PSYCH 10 MIDTERM 1 FLASHCARDS

Charles Darwin

natural selection on physical and behavioral traits ("survival of the fittest")

Phrenology

earliest form of mapping the brain according to mental traits (very flawed)

Phineas Cage

metal tamping rod stabbed up through his left eye and through the frontal lobe; consequences: became more impulsive and couldn't go through with his plans

Wilhelm Wundt

1st experimental psychology lab; structuralism; Edward Titchener was his student

Structuralism

analysis of the conscious experience by breaking it down into its basic elements (through introspection)

weakness: everyone's perception of the world is different --> makes introspection flawed, difficult to access subconscious of everyone

Introspection

examining and documenting every aspect of one's own thoughts and feelings

William James

functionalism; influenced by Darwin's Theory of Evolution

Functionalism

study of the purpose and function of behaviors/mental processes; what the mind does

Behaviorism

study of only observable behavior; what is the stimulus and response (nothing about what the subject is thinking about)

Psychoanalytic Theory

a theory to explain how behavior and personality are influenced by unconscious processes; iceberg (tip: conscious, rest: the unconscious (use therapy like hypnosis))

Sigmund Freud

psychoanalytic theory; study the unconscious mind

Cross-Cultural Psychology

a field of psychology that draws comparisons about individual & group behaviors across different cultures

W estern
E ducated
I ndustrialized
R ich
D emocratic

Modern Psychology

biological/physiological/neurological, cognitive, developmental, social

Hindsight Bias

"i knew it" bias; belief of an outcome after it occurred; obvious answers once known

Scientific vs Correlational Designs

Scientific:
- have a defined independent and dependent variable
- experimentally manipulating IV to observe impact on DV
- can infer causation
- random assignment

Correlational:
- have two variables: predictor and outcome variables
- looking at correlation between two variables (no "cause" in outcome)
- measures strength of relationship between two variables
- positive, negative, zero correlation

Placebo Effect

receiving a particular treatment will affect human behavior (ex: sugar pill used to treat depression --> potentially helps human feel better)

Experimenter Bias

experimenter's expectations subconsciously influence how they behave/treat participants --> influences outcome

Rosenthal & Fode (1963)

rat experiment; smarter rats were treated better than the "dumb" rats --> influenced smarter rats to do better

Demand Characteristics

participants form an interpretation of the experiment's purpose --> subconsciously change their behavior to fit interpretation

Hawkthorne Effect

workers behaved differently because they knew they were being observed, compared to when they didn't know they were being observed

Converging Operations

research strategy where a variety of research techniques were used to investigate/converge upon a particular experimental/research result

Replication

process of repeating a study --> finding similar outcome each time

Dualist perspective

Descartes; mind & body are separate; thought that pineal gland was where the ind and body interacted

Major Brain Regions

Forebrain, Midbrain, Hindbrain

Hindbrain

Cerebellum, Medulla, Reticular formation, Pons

Cerebellum

controls motor skills; first to be affected by alcohol; "I'm not drunk, my cerebellum is drunk!"

Medulla

maintains internal bodily systems; controls heart rate, respiration, and circulation; "If medullum damaged, ME Die"

Reticular Formation

controls sleep, wakefulness, and arousal; damaged --> coma; "rest"-icular formation

Midbrain

tegmentum, tectum; responsible for response to stimulus

Forebrain

Thalamus, Hypothalamus, Basal Ganglia, Hippocampus, Amygdala

Thalamus

filters and transmits sensory info (except sense of smell)

Hypothalamus

triggers flight or fight response; Fighting, Feeding, Fleeing, F***ing (mating); "hypo"thermia

Basal Ganglia

directs intentional movement (conscious); "play the bass" intentionally

Hippocampus

responsible for creating and integrating new memories; looks like a seahorse

Amygdala

controls emotional processes; "Amy" is emotional

Somatosensory Cortex

controls how sensitive your body parts are; more sensitive body part --> larger portion of cortex dedicated to that part

Motor Cortex

controls the skeletal & muscular movements; works with basal ganglia for intentional movements

Lobes

Frontal - controls high functions; remember Phineas Cage
Temporal - primary auditory cortex
Occipital - primary visual cortex
Parietal - primary sensory cortex

Language Brain Areas

Bronca's Area - controls speech execution (Bronca's Aphasia)
Wernicke's Area - controls hearing/reading comprehension (Wernicke's Aphasia)

Split Brain characteristics

Left side of brain controls language execution, while right side controls visual/spatial relationships. For example, if there is word "cow" on the left side and a picture of a hammer on the right, a split brain patient would see a cow but say hammer.

Neurons

nerve cells that receive and transmit sensory information

Parts of Neuron

Cell Body: coordinates info-processing tasks and keeps cell alive
Dendrites: receive info from other neurons and relays to cell body
Axon: carries info to other neurons, muscles, or glands
Synapse: region between axon of one neuron and dendrites of another
Myelin Sheath: fatty sheath that insulates axons; allows for increased speed/efficiency of neural communication (when damaged --> multiple sclerosis)

Neuron Sending & Receiving Process

Action Potential (electrical signal that is conducted along neuron's axon to synapse; repolarization) & Transmission across synapse

Hodgkin & Huxley

studied neural impulse of resting potential using squid axons (when axon stimulated --> depolarization)

Neurotransmitters

Excitatory: increase the likelihood of an action potential
Inhibitory: decrease the likelihood of an action potential

Examples: Acetylcholine (Ach: voluntary motor control), Dopamine (regulates motor behavior, motivation, pleasure, emotional arousal), Serotonin (regulates sleep, wakefulness, eating behavior)

How do we experience strong/weak sensations?

Strength of sensations are determined by the rate of firing and the number of neurons stimulated

Drugs that affect neurotransmitters

Agonist: drugs that increase action of neurotransmitter
Antagonist: drugs that diminish the function of neurotransmitter (botox = Ach antagonist)

Brain study techniques

MRI: produces high-quality images of brain structure
fMRI: examines changes in brain activity by measuring blood's oxygen levels (great location-wise, poor timing-wise)
EEG: electrical activity from large populations of active neurons (direct measure of neural activity; poor location-wise, great timing-wise)

Sensation vs Perception

Stimulus: physical processing of environmental stimuli by sense organs
Perception: psychological process of interpreting sensory information

Stimululs --> sensory receptors --> neural impulses --> perception

Psychophysics

methods that relate physical characteristics of stimulus to observer's perception (threshold)

Factors that influence perception

absolute threshold, JND, expectations, signal detection theory, sensory adaption, attention

Absolute threshold

smallest amount of stimulation needed for detection by sense

Just noticeable difference (JND; difference threshold)

minimum difference between two stimuli needed to detect a difference between them 50% of the time

Top-down processing vs Bottom-up processins

Top-down: perceptions influenced by our expectations/prior knowledge
Bottom-up: perceptions influenced when we perceive individual bits of sensory information & use them to construct a more complex message

Signal Detection Theory

response to a stimulus depends on person's sensitivity and on a person's decision criteria (person's experience, expectations, motivation, etc.)

Sensory Adaption

diminished sensitivity as a result of constant or recurring stimuli

Attention

Selective attention: focusing on one particular task/event
Inattentional blindness: a failure to perceive objects that are not the focus of attention
Change blindness: failure to detect changes to the visual details of a scene

Retina

photoreceptors transform light into a neural signal (transduction) --> ganglion cells gather info from photoreceptors --> message sent to brain via optic nerve

Rods vs Cones

cones: center of retina, low sensitivity in dim light, high color sensitivity, high detail sensitivity
rods: periphery, high sensitivity in dim light, low color sensitivity, low detail sensitivity (a lot more rods than cones)

Color Vision

trichromatic: level of the cones
opponent process: level of ganglion cells, LGN, visual cortex

Vision pathway

signal --> optic nerve --> brain --> passes through thalamus --> sends to primary visual cortex

Hubel & Wiesel (Feature Detection Cells)

neurons in V1 area of primary visual cortex (respond selectively to specific features)

Visual Processing Streams

Dorsal: "Where pathway" (helps us do things that need visual guidance)
Ventral: "What pathway" (helps with identifying what an object, who someone is)

Damage to Ventral Pathway

Visual agnosia: inability to recognize objects
Prosopagnosia: inability to recognize familiar faces

Monocular Depth Cues

helps us perceive depth using one eye (linear perspective, interposition, lights & shadows)

Binocular Depth Cues

Retinal disparity: different retinal images each eye receives based on its different perspective (coordination between both eyes)
Convergence: when a person views a nearby object, the eye muscles turn the eyes inward

Size constancy

the tendency to interpret an object as always being the same actual size, regardless of its distance (due to monocular depth cues)

Brightness Constancy

the tendency to perceive the apparent brightness of an object as the same even when the light conditions change (due to monocular depth cues)