Psych Unit 5 Terms

Intelligence

The mental quality consisting of the ability to learn from experience, solve problems, and use knowledge to adapt to new situations.

Intelligence test

A method for assessing an individual's mental aptitudes and comparing them with those of others, using numerical scores.

General intelligence (g)

A general intelligence factor that underlies specific mental abilities and is measured by every task on an intelligence test.

Factor analysis

A statistical procedure that identifies clusters of related items on a test, used to identify different dimensions of performance that underlie a person's total score.

Savant syndrome

A condition in which a person otherwise limited in mental ability has an exceptional specific skill.

Grit

Passion and perseverance in the pursuit of long-term goals.

Emotional intelligence

The ability to perceive, understand, manage, and use emotions.

Mental age

A measure of intelligence test performance that corresponds to a given level of performance.

Stanford-Binet

The widely used American revision of Binet's original intelligence test.

Intelligence quotient (IQ)

A score that represents an individual's intelligence relative to the average score of others.

Achievement test

A test designed to assess what a person has learned.

Aptitude test

A test designed to predict a person's future performance based on their capacity to learn.

Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale (WAIS)

The most widely used intelligence test, containing verbal and performance subtests.

Standardization

Defining uniform testing procedures and meaningful scores by comparison with the performance of a retested group.

Normal curve

The symmetrical, bell-shaped curve that describes the distribution of many physical and psychological attributes.

Reliability

The extent to which a test yields consistent results.

Validity

The extent to which a test measures or predicts what it is supposed to.

Content validity

The extent to which a test samples the behavior that is of interest.

Predictive validity

The success with which a test predicts the behavior it is designed to predict.

Cohort

A group of people from a given period of time.

Crystallized intelligence

Our accumulated knowledge and verbal skills.

Fluid intelligence

Our ability to reason speedily and abstractly.

Intellectual disability

A condition of limited mental ability, indicated by an intelligence score below 70.

Down syndrome

A condition of intellectual disability and associated physical disorders caused by an extra copy of chromosome 21.

Heredity

The proportion of variation among individuals that can be attributed to genes.

Stereotype threat

A self-confirming concern that one will be evaluated based on a negative stereotype.

Memory

The persistence of learning over time through the encoding, storage, and retrieval of information.

Encoding

The processing of information into the memory system.

Storage

The process of retaining encoded information over time.

Retrieval

The process of getting information out of memory storage.

Parallel processing

The processing of many aspects of a problem simultaneously.

Sensory memory

The immediate, very brief recording of sensory information in the memory system.

Short-term memory

Activated memory that holds a few items briefly.

Long-term memory

The relatively permanent and limitless storehouse of the memory system.

Working memory

The conscious, active processing of incoming auditory and visual-spatial information.

Explicit (declarative) memory

Memory of facts and experiences that can be consciously known and declared.

Effortful processing

Encoding that requires attention and conscious effort.

Automatic processing

Unconscious encoding of incidental information.

Implicit (non-declarative) memory

Retention independent of conscious recollection.

Iconic memory

A momentary sensory memory of visual stimuli.

Echoic memory

A momentary sensory memory of auditory stimuli.

Chunking

Organizing items into familiar, manageable units.

Mnemonics

Memory aids that use vivid imagery and organizational devices.

Spacing effect

The tendency for distributed study or practice to yield better long-term retention.

Testing effect

Enhanced memory after retrieving information.

Shallow processing

Encoding based on the structure or appearance of words.

Deep processing

Encoding based on the meaning of words.

Hippocampus

A neural center involved in the processing of explicit memories.

Flashbulb memory

A clear memory of an emotionally significant moment or event.

Long-term potentiation (LTP)

An increase in a cell's firing potential after brief, rapid stimulation.

Recall

A measure of memory in which the person must retrieve information learned earlier.

Recognition

A measure of memory in which the person only needs to identify items previously learned.

Relearning

Assessing the amount of time saved when learning material again.

Priming

Activation of particular associations in memory, often unconsciously.

Mood-congruent memory

Tendency to recall experiences consistent with one's current mood.

Serial position effect

Tendency to recall best the first and last items in a list.

Anterograde amnesia

Inability to form new memories.

Retrograde amnesia

Inability to retrieve information from the past.

Proactive interference

Disruptive effect of prior learning on the recall of new information.

Retroactive interference

Disruptive effect of new learning on the recall of old information.

Repression

Defense mechanism that banishes anxiety-arousing thoughts, feelings, and memories from consciousness.

Misinformation effect

Incorporating misleading information into memory of an event.

Source amnesia

Attributing an event to the wrong source, leading to false memories.

Deja vu

Eerie sense of experiencing something before, triggered by cues from the current situation.

Cognition

Mental activities associated with thinking, knowing, remembering, and communicating.

Concept

Mental grouping of similar objects, events, ideas, or people.

Prototype

Mental image or best example of a category, used for sorting items into categories.

Creativity

Ability to produce novel and valuable ideas.

Convergent thinking

Narrowing problem solutions to determine the single best solution.

Divergent thinking

Expanding possible problem solutions in different directions.

Algorithm

Methodical, logical rule or procedure that guarantees solving a problem.

Heuristic

Simple thinking strategy that allows efficient problem-solving, but may be error-prone.

Insight

Sudden realization of a problem's solution, contrasting with strategy-based solutions.

Confirmation bias

Tendency to search for information that supports preconceptions and ignore contradictory evidence.

Mental set

Tendency to approach a problem in a particular way based on past success.

Intuition

Effortless, immediate feeling or thought, contrasted with explicit reasoning.

Representative heuristic

Judging likelihood based on how well something matches a prototype.

Availability heuristic

Estimating likelihood based on the ease of recalling instances.

Overconfidence

Tendency to be more confident than correct, overestimating accuracy of beliefs.

Belief perseverance

Clinging to initial conceptions even after discrediting evidence.

Framing

The way an issue is posed, influencing decision-making and judgments.

Language

Spoken, written, or signed words and their combination for communication.

Phoneme

Smallest distinctive sound unit in a language.

Morpheme

Smallest unit carrying meaning in a language, can be a word or part of a word.

Grammar

System of rules enabling communication and understanding in a language.

Babbling stage

Stage of speech development where infants utter various sounds unrelated to the household language.

One-word stage

Stage of speech development where a child speaks mostly in single words.

Two-word stage

Stage of speech development where a child speaks mostly in two-word statements.

Telegraphic speech

Early speech stage where a child speaks like a telegram, using mostly nouns and verbs.

Aphasia

Impairment of language caused by left-hemisphere damage to Broca's or Wernicke's area.

Broca's area

Controls language expression, located in the frontal lobe of the left hemisphere.

Wernicke's area

Controls language reception and comprehension, located in the left temporal lobe.

Linguistic determinism

Whorf's hypothesis that language determines the way we think.