| intrinsically motivation | Engaging in a behavior because it is personally rewarding, not for an external reward. |
| extrinsic motivation | an external incentive to engage in a specific activity, especially motivation arising from the expectation of punishment or reward |
| flow | mental state in which a person performing some activity is fully immersed in a feeling of energized focus, full involvement, and enjoyment in the process of the activity |
| critical period | stage in life open to specific learning, emotional, or socializing experiences that occur as part of normal development and will not recur at a later stage |
| fluid intelligence | to think logically and solve problems in novel situations, independent of acquired knowledge. the ability to identify patterns and relationships that underpin novel problems and to extrapolate these findings using logic. |
| crystallized intelligence | Crystallized intelligence is the ability to use skills, knowledge, and experience. accessing information from long-term memory. |
| Broca’s Area | Broca's area is recognized as one of the main language centers of the brain. production of speech and written language, the processing and comprehension of language. |
| Wernicke’s Area | contains motor neurons involved in the comprehension of speech. The Wernicke area is located in the posterior third of the upper temporal convolution of the left hemisphere of the brain. |
| grammar | in linguistics, an abstract system of rules that describes how a language work |
| syntax | the set of rules that describes how words and phrases in a language are arranged into grammatical sentences or the branch of linguistics that studies such rules. |
| morphemes | n. in linguistic analysis, a unit of meaning that cannot be analyzed into smaller such units. |
| phonemes | in linguistics, a speech sound that plays a meaningful role in a language and cannot be analyzed into smaller meaningful sounds, conventionally indicated by slash symbols |
| transduction | The transportation or transformation of something from one form, place, or concept to another. refers to reasoning from specific cases to general cases, typically employed by children during their development. |
| parallel processing | the ability of the brain to simultaneously process incoming stimuli of differing quality. the visual system in that the brain divides what it sees into four components: color, motion, shape, and depth. |
| recall | to transfer prior learning or past experience to current consciousness: that is, to retrieve and reproduce information; to remember. |
| retrieve | the process of recovering or locating information stored in memory. Retrieval is the final stage of memory, after encoding and retention. |
| mnemonics | any device or technique used to assist memory, usually by forging a link or association between the new information to be remembered and information previously encoded. |
| chunking | the process by which the mind divides large pieces of information into smaller units (chunks) that are easier to retain in short-term memory. |
| imagery | 1. cognitive generation of sensory input from the five senses, individually or collectively, which is recalled from experience or self-generated in a non experienced form.2. mental images considered collectively, or the particular type of imagery characteristic of an individual, such as visual imagery. |
| acronyms | an abbreviation formed from the initial letters of other words and pronounced as a word |
| hormones | a substance secreted into the bloodstream by an endocrine gland or other tissue or organ to regulate processes in distant target organs and tissues. These secretions include those from the anterior and posterior pituitary gland; the corticosteroids and epinephrine, secreted by the adrenal glands; and the sex hormones released by the reproductive glands. |
| narcolepsy | a disorder consisting of excessive daytime sleepiness accompanied by brief “attacks” of sleep during waking hours. These sleep attacks may occur at any time or during any activity, including in potentially dangerous situations such as while driving an automobile. |
| sleep apnea | the temporary cessation of breathing while asleep, which occurs when the upper airway briefly becomes blocked (obstructive sleep apnea) or when the respiratory centers in the brain fail to stimulate respiration (central sleep apnea). |
| insomnia | difficulty in initiating or maintaining a restorative sleep, which results in fatigue, the severity or persistence of which causes clinically significant distress or impairment in functioning. |
| night terrors | Night terrors are a sleep disorder in which a person quickly awakens from sleep in a terrified state. |
| split brain | a brain in which the two cerebral hemispheres have been separated by partial or complete destruction of the corpus callosum (see commissurotomy), thereby blocking direct communication between them. |
| lobotomy | incision into various nerve tracts in the frontal lobe of the brain. |
| learning | the acquisition of novel information, behaviors, or abilities after practice, observation, or other experiences, as evidenced by change in behavior, knowledge, or brain function. Learning involves consciously or nonconsciously attending to relevant aspects of incoming information, mentally organizing the information into a coherent cognitive representation, and integrating it with relevant existing knowledge activated from long-term memory. |
| norm | a standard or range of values that represents the typical performance of a group or of an individual (of a certain age, for example) against which comparisons can be made. |
| critical thinking | a form of directed, problem-focused thinking in which the individual tests ideas or possible solutions for errors or drawbacks. It is essential to such activities as examining the validity of a hypothesis or interpreting the meaning of research results. |
| self-disclosure | the act of revealing personal or private information about one’s self to other people. |
| belief perseverance | the tendency to maintain a belief even after the information that originally gave rise to it has been refuted or otherwise shown to be inaccurate. |
| psychological disorders | A psychological disorder is, broadly, a condition characterized by distressing, impairing, and/or atypical thoughts, feelings, and behaviors. |
| autism | a neurodevelopmental disorder characterized by markedly impaired social interactions and verbal and nonverbal communication; narrow interests; and repetitive behavior |
| cognitive impairment | any impairment in perceptual, learning, memory, linguistic, or thinking abilities. |
| fixations | 1. an obsessive preoccupation with a single idea, impulse, or aim, as in an idée fixe.2. a shortened name for visual fixation.3. in psychoanalytic theory, the persistence of an early stage of psychosexual development or the inappropriate attachment to an early psychosexual object or mode of gratification, such as anal or oral activity; this fixation limits the person’s ability to negotiate the tasks of later psychosexual stages. —fixate vb. |
| functional fixedness | the tendency to perceive an object only in terms of its most common use. |
| prejudices | Negative attitude toward another person or group formed in advance of any experience with that person or group. Prejudices include an affective component (emotions that range from mild nervousness to hatred), a cognitive component (assumptions and beliefs about groups, including stereotypes), and a behavioral component (negative behaviors, including discrimination and violence). |
| stereotypes | a set of cognitive generalizations (e.g., beliefs, expectations) about the qualities and characteristics of the members of a group or social category. Stereotypes, like schemas, simplify and expedite perceptions and judgments, but they are often exaggerated, negative rather than positive, and resistant to revision even when perceivers encounter individuals with qualities that are not congruent with the stereotype |
| therapy | remediation of physical, mental, or behavioral disorders or disease. |
| altruistic | an apparently unselfish behavior that provides benefit to others at some cost to the individual. |
| creativity | the ability to produce or develop original work, theories, techniques, or thoughts. |
| attitude | a relatively enduring and general evaluation of an object, person, group, issue, or concept on a dimension ranging from negative to positive. Attitudes provide summary evaluations of target objects and are often assumed to be derived from specific beliefs, emotions, and past behaviors associated with those objects |
| social loafing | the reduction of individual effort that occurs when people work in groups compared to when they work alone. |
| superordinate goals | superordinate goal1. a goal that takes precedence over one or more other, more conditional goals. 2. a goal that can be attained only if the members of two or more groups work together by pooling their skills, efforts, and resources |
| neural networks | a technique for modeling the neural changes in the brain that underlie cognition and perception in which a large number of simple hypothetical neural units are connected to one another. |
| brainstem | the part of the brain that connects the cerebrum with the spinal cord. |
| limbic system | a loosely defined, widespread group of brain nuclei that innervate each other to form a network that is involved in autonomic and visceral processes and mechanisms of emotion, memory, and learning. It includes portions of the cerebral cortex (see limbic lobe), thalamus, and certain cortical and subcortical structures, such as the hippocampus, amygdala, and septal area. |
| cerebral cortex | the layer of gray matter that covers the outside of the cerebral hemispheres in the brain and is associated with higher cognitive functions, such as language, learning, perception, and planning. |
| plasticity | flexibility and adaptability. Plasticity of the nervous or hormonal systems makes it possible to learn and register new experiences. |