Psychology Exam 3 - Terms & Definitions

Attention and its role in memory

Focusing your attention helps encode information more effectively, making it easier to store and retrieve later.

Multitasking

Doing multiple tasks at once, which usually reduces performance and memory retention because attention gets split.

Elaboration

Adding meaningful connections or details to information to improve how well it sticks in memory.

Rehearsal

Repeating information over time (mentally or out loud) to keep it in short

Working memory, how it relates to short term memory

Working memory is the active system that processes and manipulates information currently held in short

Retrieval cues and reinstating the context

Using external or internal reminders (like environment or mood) to trigger stored memories.

False memories and how to avoid creating them

Misremembered or entirely fabricated details that can be minimized by avoiding leading questions and suggestions.

False memories

Inaccurate recollections of events that may feel completely real to the person remembering them.

Forgetting curve, the timeline of forgetting

Memory fades rapidly at first after learning, then levels off over time without review.

Anterograde amnesia

The inability to form new long

Consolidation

The brain’s process of stabilizing short

Declarative and nondeclarative memory

Declarative memory involves conscious recall of facts and events; nondeclarative involves skills, habits, and conditioned responses.

Episodic memory

Memory of personal experiences tied to specific times and places (your “mental time travel”).

Perspective and retrospective memory

Prospective memory is remembering to do something in the future; retrospective memory is recalling something from the past.

Behaviorist theory of language development

Language is learned through imitation, reinforcement, and conditioning (like other behaviors).

Nativist theory of language development and LADs

Humans are born with an innate language acquisition device that allows natural language learning.

Linguistic relativity

The structure of language influences or shapes how people think and perceive reality.

Steps for problem solving

Identify the problem, define it, generate solutions, test solutions, and evaluate the results.

Bilingualism

Fluency in two languages; linked to better cognitive flexibility, executive control, and sometimes memory advantages.

Heuristic

A mental shortcut or rule of thumb used to make quick decisions or solve problems efficiently (but not always accurately).

Trial and error and why it is not always effective

Trying different solutions until one works; inefficient for complex problems because it lacks strategy.

Relationship between functional fixedness and mental set

Functional fixedness limits how you see an object’s use; mental set limits how you approach a problem based on past habits.

Overload of choices

Having too many options can make decisions harder, increase anxiety, and reduce satisfaction.

Reliability

The consistency of a test or measurement; yields the same results over time.

Validity

How accurately a test measures what it’s supposed to measure.

What Wechsler changed about intelligence testing

Introduced separate verbal and performance scales, allowing a more balanced assessment.

Cultural differences in intelligence

Intelligence can be expressed or valued differently across cultures due to environment, values, and learning priorities.

Heredity of intelligence

Genetic factors influence intelligence, but environment plays a large role in how that potential is expressed.

Reaction range and role of environment

Genes set the potential range for intelligence, and environment determines where within that range a person falls.

Drive Theory

Biological needs create tension (drives) that push behavior to restore homeostasis (balance).

The importance of hormones in hunger regulation

Hormones like ghrelin (hunger), leptin (fullness), and insulin regulate appetite and energy balance.

Learned preferences for food

Food choices are shaped by cultural exposure, personal experiences, and conditioning.

Parental investment theory

The amount of parental care influences mating behavior; the sex investing more is choosier.

Biological psychology evidence for sexual orientation

Research points to genetic, hormonal, and neurological factors influencing orientation.

Achievement

The motivation to accomplish goals, excel, and master tasks.

People who are high in need of achievement and how they approach activities

They set challenging but realistic goals, persist when facing obstacles, and value feedback.

Components of emotion

Physiological arousal, cognitive interpretation, and behavioral expression all make up emotional experiences.

Brain area associated with fear and conditioned fears

The amygdala is the primary brain structure involved in processing fear.

Mimicking facial expressions and how that affects our experience of an emotion

Facial feedback can intensify or influence the emotion you actually feel.

Cultural differences in emotion

Emotional expression and interpretation vary across cultures (some are more expressive, others more restrained).

Cannon-Bard theory

Emotion and physiological response happen at the same time, not one causing the other.

James-Lange theory

Emotions result from perceiving physiological changes in the body.

Schachter’s two-factor theory

Emotion is created by physiological arousal plus the cognitive label you attach to that arousal.