Psych 2 final

Psych Final

Humanistic theories

•  Humanistic theorists believe that personality is based on internal traits, some of which are learned and some of which are biological.

Biology

• amygdala, thalamus, visual cortex- 

• Quick and Dirty Pathway

• Speed: Fast and automatic.

• Route: Sensory input → Thalamus → Amygdala.

• Function: Provides an immediate emotional response to a potential threat, prioritizing speed over accuracy.

• Example: Aditya sees a shadow and instantly feels fear, preparing her to react (fight or flight) before fully understanding what she’s seeing.

• Purpose: Critical for survival, allowing quick reactions to danger without delay.

• High Road Pathway

• Speed: Slower and more deliberate.

• Route: Sensory input → Thalamus → Visual Cortex (or other sensory cortices) → Amygdala.

• Function: Allows for a detailed analysis of the sensory input before triggering an emotional response, ensuring accuracy in assessing threats.

• Example: After the initial fear reaction, Aditya's brain processes the shadow more carefully and realizes it’s just a tree branch moving in the wind, reducing her fear.

• Purpose: Helps avoid overreaction by allowing the brain to confirm whether the stimulus is truly threatening.

Brain process emotions

• Sensory Input: The sensory information (e.g., visual or auditory stimuli) first enters the thalamus, which acts as a relay center.
  
  

• Amygdala Activation: The thalamus quickly sends the information to the amygdala, which is critical for processing emotions like fear, anger, and pleasure.
  
  

• Emotional and Physiological Response: The amygdala triggers emotional responses and sends signals to various brain structures and organs, activating the fight-or-flight response or other behavioral reactions.

HPA axis

• The hypothalamus sends a chemical message to the pituitary gland, which releases a hormone into the bloodstream that reaches the adrenal glands. The adrenals then secrete cortisol, a stress hormone that increases blood glucose and prepares the body for injury by mobilizing energy.

Altruism

• Bilogical need to help people 

Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse

Criticism – Attacking your partner’s character or personality rather than addressing a specific behavior.

Example: "You never listen to me; you're so selfish."

Contempt – Expressing disdain or disrespect through sarcasm, mockery, or hostile humor. This is the most damaging of the four.

Example: Eye-rolling, name-calling, or saying, "You're so stupid."

Defensiveness – Responding to complaints with denial, blame-shifting, or playing the victim instead of taking responsibility.

Example: "It’s not my fault; you’re the one who didn’t explain clearly."

Stonewalling – Withdrawing from the conversation, shutting down, or giving your partner the silent treatment to avoid conflict.

Example: Refusing to respond or walking away during an argument.

Conformation Bias

• Tendency to search for, interpret, and remember information in a way that confirms one’s preexisting beliefs or opinions while ignoring or dismissing evidence that contradicts them.

• Politics: People may only read news sources that align with their political views and ignore opposing perspectives.

• Health Beliefs: Someone who believes in a particular diet may focus on success stories while disregarding scientific studies that show no benefit.

• Sports: Fans might believe their team will win after a streak of victories, even if statistics suggest otherwise.

Erik Erickson

• Stage 1: Trust vs. Mistrust (Infancy)

• Stage 2: Autonomy vs. Shame/Doubt (Toddler)

• Stage 3: Initiative vs. Guilt (Preschool)

• Stage 4: Industry vs. Inferiority (School Age)

• Stage 5: Identity vs. Role Confusion (Adolescence)

• Stage 6: Intimacy vs. Isolation (Young Adulthood)

• Stage 7: Generativity vs. Stagnation (Middle Adulthood)

• Stage 8: Integrity vs. Despair (Late Adulthood)

Myelination

• This process begins on the spinal cord during the first trimester of pregnancy and on the neurons during the second trimester. As discussed in Chapter 3, myelination is the brain’s way of insulating its “wires.”

• axons, like heavily insulated wire, can send information quickly. Nonmyelinated axons send information more slowly.

justification of effort

• Justification of effort refers to the phenomenon where people attribute greater value to an outcome if they have put significant effort into achieving it, even if the effort involved unpleasant or difficult tasks. In the context of joining a fraternity or sorority, individuals may endure humiliation and physical discomfort because they convince themselves that the membership is extremely valuable to justify the hardship they endured. This concept is part of cognitive dissonance theory, where people strive to reduce the discomfort of conflicting attitudes or behaviors by changing their beliefs to match their actions.

Situationism

• behaviors are determined more by situations than by personality traits.

Interactionism

• behavior is determined jointly by situations and underlying dispositions.

Yerkes-Dodson

• The psychological principle that performance on challenging taste increases with arousal up to a moderate level. After that, additional arousal impairs performance

• Upside-down U model

Normative vs. informational influence

• Normative: when a person conforms to the expectations of others to gain social approval or disapproval

• Informational: behavior is guided by information or cues from others when uncertain about the correct action, rather than by a desire to conform for social acceptance

Vygotsky

• Emphasize the role of social interaction and language in cognitive development. 

• Higher-order thinking develops through social experiences and the use of language, particularly through inner speech.

Big Five

• Openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, neuroticism

• Found to be relatively similar across cultures

Hardiness

• A personality trait that helps to cope with stress

• Commitment, control, challenge

Resilience

• How someone can recover and bounce back after adversity/ trauma

Mischels cognitive effective processing system theory

• CAPS suggests that personality is not about consistent traits across all situations, but rather about consistency in patterns of behavior when individuals are in similar situations

Self-Efficacy

• Albery Bandura

• Individuals belief in their ability to successfully execute tasks and achieve goals in specific situations.

• Confidence has control over motivation, behavior, and social environment

Theory of Mond

• Ability to attribute mental states to oneself and others to understand that others have mental states that are different from ones own

Fundamental attribution error

• A tendency for people to overemphasize internal factors, like personality and character, when explaining someone else's behavior while underestimating the influence of external factors

Perspective giving and taking

• Giving- sharing ones personal experiences

• Taking- imagining oneself in another persons situation or position

Socioemotional Selective Theory

• As people get older they perceive their future as limited and focus on emotionally meaningful experiences, while younger individuals are more likely to focus on information-seeking and pay attention to negative details

Conformation Bias

• Tendency to search for, interpret, and remember info in a way that confirms one preexisting belief or opinion

• Disregard evidence that contradicts them

Functionalism

• Williams James

• Mental processes help individuals adapt to their environment and emphasize the purpose and function of consciousness and behavior rather than its structure

Mind body problem

• Debate concerning the relationship between the mind/ consciousness and body/ brian.

• Doug belief that brain working aligns with materialism or physicalism

• Renee believes the mind is separate from the body- dualism

Operational definition

• Specifies how a concept is measured or defined in a particular study, providing clear criteria for how the concept is assessed