General Psychology Pillar 2: Cognitive

Self-Reference Effect

The tendency for an individual to have better memory for information that relates to oneself in comparison to material that has less personal relevance.

Sensory Memory

Storage of brief, sensory events such as sights, sounds, and tastes. Serving as the first step of processing stimuli from the environment, this information is stored up to a couple of seconds. If the information is not important, then it is discarded. However, information deemed valuable is moved into our short-term memory.

Short-Term Memory

A temporary storage system that processes incoming sensory memory. Such information is either discarded or stored in a more permanent capacity.

Memory Consolidation

The transfer of short-term memory to long-term memory. This exchange can be achieved through rehearsal.

Rehearsal

The conscious repetition of information to be remembered.

Long-Term Memory

The continuous storage of information. Many argue there is no limit to the amount of storage here.

Explicit Memory

This component of long-term memory focuses on memories of facts and events we can consciously remember and recall.

Semantic

__________ memory is a type of explicit memory that deals with knowledge about words, concepts, and language. One example is our memory of who the president is.

Episodic

__________ memory is a type of explicit memory that deals with information about events we have personally experienced.

Implicit Memory

This component of long-term memory focuses on memories that are not part of our consciousness (such as memories formed through behaviors).

Recall

This type of memory retrieval refers to the ability to access information without cues.

Recognition

This type of memory retrieval refers to the ability to identify information that you have previously learned after encountering it again.

Relearning

This type of memory retrieval refers to the ability to learn information that you previously learned but may have temporarily forgotten. However, because you learned this information in the past, you will often be capable of learning it quicker than the first time (AKA muscle memory).

Equipotentiality Hypothesis

If part of one area of the brain involved in memory is damaged, another part of the same area can take over that memory function.

Amygdala

The part of the brain involved in fear and fear memories (memory storage is influenced by stress hormones). This region also processes emotional information important in encoding memories at a deeper level.

Hippocampus

The part of the brain associated with explicit memory, recognition memory, and spatial memory. Specifically, this region projects information to cortical regions that give memories meaning and connect them with other memories.

Cerebellum

This part of the brain plays a role in processing procedural memories (such as how to play the piano) and classical conditioning.

Prefrontal Cortex

The part of the brain that appears to be involved in remembering semantic tasks. Specifically, encoding is associated with left frontal activity while retrieval of information is associated with the right frontal region.

Arousal Theory

The idea that strong emotions trigger the formation of strong memories and weaker emotional experiences form weaker memories.

Flash Bulb Memory

A record of an atypical and unusual event that has very strong emotional associations. For instance, most people can remember where they were when they heard the news about the 9/11 attack.

Amnesia

The loss of long-term memory that occurs as the result of disease, physical trauma, or psychological trauma.

Anterograde Amnesia

The inability to remember new information after the point of trauma, this type of amnesia is depicted in Adam Sandler’s “50 First Dates.”

Retrograde Amnesia

The loss of memory (partial or complete) for events that occurred prior to the trauma.

Suggestibility

The effects of misinformation from external sources that leads to the creation of false memories.

Transience

Also referred to as storage decay, this type of forgetting refers to the accessibility of memory that decreases over time.

Absentmindedness

Forgetting caused by lapses in attention.

Blocking

This type of forgetting refers to accessibility of information that is temporarily blocked (such as tip-of-the-tongue phenomenon)

Misattribution

The source of memory is confused.

Suggestibility

False memories

Bias

Memories distorted by current belief system.

Stereotypical Bias

A type of bias that involves racial and gender biases.

Egocentric Bias

A type of bias that involves enhancing our memories of the past in such a way as to make ourselves look better.

Hindsight Bias

A type of bias that is characterized by the tendency to think an outcome was inevitable after the fact.

Rehearsal

Conscious repetition of information to be remembered.

Chunking

Organizing information into manageable bits/chunks.

Elaborative Rehearsal

Technique in which you think about the meaning of the new information and its relation to knowledge already stored in your memory.

Reflex

A motor/neural reaction to a specific stimulus. This innate behavior involves activity of specific body parts and primitive centers of the CNS (spinal cord and medulla). For instance, human babies are born with the innate behavior to suck.

Instinct

A behavior triggered by a broader range of events (such as aging, change of seasons, etc). These types of innate behaviors involve movement of the organism as a whole and thus require higher brain centers.

Learning

A relatively permanent change in behavior or knowledge that results from experience.

Associative Learning

When an organism makes connections between stimuli or events that occur together in the environment.

Classical Conditioning

Process by which we learn to associate stimuli and consequently to anticipate events.

Acquisition

The initial period of learning when an organism learns to connect a neutral stimulus and an unconditioned stimulus.

Extinction

Decrease in the conditioned response when the unconditioned stimulus is no longer presented with the conditioned stimulus.

Spontaneous Recovery

The return of a previously extinguished conditioned response following a rest period.

Habituation

Learning not to respond to a stimulus that is presented repeatedly without change.

Stimulus Generalization

When an organism demonstrates the conditioned response to stimuli that are similar to the conditioned stimulus. For instance, when Little Albert was conditioned to fear the white rabbit (because he repeatedly heard a loud noise when he reached out to touch the rabbit), he eventually became afraid of all furry things.

Operant

In __________ conditioning, organisms learn to associate a behavior and its consequences.

Primary

__________ reinforcers are those that have innate reinforcing qualities such as food, water, sleep, sex, and pleasure. In other words, the value of these reinforcers does not need to be learned.

Secondary

___________ reinforcers are those that have no inherent value. Rather, their value is learn and becomes reinforcing when linked with something innately valuable.

Fixed Interval

One form of partial reinforcement is __________ in which reinforcement is delivered at predictable time intervals (such as when patients take pain relief medication at set times).

Variable Interval

One form of partial reinforcement is __________ in which reinforcement is delivered at unpredictable time intervals.

Fixed Ratio

One form of partial reinforcement is __________ in which reinforcement is delivered after a predictable number of responses (such as when an animal gets rewarded with a treat after pushing a button 10 times).

Variable Ratio

One form of partial reinforcement is __________ in which reinforcement is delivered after an unpredictable number of responses (such as in gambling).

High, Steady

Variable ratio reinforcement yields ____________ (high/low) and __________ (steady/unsteady) response rates.

High

Fixed ratio reinforcement yields a ____________ (high/low) response rate.

Latent Learning

Learning that occurs but is not observable in behavior until there is a reason to demonstrate it. For instance, I learned the route my parents take to school, but I did not demonstrate my understanding of this route until I myself began driving.

Vicarious Reinforcement

Process where observer sees the model rewarded, making the observer more likely to imitate the model’s behavior.

Vicarious Punishment

Process where the observer sees the model punished, making the observer less likely to imitate the model’s behavior.

Attention

The cognitive process of selectively concentrating on one aspect of the environment while ignoring other stimuli.

Selective Attention

The act of focusing on a particular aspect of the environment while ignoring others.

Motivation

Factors that can influence perception by directing attention and influencing the interpretation of sensory information. For example, someone with __________ to see a particular outcome may perceive stimuli (and life situations) in a way that aligns with their goals.

Trichromatic

The ___________ Theory of Color Vision is a scientific explanation for how humans perceive and distinguish colors. This theory suggests that the human eye has three types of color receptors (cones) each sensitive to a specific range of wavelengths.

Color Mixing

The combining of signals from your three types of cones (short/blue, medium/green, and long/red), allowing your brain to perceive a wide range of colors.

Red, green, blue

The primary colors according to the trichromatic theory.

Hertz

Units of frequency (defined as one cycle/second).

Higher

____________ frequency sound waves are generally perceived as higher pitched.

Language

A communication system that involves using words and systematic rules to organize those words to transmit information from one individual to another.

Lexicon

The words of a given language.

Grammar

The set of rules that are used to convey meaning through the use of the lexicon.

Phoneme

A basic sound unit such as “ah” or “eh.”

Morphemes

The smallest units of language that convey some type of meaning.

Semantics

The meaning we derive from morphemes and words.

Syntax

The way words are organized into sentences.

Heuristic

A general problem-solving framework.

Anchoring Bias

The tendency to focus on one piece of information when making a decision or solving a problem.

Confirmation Bias

The tendency to focus on information that confirms your existing beliefs.

Hindsight Bias

A bias that leads you to believe the event you just experienced was predictable, even though it wasn’t.

Representative Bias

The tendency to unintentionally stereotype someone or something.

Availability Heuristic

The tendency to make a decision based on an example, information, or recent experience that is readily available to you, even though it may not be the best example to inform your decision.

Creativity

The ability to generate, create, or discover new ideas, solutions, and possibilities.

Divergent Thinking

Thinking outside the box.

Convergent Thinking

The ability to provide a correct or well-established answer or solution to a problem.

Flynn Effect

The observation that each generation has a significantly higher IQ than the last.