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What is psychology? Psychology is the scientific study of behavior and mental processes, focusing on how individuals think, feel, and behave in various environments.

Structuralism

• Definition: Structuralism is the first school of thought in psychology, focusing on breaking down mental processes into their most basic components. It sought to understand the structure of the human mind.

• Founder: Wilhelm Wundt (Germany, 1879). Wundt established the first psychology lab and used introspection as his primary method.

• Introspection: A technique where participants self-report their thoughts and feelings in response to stimuli.

Functionalism

• Definition: Functionalism focuses on the function of mental processes and how they help individuals adapt to their environment.

• Founder: William James (United States, late 1800s). James is known for his work on the psychology of consciousness and for writing The Principles of Psychology.

• Key Idea: Psychology should study the functions of behavior, not just its structure.

Modern Perspectives in Psychology

1. Biological: Focuses on how the brain, nervous system, hormones, and genetics influence behavior.

2. Cognitive: Focuses on mental processes such as thinking, memory, and problem-solving.

3. Behavioral: Examines behavior through the lens of learning, conditioning, and environmental stimuli.

4. Humanistic: Emphasizes individual growth, free will, and self-actualization (e.g., Maslow, Rogers).

5. Psychodynamic: Rooted in Freud’s ideas; it emphasizes unconscious drives, early childhood experiences, and conflicts.

6. Sociocultural: Focuses on how social and cultural influences shape behavior.

7. Evolutionary: Explores how natural selection and evolution have shaped the human mind and behavior.

Types of Psychological Professionals

• Psychologists: Hold a Ph.D. or Psy.D. and study behavior and mental processes. They may specialize in therapy, research, or assessments.

• Psychiatrists: Medical doctors (M.D. or D.O.) who can prescribe medication and diagnose mental illnesses.

Chapter 2 – The Research Enterprise in Psychology

Research Methods

• Experiment: A controlled study where the researcher manipulates an independent variable (IV) and observes its effect on a dependent variable (DV). This allows the researcher to determine cause-and-effect relationships.

• Correlational Study: Examines the relationship between two variables but does not imply causation.

• Naturalistic Observation: Observing behavior in its natural setting without intervention.

• Laboratory Observation: Observing behavior in a controlled, structured setting.

• Case Study: In-depth study of an individual or group.

• Survey: A method of gathering data from large groups via questionnaires or interviews.

Experiments

• Main Benefit: The ability to determine cause-and-effect relationships.

• Key Terms:

  • IV (Independent Variable): The variable manipulated in an experiment.

  • DV (Dependent Variable): The variable that is measured.

  • Control Group: A group that does not receive the experimental treatment.

  • Placebo: A fake treatment to control for placebo effects.

  • Single-blind: Participants do not know if they’re in the experimental or control group.

  • Double-blind: Neither the participant nor the experimenter knows which group they are in, reducing bias.

  • Confounding Variable: An uncontrolled factor that affects the outcome.

Correlational Studies

• Correlation: A measure of the relationship between two variables.

  • Positive correlation: As one variable increases, the other increases (e.g., height and weight).

  • Negative correlation: As one variable increases, the other decreases (e.g., stress and sleep).

• Strength of Correlation: Measured by the correlation coefficient (r). Ranges from -1 to +1; closer to these extremes means a stronger relationship.

Chapter 7 – Human Memory

Levels of Processing

• The theory suggests that memory retention depends on the depth of processing. Deeper (semantic) processing leads to better memory.

  • Example: Repeating a phone number (shallow) vs. thinking about its meaning (deep).

Rehearsal

• Maintenance rehearsal: Repeating information to keep it in short-term memory.

• Elaborative rehearsal: Connecting new information to existing knowledge to improve memory retention.

Tip-of-the-tongue Phenomenon: When you can't quite recall a word or name but feel like it's just out of reach. Best remedy: relax and wait; retrieval is likely to happen after a brief delay.

Forgetting Theories

• Poor encoding: Information is not encoded properly.

• Pseudoforgetting: Thinking you’ve forgotten something you never learned.

• Decay: Information fades over time.

• Interference: New or old memories disrupt recall.

  • Proactive: Old memories interfere with new ones.

  • Retroactive: New memories interfere with old ones.

• Retrieval Failure: Lack of cues makes it hard to recall information.

• Repression: Unconscious forgetting of traumatic memories.

Chapter 3 – The Biological Bases of Behavior

Neurons and Neurotransmitters

• Neurons: Nerve cells that transmit electrical signals.

• Action potential: An electrical impulse that travels down the axon.

• Myelin: Fatty sheath around axons that speeds up signal transmission.

• Synapse: Gap between neurons where neurotransmitters are released.

• Neurotransmitters: Chemicals that transmit signals across synapses.

  • Dopamine: Involved in movement, pleasure, and reward.

  • Endorphins: Involved in pain relief and pleasure.

Nervous System

• CNS: Central Nervous System (brain and spinal cord).

• PNS: Peripheral Nervous System (nerves outside CNS).

• Sympathetic: "Fight or flight" response.

• Parasympathetic: "Rest and digest" response.

Brain Structures

• Amygdala: Involved in emotions and memory.

• Thalamus: Relays sensory information.

• Hypothalamus: Regulates hunger, thirst, and homeostasis.

• Hippocampus: Key to memory formation.

• Medulla: Controls vital functions like heart rate and breathing.

• Corpus Callosum: Connects the two brain hemispheres.

Chapter 5 – Variations in Consciousness

Circadian Rhythms: Biological processes that occur on a roughly 24-hour cycle, like sleep-wake cycles. Melatonin: Hormone that regulates sleep.

Sleep

• Stages:

  • Non-REM: Stages 1-3 (progressively deeper sleep).

  • REM: Rapid Eye Movement sleep, associated with vivid dreaming.

• Sleep Disorders: Insomnia, sleep apnea, narcolepsy, etc.

Why We Sleep: Sleep is essential for brain function, memory consolidation, and overall health.

Dreaming: Theories include Freud’s unconscious wishes, activation-synthesis, and information processing.

Psychoactive Drugs: Affect the brain and consciousness.

• Stimulants: Increase CNS activity (e.g., caffeine, nicotine).

• Depressants: Slow down CNS activity (e.g., alcohol, benzodiazepines).

• Hallucinogens: Alter perception (e.g., LSD, marijuana).

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Chapter 6 – Learning

Classical Conditioning (Pavlovian Conditioning)

• UCS (Unconditioned Stimulus): A stimulus that naturally triggers a response without prior learning (e.g., food).

• UCR (Unconditioned Response): A natural, unlearned reaction to the UCS (e.g., salivation in response to food).

• NS (Neutral Stimulus): A stimulus that does not initially trigger a response (e.g., a bell before conditioning).

• CS (Conditioned Stimulus): A previously neutral stimulus that, after being paired with the UCS, begins to elicit a conditioned response (e.g., the bell after pairing with food).

• CR (Conditioned Response): A learned response to the CS (e.g., salivation in response to the bell).

Other Classical Conditioning Concepts:

• Extinction: The gradual disappearance of the conditioned response when the CS is no longer paired with the UCS.

• Spontaneous Recovery: The reappearance of the conditioned response after a period of extinction.

• Generalization: The tendency to respond to stimuli that are similar to the CS (e.g., a dog salivating to a different bell).

• Discrimination: The ability to distinguish between the CS and other stimuli that do not signal the UCS.

• Conditioned Taste Aversion: A form of classical conditioning where a person develops an aversion to a taste after it is paired with nausea.

Operant Conditioning (B.F. Skinner)

• Reinforcement: Strengthening a behavior by providing a consequence.

  • Positive reinforcement: Adding something pleasant (e.g., giving a treat to a dog for sitting).

  • Negative reinforcement: Removing something unpleasant (e.g., stopping a loud noise when a behavior occurs).

• Punishment: Decreasing a behavior by introducing an unpleasant consequence or removing a pleasant one.

  • Positive punishment: Adding something unpleasant (e.g., scolding a child for misbehaving).

  • Negative punishment: Removing something pleasant (e.g., taking away a teenager’s phone for breaking curfew).

• Primary Reinforcer: A naturally reinforcing stimulus (e.g., food, water, warmth).

• Shaping: Gradually reinforcing successive approximations of a target behavior (e.g., training a dog to roll over by rewarding smaller actions that lead to the desired behavior).

Observational Learning (Albert Bandura)

• Modeling: Learning by observing and imitating others.

  • Example: A child learns to tie their shoes by watching their parent do it.

• Bandura’s Bobo Doll Experiment: Demonstrated that children imitate aggressive behavior modeled by adults, suggesting that learning occurs through observation and modeling.

Chapter 10 – Human Development

Stages of Prenatal Development

• Zygote: A fertilized egg that divides and develops into an embryo.

• Embryo: The stage where the organs begin to form (about 2 to 8 weeks).

• Fetus: The developing human from about 9 weeks after conception until birth.

Teratogens: Harmful substances that can cause birth defects during pregnancy.

• Examples: Alcohol (can cause fetal alcohol syndrome), drugs, infections.

Jean Piaget’s Stages of Cognitive Development

1. Sensorimotor Stage (Birth to 2 years): Infants learn through sensory experiences and motor actions. Key milestone: object permanence (understanding that objects continue to exist even when out of sight).

2. Preoperational Stage (2 to 7 years): Children develop language and symbolic thinking but lack conservation (the understanding that quantity remains the same despite changes in shape). They are also egocentric (cannot take the perspective of others).

3. Concrete Operational Stage (7 to 11 years): Children develop the ability to perform mental operations and understand conservation (e.g., that water poured into a different container still has the same amount). Thinking is limited to concrete, tangible objects.

4. Formal Operational Stage (11 years and up): Adolescents can think abstractly, logically, and systematically.

Lev Vygotsky’s Sociocultural Theory

• Vygotsky emphasized the role of social interaction and cultural tools in cognitive development.

• Private speech: Talking to oneself to guide actions, important for self-regulation.

• Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD): The difference between what a learner can do independently and what they can do with guidance from others.

Lawrence Kohlberg’s Stages of Moral Development

• Preconventional: Morality based on self-interest and the consequences of actions (e.g., avoiding punishment).

• Conventional: Morality based on societal rules and approval (e.g., following laws and social conventions).

• Postconventional: Morality based on abstract principles and ethical reasoning (e.g., justice and individual rights).

Parenting Styles (Diana Baumrind)

1. Authoritative: High warmth, high control—leads to well-adjusted children.

2. Authoritarian: Low warmth, high control—leads to obedient but less happy children.

3. Permissive: High warmth, low control—leads to children who are impulsive and less disciplined.

4. Neglectful: Low warmth, low control—leads to children with poor social skills and low self-esteem.

Erikson’s Psychosocial Development Erikson proposed 8 stages of development, each involving a specific conflict that must be resolved:

1. Trust vs. Mistrust (Infancy)

2. Autonomy vs. Shame and Doubt (Early Childhood)

3. Initiative vs. Guilt (Preschool)

4. Industry vs. Inferiority (School Age)

5. Identity vs. Role Confusion (Adolescence)

6. Intimacy vs. Isolation (Young Adulthood)

7. Generativity vs. Stagnation (Middle Adulthood)

8. Integrity vs. Despair (Late Adulthood)

Chapter 12 – Social Behavior

Cognitive Dissonance (Leon Festinger)

• The discomfort felt when a person’s beliefs are contradicted by their actions. People are motivated to reduce this discomfort by changing their attitudes, beliefs, or behaviors to align.

Attribution Theory

• Internal Attribution: Explaining behavior based on personal factors (e.g., “She is late because she’s disorganized”).

• External Attribution: Explaining behavior based on external factors (e.g., “She is late because of traffic”).

• Fundamental Attribution Error: The tendency to overemphasize internal factors when explaining others' behavior while underestimating external factors.

• Actor/Observer Bias: The tendency for individuals to attribute their own actions to external factors but others’ actions to internal factors.

Conformity (Asch’s Study)

• Normative Social Influence: Conforming to gain approval or avoid rejection.

• Informational Social Influence: Conforming because we believe others are correct in their judgments.

Obedience (Milgram’s Study)

• Milgram’s experiment showed that people are likely to obey authority figures, even when asked to perform actions that conflict with personal conscience (e.g., administering what they believed were harmful shocks to others).

Bystander Effect & Diffusion of Responsibility

• People are less likely to help others in an emergency when other people are present. Diffusion of responsibility occurs when the presence of others reduces the personal responsibility felt by individuals to act.

Group Polarization: The tendency for a group’s prevailing attitudes to become more extreme after group discussions.

Stereotypes, Prejudice, and Discrimination

• Stereotypes: Beliefs about a group of people, often oversimplified and generalized.

• Prejudice: Negative attitudes toward a group based on their membership in that group.

• Discrimination: Unfair treatment based on group membership.

• Theories of Prejudice:

  • Learning Theory: Prejudice is learned through socialization.

  • In-group Bias: Favoring one's own group over others.

  • Realistic Conflict Theory: Prejudice arises from competition for limited resources.

  • Scapegoating: Blaming an out-group for problems faced by the in-group.

Compliance Techniques

• Foot-in-the-door: Getting a person to agree to a small request before asking for a larger one.

• Door-in-the-face: Making a large request that is expected to be refused, followed by a smaller, more reasonable request.

• Low-balling: Offering a product at a low price and then increasing the price after commitment.

• That’s-not-all: Offering a product at an inflated price and then offering additional items for free, making it seem like a better deal.

• Reciprocity Norm: People are more likely to comply when they have received a favor or gift first.

Chapter 13 – Psychological Disorders

Models of Abnormality

• Biological Model: Suggests that psychological disorders have a genetic or physiological basis.

• Psychological Model: Focuses on internal factors like thoughts, feelings, and experiences.

• Sociocultural Model: Emphasizes the impact of society and culture on mental health.