and developmental processes with nonhuman animals due to our shared evolutionary history

fetal alcohol spectrum disorder (FASD)

the harmful effects of alcohol consumption on a developing fetus, including characteristic facial features, intellectual developmental disorder, attentional challenges, and hyperactivity

colic

excessive, inconsolable crying by a young infant for no apparent reason

Apgar score

method for evaluating the health of the newborn immediately following birth based on skin tone, pulse rate, facial response, arm and leg activity, and breathing

low birth weight (LBW)

a birth weight of less than 5 1/2 pounds (2500 grams)

Neuron

cell specialized in sending/receiving messages within the brain and between the brain and body

Cell body

contains basic cell material and creates neurotransmitters, contains nucleus

Dendrites

receive input from other cells and bring it to cell body as an electrical impulse, receive messages

Axon

different lengths and connects between axon terminals and cell body, send messages

Synapse

connection between neurons that receive neurotransmitters

Myelin sheath

fatty sheet coating the axon that speeds up messages being sent

Neurogenesis

production of cells through cell division

Migration

neurons move to appropriate locations

Myelination

formation of fatty sheath

Synaptogenesis

the process of forming connections between neurons

Synaptic pruning

rarely used synapses are eliminated

Developmental Process in Brain

1. neurogenesis

2. migration

3. myelination

4. synaptogenesis

5. synaptic pruning

pruning vs. growth

Pruning = early brain development is drive by pruning of unused/unnecessary connections vs. growth = early brain development is driven by growth of dendritic arbors, synapses, and connections

Plasticity

the extent to which brain organization is flexible and shaped by experience

Experience-dependent plasticity

Process through which individual experiences lead to creation/reorganization of neural connections

Experience-expectant plasticity

The process through which typical brain wiring occurs, resulting from the typical human environment, available throughout human evolution

genotype

inherited genetic material

phenotype

the observable expression of the genotype, including both body characteristics and behavior

endophenotypes

mediate the pathways between genes and behavior

behavior genetics

the science concerned with how variation in behavior and development results from the combination of genetic and environmental factors

Heritability

a statistical estimate of the proportion of the measured variance on a trait among individuals in a given population that is attributable to genetic differences among those individuals

occipital lobe

major area of the cortex that is primarily involved in processing visual information

temporal lobe

associated with speech and language, and the processing of emotion and auditory information

parietal lobe

engages in spatial processing and is also involved in the integration of information from different sensory modalities

frontal lobe

the brain's "executive," is involved in cognitive control, including working memory, planning, decision-making, and inhibitory control

cerebral lateralization

The hemispheres are specialized for different modes of processing

arborization

an enormous increase in the size and complexity of the dendritic "tree" that results from growth, branching, and the formation of spines on the branches

Infant Motor Reflexes

- Rooting: stroke cheek - turn head and open mouth

- Sucking: object in mouth - suck

- Stepping: hold a baby upright - steps

- Babinski: stroke toes - toes fan out

- Grasping: object in hand - grasp

- Moro: loud noise or falling - arms out and then in

Fine-motor skills

small muscle movements

Gross motor skills

large muscle control

Dynamic Systems hypothesis

This theory considers the developing infant as a complex system composed of many interacting components embedded in a complex and changing environment... depict development as a process of constant change... emphasize children's innate motivation to explore the environment

Stages of walking

Cruising: walking while holding onto objects

Early walking: disorganized, jerky, recover balance with each step

Component skills for walking: balance, stepping, interpreting environment, motivation, nervous system, body proportions

Re-learning: balance needed for sitting, crawling, walking and biking (and parkour) does not have the same demands

Thatcher effect

Close for babies is easier than far, it is not possible for them to discriminate faces if they are not at a particular distance cause they cannot focus on a particular place

Perceptual narrowing

babies are at 5 months old equally good at telling apart animals as they are with humans

Sensation

the processing of information from the external world via receptors in the sense organs (eyes, ears, skin, and so on) and brain

Perception

the process of organizing and interpreting sensory information about the world around us

preferential-looking technique

a method for studying visual attention in infants that involves showing infants two images simultaneously to see if the infants prefer one over the other (indexed by longer looking)

contrast sensitivity

infants can detect a pattern only when it is composed of highly contrasting elements

Cataracts

clouding of the lends inside the eye

object segregation

the identification of separate objects in a visual array

violation-of-expectancy

a procedure in which infants are shown an event that should evoke surprise or interest if it is inconsistent with their prior knowledge

binocular disparity

the difference between the retinal image of an object in each eye that results in two slightly different signals being sent to the brain

stereopsis

the process by which the visual cortex combines the differing neural signals caused by binocular disparity, resulting in the perception of depth

monocular depth cues

the perceptual cues of depth (such as relative size and interposition) that can be perceived by one eye alone

binocular depth cues

our eyes have 2 overlapping fields of vision... disparity between the fields helps locate things

auditory localization

perception of the location in space of a sound source

perceptual narrowing

developmental changes in which experience fine-tunes the perceptual system to focus on the distinctions between stimuli that are most relevant in a person's environment

Constructivism

Children "construct" knowledge on the basis of their experiences in the world by combining rudimentary innate knowledge with subsequent experiences

Assimilation

children translate new information into a form they can understand, they fit something new into their current theories

Accommodation

children improve their current understanding in response to new experiences, sometimes this means they create new theories

Equilibration

the mechanism by which children balance assimilation and accommodation to create a stable understanding of something

Piaget Theory

Believed that children go through qualitative stages and that each stage is an improvement... set standard and you have to meet standard to advance stage

Piaget's stage theory

1. Sensorimotor

2. Preoperational

3. Concrete operational

4. Formal operational