• EARLY APPROACHES

  • Structuralism – used INTROSPECTION (act of looking inward to examine mental experience) to determine the underlying STRUCTURES of the mind

  • Functionalism – need to analyze the PURPOSE of behavior

• APPROACHES KEY WORDS

  • Evolutionary – Genes

  • Humanistic – free will, choice, ideal, actualization

  • Biological – Brain, NTs

  • Cognitive – Perceptions, thoughts

  • Behavioral – learned, reinforced

  • Psychoanalytic/dynamic – unconscious, childhood

  • Sociocultural – society

  • Biopsychosocial – combo of above

• PEOPLE:

  • Mary Calkins: First Fem. Pres. of APA

  • Charles Darwin: Natural selection & evolution

  • Dorothea Dix: Reformed mental institutions in U.S.

  • Stanley Hall: 1^st pres. of APA1^st journal

  • William James: Father of American Psychology – functionalist

  • Wilhem Wundt: Father of Modern Psychology – structuralist

  • Margaret Floy Washburn–1st fem. PhD

  • Christine Ladd Franklin – 1^st fem.

• EXPERIMENT : Adv: researcher controls variables to establish cause and effect Disadv: difficult to generalize

  • Independent Variable: manipulated by the researcher

    • Experimental Group: received the treatment (part of the IV)

    • Control Group: placebo, baseline (part of the IV)

    • Placebo Effect: show behaviors associated with the exp. group when having received placebo

    • Double-Blind: Exp. where neither the participant or the experimenter are aware of which condition people are assigned to

  • Dependent Variable: measured variable (is DEPENDENT on the independent variable)

• Operational Definition: clear, precise, typically quantifiable definition of your variables – allows replication

• Confound: error/ flaw in study

• Random Assignment: assigns participants to either control or experimental group at random – minimizes bias, increase chance of equal representation

• Random Sample: method for choosing participants – minimizes bias

• Validity: accurate results

• Reliability: same results every time

• NATURALISTIC OBSERVATION: Adv: real world validity (observe people in their own setting) Disadvantage: No cause and effect

• CORRELATION: Adv: identify relationship between two variables Disadvantage: No cause and effect (CORRELATION DOES NOT EQUAL CAUSATION)

  • Positive Correlation – Variables vary in the same direction

  • Negative Correlation – variables vary in opposite directions

  • The stronger the # the stronger the relationship REGARDLESS of the pos/neg sign

• CASE STUDY: Adv. Studies ONE person (usually) in great detail – lots of info Disadv: No cause and effect

• DESCRIPTIVE STATS: shape of the data

  • Measures of Central Tendency:

    • Mean: Average (use in normal distribution)

    • Median: Middle # (use in skewed distribution)

    • Mode: occurs most often

• INFERENTIAL STATISTICS: establishes significance (meaningfulness) Significant results = NOT due to chance

• ETHICAL GUIDELINES (APA)

  • Confidentiality

  • Informed Consent

  • Debriefing

  • Deception must be warranted

• NEURON: Basic cell of the NS

  • Dendrites: Receive incoming signal

  • Soma: Cell body (includes nucleus)

  • Axon: AP travels down this

  • Myelin Sheath: speeds up signal down axon

  • Terminals: release NTs – send signal onto next neuron

  • Synapse: gap b/w neurons

• Action Potential: movement of sodium and potassium ions across a membrane sends an electrical charge down the axon

  • All or none law: stimulus must trigger the AP past its threshold, but does not increase the intensity of the response (flush the toilet)

  • Refractory period: neuron must rest and reset before it can send another AP (toilet resets)

• Sensory neurons – receive signals

• Afferent neurons – Accept signals

• Motor neurons – send signals

• Efferent neurons – signal Exits

• CENTRAL NS: Brain and spinal cord

• PERIPHERAL NS: Rest of the NS

  • Somatic NS: Voluntary movement

  • Autonomic NS: Involuntary (heart, lungs, etc)

    • Sympathetic NS: Arouses the body for fight/flight (generally activates)

    • Parasympathetic NS: established homeostasis after a sympathetic response (generally inhibits)

• NEUROTRANSMITTERS (NTS): Chemicals released in synaptic gap, received by neurons

  • GABA: Major inhibitory NT

  • Glutamate: Major Excitatory NT

  • Dopamine: Reward & movement

  • Serotonin: Moods and emotion

  • Acetylcholine (ACH): Memory

  • Epinephrine & Norepinephrine: sympathetic NS arousal

  • Endorphins: pain control, happiness

  • Oxytocin: love and bonding

• Agonist: drug that mimics a NT

• Antagonist: drug that blocks a NT

• Reuptake: Unused NTs are taken back up into the sending neuron. SSRIs (selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors) block reuptake – treatment for depression

• AREAS OF THE BRAIN:

• Hindbrain: oldest part of the brain

  • Cerebellum – movement (what does it take to ring a bell)

  • Medulla – vital organs (HR, BP)

  • Pons – sleep/arousal (Ponzzzzzz)

• Midbrain

  • Reticular formation: attention (if you can’t pay attention, You R F’d)

• Forebrain: higher thought processes

  • Limbic System

    • Amygdala: emotions, fear (Amy, da! You’re so emotional!)

    • Hippocampus: memory (if you saw a hippo on campus you’d remember it!)

  • Thalamus: relay center

  • Hypothalamus: Reward/pleasure center, eating behaviors

  • Broca’s Area: Inability to produce speech (Broca – Broken speech)

  • Wernicke’s Area: Inability to comprehend speech (Wernicke’s what?)

  • Cerebral Cortex: outer portion of the brain – higher order thought processes

    • Occipital Lobe: located in the back of the head - vision

    • Frontal Lobe: decision making, planning, judgment, movement, personality

    • Parietal Lobe: located on the top of the head - sensations

    • Temporal Lobe: located on the sides of the head (temples) – hearing and face recognition

    • Somatosensory Cortex: map of our sensory receptors –in parietal lobe

    • Motor Cortex: map of our motor receptors – located in frontal lobe

  • Corpus Callosum: bundle of nerves that connects the 2 hemispheres – sometimes severed in patients with severe seizures – leads to “split-brain patients”

    • Lateralization: the brain has some specialized features – language is processed in the L Hemisphere

    • Split-brain experiments: done by Sperry & Gazzanaga.

    • Images shown to the right hemisphere will be processed in the left (& vice versa), patient can verbally identify what they saw

• BRAIN PLASTICITY: Brain can “heal” itself

• NATURE VS. NURTURE: ANSWER IS BOTH

  • Twin Studies:

    • Identical twins – Monozygotic (MZ)

    • Fraternal twins – Dizygotics (DZ)

  • Genetics: MZ twins will have a higher percentage of also developing a disease

  • Environment: MZ twins raised in different environments show differences

• ENDOCRINE SYSTEM: sends hormones throughout the body

  • Pituitary Gland: Controlled by hypothalamus. release growth hormones

  • Adrenal Glands: related to sympathetic NS: releases adrenaline

Sensation & Perception

(6 – 8%)

• ABSOLUTE THRESHOLD: detection of signal 50% of time (is it there)

• DIFFERENCE THRESHOLD (also called a just noticeable difference (JND) and follows WEBER’S LAW: two stimuli must differ by a constant minimum proportion. (Can you tell a change?)

• SIGNAL DETECTION THEORY

• Sensory Adaptation: diminished sensitivity as a result of constant stimulation (can you feel your underwear?)

• Perceptual Set: tendency to see something as part of a group – speeds up signal processing

• Inattentional Blindness: failure to notice something b/c you’re so focused on another task (gorilla video)

• Cocktail party effect: notice your name across the room when its spoken, when you weren’t previously paying attention

• VISUAL SYSTEM:

  • Pathway of vision: light → cornea →pupil/iris → lens → retina → rods/cones → bipolar cells → ganglion cells → optic nerve → optic chiasm → occipital lobe

  • Cornea – protects the eye

  • Pupil/iris – controls amount of light entering eye

  • Lens – focuses light on retina

  • Fovea–area of best vision(cones here)

  • Rods – black/white, dim light

  • Cones – color, bright light

  • Bipolar cells – connect rods/cones and ganglion cells

  • Ganglion cells – opponent-processing occurs here

  • Blind spot – occurs where the optic nerve leaves the eye

  • Feature detectors – specialized cells that see motion, shapes, lines, etc. (experiments by Hubel & Weisel)

• THEORIES OF COLOR VISION:

  • Trichromatic – three cones for receiving color (blue, red, green)

    • Explains color blindness - they are missing a cone type

  • Opponent Process – complementary colors are processed in ganglion cells – explains why we see an after image

• Visual Capture: Visual system overwhelms all others (nauseous in an IMAX theater – vision trumps vestibular)

• Constancies: recognize that objects do not physically change despite changes in sensory input (size, shape, brightness)

• Phi Phenomenon: adjacent lights blink on/off in succession – looks like movement (traffic signs with arrows)

• Stroboscopic movement: motion produced by a rapid succession of slightly varying images (animations)

• MONOCULAR CUES (how we form a 3D image from a 2D image)

  • Interposition: overlapping images appear closer

  • Relative Size: 2 objects that are usually similar in size, the smaller one is further away

  • Relative Clarity: hazy objects appear further away

  • Texture Gradient: coarser objects are closer

  • Relative Height: things higher in our field of vision look further away

  • Linear Perspective: parallel lines converge with distance (think railroad tracks)

• BINOCULAR CUES: (how both eyes make up a 3D image)

  • Retinal Disparity: Image is cast slightly different on each retinal, location of image helps us determine depth

  • Convergence: Eyes strain more (looking inward) as objects draw nearer

• TOP-DOWN PROCESSING: Whole → smaller parts

• BOTTOM-UP PROCESSING: Smaller Parts → Whole

• AUDITORY SYSTEM:

  • Pathway of sound: sound → pinna → auditory canal →ear drum (tympanic membrane) → hammer, anvil, stirrup (HAS) → oval window → cochlea → auditory nerve → temporal lobes

  • Outer Ear: pinna (ear), auditory canal

  • Middle Ear: ear drum , HAS (bones vibrate to send signal)

  • Inner Ear: cochlea – like COCHELLA (sounds 1^st processed here)

• THEORIES OF HEARING: both occur in the cochlea

  • Place theory – location where hair cells bends determines sound (high pitches)

  • Frequency theory – rate at which action potentials are sent determines sound (low pitches)

• OTHER SENSES:

  • Touch: Mechanoreceptors → spinal cord → thalamus → somatosensory cortex

  • Pain: Gate-control theory: we have a “gate” to control how much pain ix experienced

  • Kinesthetic: Sense of body position

  • Vestibular: Sense of balance (semicircular canals in the inner ear effect this)

  • Taste (gustation): 5 taste receptors: bitter, salty, sweet, sour, umami (savory)

  • Smell (olfaction): Only sense that does NOT route through the thalamus 1st. Goes to temporal lobe and amygdala

• GESTALT PSYCHOLOGY: Whole is greater than the sum of its parts

  • Gestalt Principles:

    • Figure/ground: organize information into figures objects (figures) that stand apart from surrounds (back ground)

    • 

    • Closure: tendency to mentally fill in gaps

    • Proximity: tendency to group things together that appear near each other

    • Similarity: tendency to group things together based off of looks

    • Continuity: tendency to mentally form a continuous line

States of Consciousness (2 – 4%)

• STATES of CONSCIOUSNESS:

  • Higher-Level: controlled processes – totally aware

  • Lower-Level: automatic processing (daydreaming, phone numbers)

  • Altered States: produced through drugs, fatigue, hypnosis

  • Subconscious: Sleeping and dreaming

  • No awareness: Knocked out

• METACOGNITION: Thinking about thinking

• SLEEP:

  • Beta Waves: awake

  • Alpha Waves: high amp., drowsy

  • Stage 1: light sleep

  • Stage 2: bursts of sleep spindles

  • Stage 3 (delta waves: Deep sleep

  • Stage 4: extremely deep sleep

  • Rapid Eye Movement (REM): dreaming

Entire cycle takes 90 minutes, REM occurs inb/w each cycle. REM lasts longer throughout the night

• CIRCADIAN RHYTHM: 24 hour biological clock

  • Body temp and awareness change due to this

  • Controlled by the Suprachiasmatic nucleus (SCN) in the brain

  • Explains jet lag

• SLEEP DISORDERS

  • Insomnia: Inability to fall asleep (due to stress/anxiety)

  • Sleep walking: (due to fatigue, drugs, alcohol)

  • Night terrors: extreme nightmares – NOT in REM sleep – typical in children

  • Narcolepsy: fall asleep out of nowhere (due to deficiency in orexin)

  • Sleep Apnea: stop breathing suddenly while asleep (due to obesity usually)

• DREAM THEORIES:

  • Freud’s Unconscious Wish Fulfillment: Dreaming is gratification of unconscious desires and needs

    • Latent Content: hidden meaning of dreams

    • Manifest Content: obvious storyline of dream

• Activation Synthesis: Brain produces random bursts of energy – stimulating lodged memories. Dreams start random then develop meaning

• HYPNOSIS

  • It Can: Reduce pain, help you relax

  • It CANNOT: give you superhuman strength, make you regress, make you do things against your will

• PSYCHOACTIVE DRUGS:

  • Triggers dopamine release in the brain

  • Depressants: Alcohol, barbiturates, tranquilizers, opiates (narcotics)

    • Decrease sympathetic NS activation, highly addictive

  • Stimulants: Amphetamines, Cocaine, MDMA (ecstasy), Caffeine, Nicotine

    • Increase sympathetic NS activation, highly addictive

  • Hallucinogens: LSD, Marijuana

    • Causes hallucinations, not very addictive

  • Tolerance: Needing more of a drug to achieve the same effects

  • Dependence: Become addicted to the drug – must have it to avoid withdrawal symptoms

  • Withdrawal: Psychological and physiological symptoms associated with sudden stoppage. Unpleasant – can kill you.

• CLASSICAL CONDITIONING: PAVLOV!

  • Unconditioned Stimulus (US): brings about response w/o needing to be learned (food)

  • Unconditioned Response (UR): response that naturally occurs w/o training (salivate)

  • Neutral Response (NS): stimulus that normally doesn’t evoke a response (bell)

  • Conditioned Stimulus (CS): once neutral stimulus that now brings about a response (bell)

  • Conditioned Response (CR): response that, after conditioning, follows a CS (salivate)

  • Contiguity: Timing of the pairing, NS/CS must be presented immediately BEFORE the US

  • Acquisition: process of learning the response pairing

  • Extinction: previously conditioned response dies out over time

  • Spontaneous Recovery: After a period of time the CR comes back out of nowhere

  • Generalization: CR to like stimuli (similar sounding bell)

  • Discrimination: CR to ONLY the CS

• CONTINGENCY MODEL: Rescorla & Wagner – classical conditioning involves cognitive processes

• CONDITIONED TASTE AVERSION (ONE-TRIAL LEARNING): John Garcia – Innate predispositions can allow classical conditioning to occur in one trial (food poisoning)

• COUNTERCONDITIONING: Little Albert and John Watson (father of behaviorism) – conditioned a fear in a baby (only to countercondition – remove it- later on)

• OPERANT CONDITIONING: SKINNER!

  • LAW OF EFFECT (Thorndike): Behaviors followed by pos. outcomes are strengthened, neg. outcomes weaken a behavior (cat in the puzzle box)

• PRINCIPLES OF OPERANT COND:

  • Pos. Reinforcement: Add something nice to increase a behavior (gold star for turning in HW)

  • Neg. Reinforcement: Take away something bad/annoying to increase a behavior (put on seatbelt to take away annoying car signal)

  • Pos. Punishment: Add something bad to decrease a behavior (spanking)

  • Neg. Punishment: Take away something good to decrease a behavior (take away car keys)

  • Primary Reinforcers: innately satisfying (food and water)

  • Secondary Reinforcers: everything else (stickers, high-fives)

    • Token Reinforcer: type of secondary- can be exchanged for other stuff (game tokens or money)

  • Generalization: respond to similar stimulus for reward

  • Discrimination: stimulus signals when behavior will or will not be reinforced (light on means response are accepted)

  • Extinction / Spontaneous Recovery: same as classical conditioning

  • Premack Principle: high probability activities reinforce low probability activities (get extra min at recess if you everyone turns in their HW)

  • Overjustification Effect: reinforcing behaviors that are intrinsically motivating causes you to stop doing them (give a child 5$ for reading when they already like to read – they stop reading)

  • Shaping: use successive approximations to train behavior (reward desired behaviors to teach a response – rat basketball)

  • Chaining: tie together several behaviors

  • Continuous Reinforcement schedule: Receive reward for every response

  • Fixed Ratio schedule: Reward every X number of response (every 10 envelopes stuffed get $)</p></li><li><p><strong>Fixed Interval schedule:</strong> Reward every X amount of time passed (every 2 weeks get a paycheck)</p></li><li><p><strong>Variable Ratio schedule:</strong> Rewarded after a random number of responses (slot machine</p></li><li><p><strong>Variable Interval schedule:</strong> Rewarded after a random amount of time has passed (fishing)</p></li><li><p><strong><em>Variable schedules are most resistant to extinction</em> (</strong>how long will keep playing a slot machine before you think its broken?)</p></li></ul></li><li><p><strong>SOCIAL (OBSERVATIONAL) LEARNING: <em>BANDURA!</em></strong></p></li><li><p><strong>Modeling Behaviors: </strong>Children model (imitate) behaviors. Study used BoBo dolls to demonstrate the following</p><ul><li><p><strong>Prosocial –</strong> helping behaviors</p></li><li><p><strong>Antisocial –</strong> mean behaviors</p></li></ul></li><li><p><strong>MISC LEARNING TYPES</strong></p><ul><li><p><strong>Latent learning (<em>Tolman!)</em> – </strong>learning is hidden until useful (rats in maze get reinforced half way through, performance improved</p><ul><li><p><strong>Cognitive maps –</strong> mental representation of an area, allows navigation if blocked</p></li></ul></li><li><p><strong>Insight learning (Kohler!) – </strong>some learning is through simple intuition (chimps with crates to get bananas)</p></li><li><p><strong>Learned Helplessness (Seligman!) </strong>– no matter what you do you never get a positive outcome so you just give up (word scrambles)</p></li></ul></li></ul><p>Cognition</p><p>(8 – 10$. No happiness

  • Career – work for advancement. Some happiness

  • Calling – work because you love it. Lotsa happiness

• Prenatal Development:

  • Zygote: 0 – 14 days, cells are dividing

  • Embryo: until about 9 weeks, vital organs being formed

  • Fetus: 9 wks to birth, overall development

  • Teratogens: external agents that can cause abnormal prenatal development (alcohol, drugs, etc)

    • Fetal alcohol syndrome (FAS): large amount of alcohol leads to FAS, causes deformities, mental retardation, death

• Physical Development:

  • Maturation: natural course of development, occurs no matter what (walking)

  • Reflexes: innate responses we’re born with

    • Rooting, sucking, swallowing, grasping, stepping

  • Habituation: after continual exposure you pay less attention – used to test babies

  • Eyes have the most limited development, takes till 1 year

    • Visual cliff: babies have to learn depth perception, so they will cross a “cliff”

  • Other senses are fairly developed

  • Brain development continues for a few years

• JEAN PIAGET’S COGNITIVE DEV.

• Schemas – concepts or frameworks that organize info

• Assimilation: incorporate new info into existing schema (aSSimlation – same stuff)

• Accommodation: adjust existing schemas to incorporate new information (ACcommodation - All Change)

• Sensorimotor Stage: Birth to 2 years: focused on exploring the world around them

  • Lack Object Permanence: Objects when removed from field of view are thought to disappear (peek-a-boo)

  • Dev. Sense of Self: by 2 yrs can recognize themselves in the mirror

• Pre-operational Stage: 2 – 7 years: use pretend play, developing language, using intuitive reasoning

  • Lack Conservation: recognize that substances remain the same despite changes in shape, length, or position (girls with juice in glasses)

  • Lack Reversibility: cannot do reverse operations (count out both 4+2 and 2+4)

  • Are egocentric: inability to distinguish one’s own perspective from another’s – think everyone sees what they see

• Concrete Operational Stage: 7-11 yrs: use operational thinking, classification, and can think logical in concrete context

• Formal Operational Stage: 11-15 yrs: use abstract and idealist thoughts, hypothetical-deductive reasoning

• Problems with Piaget’s theory: stages to discrete, dev. differs b/w kids

• VYGOTSKY’S THEORY: cognitive development is a social process too, need to interact w/ others

  • Zone of Proximal Development: gap b/w what a child can do on their own and w/ support. Need scaffolding (teachers)

SOCIOEMOTIONAL DEVELOPMENT

• Temperament: patterns of emotional reactions and babies (precursor to personality)

• Imprinting: baby geese believe the first thing they see after hatching is their mom – happens during a critical period (from LORENZ)

• HARRY HARLOW: discovered that contact comfort is more important than feeding (monkeys fed on wire or cloth mothers). Monkeys raised in isolation couldn’t socialize

• MARY AINSWORTH: developed the strange situation paradigm (children left alone in a room w/ a stranger, then reunited w/ mom – determines your attachment style

  • Secure attachment (60% of infants): upset when mom leaves, easily calmed on return. Tend to be more stable adults

  • Avoidant attachment (20% infants): actively avoids mom, doesn’t care when she leaves

  • Ambivalent attachment(10% infants): actively avoids mom, freaks out when she leaves

  • Disorganized attachment (5%): confused, fearful, dazed – result of abuse

• BAUMRIND: parenting styles

  • Authoritarian: rules & obedience, “my way or the highway” – kids lack initiative in college

  • Permissive: kids do whatever – no rules – kids lack initiative in college

  • Authoritative: give and take w/ kids – kids become socially competent and reliable

• KOHLBERG’S MORAL DEV

  • Preconventional morality: Children: they follow rules to avoid punishment

  • Conventional morality: adolescents: follow rules b/c rules exist to keep order

  • Postconventional morality: adults: they do what they believe is right (even if it goes against society)

• Carol Gilligan: said moral reasoning and moral behaviors are two different things (what you say isn’t always what you do)

• ERIKSON’S SOCIOEMOTINAL DEV. : 8 stages, each stage represents a crisis that must be resolved, results in competence or weakness

  • Trust vs Mistrust (birth – 18 months): if needs are dependably met infants dev basic trust

  • Autonomy vs shame&doubt (1 -3 yrs): toddlers learn to exercise their will and think for themselves

  • Initiative vs guilt (3-6 yrs): learn to initiate tasks and carry out plans

  • Industry vs inferiority (6 yrs to puberty): learn the pleasure of applying themselves to tasks

  • Identity vs role confusion: (adolescence thru 20s): refine a sense of self by testing roles and forming an identity

  • Intimacy vs isolation: (20s—40s): form close relationships and gain capacity for love

  • Generativity vs stagnation: (40s-60s): discover sense of contributing to the world, thru family & work

  • Integrity vs despair: (60s and up): reflect on your life, feel satisfaction or failure

• PUBERTY! (rapid skeletal and sexual maturation)

  • Primary sex characteristics: necessary structures for reproduction (ovaries, testicles, vagina, penis)

  • Secondary sex characteristics: nonreproductive characteristics that dev during puberty (breasts, hips, deepening of voice, body hair)

  • Frontal lobe continuous dev (not fully developed till 25)

• GENDER DEVELOPMENT: sex = chromosomes, gender = what you identify yourself as

  • Gender roles: expected behaviors (norms) for men/women

  • Social learning theory: we learn gender roles and identity from those around us

• AGING:

  • Cellular clock theory: cells have a maximum # of divisions before they can’t divide anymore

  • Free-radical theory: unstable oxygen molecules w/in cells damage DNA

  • Over time skills decrease (reaction time, memory)

• CROSS-SECTIONAL STUDY: studies ppl of different ages at the same point in time

  • Adv: inexpensive & quick

  • Disadv: can be differences due to generational gap

• LONGITUDINAL STUDY: studies same ppl over time

  • Adv: eliminates groups differences, lots of detail

  • Disadv: expensive, time consuming, high drop out rates

• Stages of Grief (crap btw)

  • Denial: “this can’t be happening”

  • Anger: “why me?”

  • Bargaining: “just let me live to see my kids graduate”

  • Depression: “why bother”

  • Acceptance: “its going to okay”

• Problem-focused coping: solving or doing something to alter the course of stress (planning, acceptance)

• Emotion-focused coping: reducing the emotional distress (denial, disengagement)

PSYCHODYNAMIC EXPLANATION

SIGMUND FREUD said personality was largely unconscious. Came up w/ the following:

• Conscious: immediate awareness of current environment

• Preconscious: available to awareness (phone #s)

• Unconscious: unavailable to awareness

• id: our hidden true animalistic wants and desires – operates on the pleasure principle, all about rewards and avoiding pain (devil on your shoulder – entirely unconscious)

• superego: our moral conscious (angel on your shoulder, all 3 consciousness)

• ego: reality principle, has to deal w/ society, stuck mediating b/w the id and superego (its you! – conscious and preconscious)

When ego cannot mediate b/w the id and superego, we use defense mechanisms

• Repression: push memories back into the unconscious mind (sexual abuse is too traumatic to deal w/ so you repress it)

• Projection: attribute personal shortcomings & faults on to others (man who wants to have an affair accuses his wife of having one)

• Denial: refuse to acknowledge reality (refuse to believe you have cancer)

• Displacement; shift feelings from an unacceptable object to a more acceptable one (can’t tell at teacher, go home and yell at the dog)

• Reaction formation: transform unacceptable motive into his opposite (woman who fears sexual urges becomes a religious zealot)

• Regression: transform into an earlier development period in the face of stress (during exam week you start to suck your thumb)

• Rationalization: replace a less acceptable reasoning with a more acceptable one (don’t get into your college – justify it was a sucky college anyway)

• Sublimination: replace unacceptable impulse w/ a socially acceptable one (man w/ strong sexual urges paints nudes. Dexter)

FREUD’S PSYCHOSEXUAL STAGES

• Oral stage (0-18 months): pleasure focuses on the mouth (id)

• Anal stage (18 – 36 months): pleasure involves eliminative functions (ego forms)

• Phallic stage (3 – 6 yrs): pleasure focuses on genitals (superego forms)

  • Oedipal complex: young boys learn to identify w/ their father out of fear of retribution (castration anxiety)

  • Electra complex: young girls learn to identify w/ their mother b/c they cannot with their father (penis envy)

• Latency stage (6 yrs to puberty): psychic time out – personality is set

• Genital State (adulthood): sexual reawakening – oedipal and electra “feelings” are repressed, turn sexual wants onto an appropriate person

• FIXATION: can become “stuck” in an earlier stage – influences personality (oral stage smokes/drinks, anal is “anal retentive”, phallic is promiscuous)

What’s wrong w/ Freud theory? – unverifiable, descriptive not predictive

What’s good about it? – 1^st theory about personality, sparked psychoanalysis

How do we test this approach?

• Psychoanalysis: analyze a person’s unconscious motives thru the use of:

  • Free Association: say aloud everythying that comes to mind w/o hesitation

  • Transference: looks for feelings to transferred to psychoanalyst

  • Dream interpretation: analyze the manifest (seen message) and latent (hidden messages) content

  • Projective Tests: ambiguous stimuli shown to look at your unconscious motives (THESE SUCK B/C THEY ARE VERY SUBJECTIVE)

    • Thematic apperception test (TAT) : tell a story about a picture (when someone has a tattoo (tatt) you ask what it means

    • Rorschach inkblot: show an inkblot

NEO-FREUDIANS

• CARL JUNG: believed in the collective unconconcious (shared inherited reservoir of memory – explains common myths across civilizations & time)

• KAREN HORNEY: said personality develops in context of social relationships, NOT sexual urges (security not sex is motivation, men get womb envy)

TRAIT PERSPECTIVE

• Traits are enduring personality characteristics, people can be described by these – have strong or weak tendencies. They are stable, genetic, and predict other attributes.

• Use factor analysis to find these: statistical procedure used to identify similar components

• TRAIT THEORIES:

• Big Five: (by Costa & McCrae) (acronym OCEAN) You vary on each of these

  • Openness : imaginative, independent, like variety

  • Conscientiousness: organized, careful, disciplined

  • Extraversion: sociable, fun-loving, affectionate (opoosite it introversion: shy, timid, reserved)

  • Agreeableness: soft hearted, trusting, helpful

  • Neuroticism (emotional stability): calm, secure

What’s wrong with trait theory? – ignores the role of the situation in behavior

What’s good about it? - identifying traits gives us perspectives about careers, relationships, health

How do we test this approach?

• MMPI – helpful for mental health and job placement

• Myer’s Briggs – gave you 4 letter combo

What’s wrong w/ these tests?

• They’re long, social desirability can be an influence, and they’re too broad

HUMANISTIC PERSPECTIVE

• Emphasized personal growth and free will. You don’t like yourself? So change!

• CARL ROGERS: talked about our self-concept (idea of who we are). Your self-concept is the center of your personality

  • Actual (social) self: what others see

  • Ideal (true) self: who you WANT to be

  • A positive self-concept makes us perceive the world positively (optimist)

  • A negative self-concept makes us feel dissatisfied and unhappy

What wrong with humanistic theory? - too optimistic about human nature, abstract concepts are difficult to test

What’s good about it? – emphasizes conscious experiences and change

• Individualistic Cultures: give priorities to own goals over group goals. Define your identify in terms of you (American society)

• Collectivistic Cultures: give priority to the goals of the group, your identity is part of that group (China)

SOCIAL-COGNITIVE PERSPECTIVE

• Behavior is a complex interaction of inner process and environmental influence – which influences personality

• Emphasizes conscious awareness, beliefs, expectations, and goals

• BANDURA! Talked about RECIPROCAL DETERMINISM: interaction of behavior, cognitions, and environment make up you.

{I’m outgoing (behavior), I choose to teach b/c it lets me be outgoing (environment), and I have thought this through which is why I teach despite making less money (cognitive)}

• Self-efficacy: belief that one can succeed, so you ensure you do

• Internal locus of control: you control your own fate

• External locus of control: chance / outside forces control your fate

What’s wrong with social-cognitive? – Too specific, cannot generalize

What’s good about it? – Highlights situations, and cognitive explanations of personality

How do we test it? – Observations & interviews (time consuming)

Testing &

Individual Differences

(5-7%)

Individual Theories about Intelligence

• GALTON: 1^st to suggest intelligence was inherited. Intelligence based on muscle strength, size of head, reaction time, etc.

• CATTELL: 2 clusters of mental abilities

  • Crystalized intelligence: reasoning and verbal skills - what you learn in school – the cold hard (like crystals!) facts

  • Fluid intelligence: spatial abilities, rote memory, things that come natural to you – can’t learn in school. Also decrease over time

• SPEARMAN’S G FACTOR: said a general intelligence (g) underlies all mental abilities (typical IQ of today)

• GARDNER: multiple intelligences (8): linguistic, logical-mathematical, musical, spatial, bodily-kinesthetic, intrapersonal (self), interpersonal (social), naturalist

• STERNBERG: TRIARCHIC THEORY

  • Analytical: mental components to solve problems, what IQ tests assess (book smarts)

  • Practical: ability to size up new situations and adapt to real-life demands (street smarts)

  • Creative: intellectual and motivational processes that lead to novel solutions, idea, products

• BINET: developed 1^st intelligence test, combined with TERMAN – developed the STANFORD-BINET IQ TEST

• Chronological age = actual age

  • Mental age = tested age compared to other of that age

  • 100 is average

• WECHSLER: developed the WAIS and WISC – most commonly used today

• FLYNN effect: IQ has steadily risen over the past 80 years – probably due to education standards and better IQ tests

• Extremes of Intelligence: high IQ = above 135; mentally retarded = below 70

• Causes of mild retardation:

  • PKU – liver fails to produce an ezyme needed to breakdown chemicals – leads to brain damage

  • Down syndrome – extra copy of 21^st chromosome

  • Fragile X – higher chance in boys due to ONE X chromosome

• Influence on IQ:

  • Genetics: MZ twins have similar IQ, adopted kids more similar to biological parents

  • Environment: early neglect leads to lower IQ, good schooling to higher IQ

• Types of Tests:

  • Aptitude: predicts your abilities to learn a new skill (ASVAB)

  • Achievement: tests what you know(SAT)

• TEST CREATION:

  • Standardization: administer a test to a representative sample of future test takers to establish a basis for meaningful comparison (test it out 1^st)

  • Should be reliable: same results over time

    • Split-half reliability: compare two halves of the test

    • Test-retest reliability: use the same test on 2 different occasions

  • Should be valid: test is accurate – measures what it is intended to

    • Content validity: test measures what you want it to (an IQ test actually measures IQ)

    • Predictive validity: test is able to accurately predict a trait (high math scores predicts good engineer)

• Standardized tests establish a normal distribution

• Standard deviations are used to compare scores.

• Standard deviation measures how much the scores vary from the mean. The percentages stay the same in every curve

Abnormal Behavior

(7 – 9%)

• Defining abnormal behavior:

  • Must be deviant, distressful, and dysfunctional

• Historical causes: biology, psychological issues, supernatural issues (demons)

• Medical model: emphasizes treatment of disorders, as they have a biological origin. Came through the reformation of institutions in U.S. (DORTHEA DIX)

• Biopsychosocial model: currently used model – stress biological, psychological, and social causes

• Diagnosing abnormal behavior:

  • DSM: manual listing all currently accepted psychological disorders. Classifies them based on criteria – provides no explanation of causes or treatments

ANXIETY DISORDERS

Most common disorders in the U.S.

• Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD): person is generally anxious, all the time, for NO REASON

• Panic Disorder: person is prone to frequent panic attacks (feeling like you’re having a heart attack). Can come w/ agoraphobia: anxiety about being in places you cannot escape (fear of public spaces / people)

• Phobias: irrational fear that disrupts your life

• Obsessive-compulsive Disorder (OCD): person if overwhelmed with both:

  • Obsessions: persistent unwanted thoughts (did I leave the stove on?)

  • Compulsions: senseless rituals (hand washing)

• Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD): characterized by flashbacks, problems w/ concentration, and anxiety following a traumatic event (war, natural disasters)

CAUSES OF ANXIETY DISORDERS:

• Psychodynamic: repressed thoughts & feelings manifest in anxiety and rituals

• Behaviorist: fear conditioning leads to anxiety, which is then reinforced. Phobias might be learned through observational learning

• Biological: natural selection favored those with certain phobias (heights). Twins often share disorders. Often see less GABA in the brain

SOMATOFORM DISORDERS

• Psychological disorders w/ no apparent physical cause

  • Conversion disorder: loss of feeling or usage of a limb or body part (sight) – absolutely no physiological cause though

  • Hypochondriasis: person interprets normal symptoms as a major disease – must disrupt their life

DISSOCIATIVE DISORDERS

• Dissociative Identity Disorder: formerly multiple personalities – person fractures into several distinct personalities who normally have no awareness of each other. NOT SCHIZOPHRENIA!

  • Usually caused by traumatic childhood abuse

  • Legitimacy is doubted by some, more common in those w/ good health insurance

  • Treatment involves integration of the personalities

• Dissociative Fugue: following a traumatic event a person leaves, taking on a whole new life & personality w/ no memory of the previous one

MOOD DISORDERS

• Major depressive disorder: extreme sadness and despair, apathy towards life, w/ no known cause

• Dysthymia: milder form of depression, lasts for years (Eeyore!)

• Bipolar disorder: bouts of severe depression & manic episodes

  • Mania: heightened mood, characterized by risky behaviors, fast talking, flights of ideas

• Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD): form of depression that occurs typically winter – found mostly in Northern areas (Alaska, Ireland) UNIQUE TREATMENT = LIGHT THERAPY

CAUSES OF MOOD DISORDERS

• Biology: lower levels of serotonin & norepinephrine linked to depression, higher levels of norepinephrine linked to mania. Runs in families suggesting GENES. Twin studies also support this.

• Cognitive: negative thought patterns leads to depression

SCHIZOPHRENIA

NOT MULTIPLE PERSONALITIES! THEY HAVE ONE PERSONALITY!

• SYMPTOMS

  • Positive Symptoms (not good – means something added))

    • Hallucinations: sensory experiences w/o sensory stimulation (seeing and/or hearing things)

    • Delusions: fixed, false beliefs (people are out to get them, grandiose thoughts (I am God)

    • Disorganized thinking

    • Disorganized speech

  • Negative Symptoms (something taken away)

    • Flat affect: lack ability to show emotions

    • Impaired decision making, inability to pay attention

  • Catatonia: become frozen over periods of time (exhibit waxy flexibility: can move them into new positions)

• CAUSES OF SCHIZOPHRENIA

  • Brain abnormalities: enlarged ventricles (atrophy), smaller frontal cortex

  • Genetics: runs in families, MZ twins at higher risk

  • Dopamine hypothesis: too much dopamine in the brain

  • Diathesis – Stress: individual has a genetic predisposition, disease must be “turned-on” by environmental stimuli (like stress) – explains why it is most commonly developed during college years

PERSONALITY DISORDERS

• Marked by disruptive, inflexible, enduring behavior patterns – makes this very difficult to treat!

  • Antisocial: NOT “avoidant of socialization” – more like “anti-society” – disregard for others, manipulative, breaks laws

  • Borderline: instable interpersonal relationships & self-image, “I hate you, don’t leave me”

  • Histrionic: excessive emotionality & attention seeking (slut disorder)

  • Narcissistic: need for admiration & lack of empathy (who cares about everyone else – look at me!)

Treatment of Psychological Disorders (5-7%)

• PSYCHODYNAMIC APPROACH: SEE PERSONALITY SECTION

• HUMANISTIC APPROACH:

  • Client-centered therapy: (developed by CARL ROGERS) techniques include active listening, accepting environment, focuses on patient growth (you figure out what needs to change and do it)

• COGNITIVE APPROACH:

  • Rational-emotive therapy: (developed by ELLIS) techniques include analyzing self-defeating behaviors to change thought patterns – and then change behaviors associated w/ said patterns

    • Best for anxiety disorders

    • Very confrontational

  • Cognitive therapy: (developed by BECK) illogical thoughts → psychological problems, challenges those thoughts

    • Best for depression

    • Self-directed – you figure out your errors

• BEHAVIORAL APPROACH (typically used for anxiety disorders / phobias)

  • Classical Conditioning:

    • Counterconditioning Little Albert & Watson

      • Aversive conditioning: associate an unpleasant experience (e.g. nausea) w/ an unwanted behavior (e.g. drinking alcohol)

    • Exposure therapy: slowly expose people to whatever it is that makes them anxious

      • Systematic desensitization: associate a pleasant relaxed state w/ gradually increasing anxiety triggering stimuli (create a desensitization hierarchy – ex. List of things about flying that makes you nervous – step through each one till you can do it)

      • Intensive exposure therapy (Flooding): force someone to experience the fear (afraid of drowning, throw you in a pool)

  • Operant Conditioning: use behavior modification (reward good behaviors w/ token reinforcers ). Used in schools, w/ autistic children, etc.

• OTHER THERPAIES:

  • Family therapy: treats the family as a system, individual behaviors are influenced by family dynamics

  • Group therapy: therapy through a group – lets patients see “they’re not alone”

• BIOLOGICAL APPROACH: CALLED BIOMEDICAL THERAPIES

  • Drug therapies (psychopharmacology):

    • Anti-psychotics: decrease dopamine: treats schizophrenia

      • Side effects: TARDIVE DYSKINESIA: hand tremors (similar to Parkinson’s- due to lack of dopamine), worsening of negative symptoms, extreme sedation

      • Drug names: thorazine, clozapine

    • Antidepressants: increase serotonin through REUPTAKE inhibition

      • Side effects: drowsiness, anxiety, can increase suicide risk in teens

      • Drug names: SSRIs (selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors) like Prozac, Zoloft, Paxil. SNRIs (selective norepinephrine reuptake inhibitors) Cymbalta, Effexor

    • Mood stabilizers: used in the treatment of BIPOLAR disorder : LITHIUM

    • Anti-anxiety drugs: depress the central nervous system (dangerous in combo w/ alcohol) Xanax, Ativan

  • Electroconvulsive therapy (ECT): send electricity into the brain to induce minor seizures. Used (rarely) to treat depression (when nothing else works). Thought to “reboot” the brain

  • Psychosurgery (frontal lobotomy): frontal lobe is surgically destroyed. Used to treat depression or violent individuals – almost never used anymore

Social

(8-10%)

SOCIAL THINKING

• Attribution theory: we explain others behaviors by crediting the situation or the person’s disposition (they only passed b/c they cheated)

• Fundamental attribution error (very similar to Actor-observer bias): tendency for observers to underestimate the importance of the situation and overestimate the impact of personal disposition (that guy cut me off b/c he’s a jerk – not that his wife could be in labor)

ATTITUDES AND ACTIONS

• Central route to persuasion: change people’s attitudes through logical arguments and explanations. Leads to long term behavior change

• Peripheral route to persuasion: change people’s attitudes through incidental cues (like a speaker’s attractiveness). Leads to temporary behavior changes

• Foot in the door phenomenon: complying w/ a small request then leads to going along w/ a larger request (can I have $5? Yes. Now can I have $25?)

• Door in the face phenomenon: a large request is turned down, when then leads you to be more likely to comply w/ a small request (can I have $100? Heck no! How about $20? Okay)

• STANFORD PRISON EXPERIMENT (ZIMBARDO): classic “experiment” where individuals were assigned to be guards / prisoners. w/in days they took on their roles and went too far. Highly unethical

• Cognitive dissonance (FESTINGER): two opposing thoughts conflict w/ each other, causing discomfort (dissonance), which makes us find ways to justify the situation (cult that was going to be abducted by aliens, smokers)

SOCIAL INFLUENCE

• Conformity: classic experiment done by ASCH – showed lines of different lengths, confederates gave wrong answers to see if others would go along w/ it

  • Normative social influence: we conform to gain approval or to not stand out from the group (be part of the norm

  • Informational social influence: we conform to others b/c we think their opinions must be right

• Obedience: classic experiment done by MILGRAM: participants were to “teach” another individual using shocks. 60% of participants would administer lethal shocks to another person simply b/c they were told to

GROUP INFLUENCE

• Social facilitation: perform better on simple or well learned tasks in the presence of others

• Social loafing: tendency for ppl in a group to exert less effort when pooling their effort together (tug of war)

• Deindividuation: loss of self-awareness and self-restraint occurring in group situations that foster arousal and anonymity (mob mentality)

• Group polarization: the more time spent w/ a group the more similar (polarized) their thoughts / opinions will become

• Groupthink: desire for harmony w/in a group leads to everyone going along w/ the same thinking, ignoring other possibilities or bad ideas

• Risky shift: groups make riskier decisions together rather than alone

PREJUDICE

• Ingroup: “US” – ppl w/ whom we share a common identity

• Outgroup: “them” – ppl perceived as different or not part of the group

• Ingroup bias: tendency to favor our own group

• Scapegoat theory: prejudice offers an outlet for anger by providing someone else to blame

• Ethnocentrism: tendency to see your own group as more important than others

• Just-world phenomenon: tendency for ppl to believe that the world is just and therefore ppl get what they deserve (homeless ppl)

AGGRESION

• Genetic influence: runs in families, can breed for in animals

• Lower serotonin, higher testosterone

• Environmental influence: social learning theory (BANDURA) – observing violence in others makes us more violent for a time

  • Also: pollution, crowding, heat, humidity

• Frustration-aggression hypothesis: frustration creates anger, which leads to aggression

ATTRACTION

• Mere exposure effect: repeated exposure to novel stimuli increases liking of them (the more time you spend around something the more you like it)

• Physical attractiveness: pretty ppl are thought to be more credible, less likely to do bad things

• Similarity: we prefer ppl similar to us

ALTRUISM

• Altruism: unselfish regard for the welfare of others

• Bystander effect: the more ppl around the less likely we are to help someone in need

• Social exchange theory: social behavior (helping) is an exchange process – aim is to maximize benefits and minimize cost

• Reciprocity norm: we give so we can get

CONFLICT

• Social trap: conflicting parties pursue their own best interests, which can result in destructive results (prisoner’s dilemma – game theory)

• 

• Approach approach conflict: win – win situation; conflict is which win you have to choose (you can eat out at ONE of your two favorite restaurants – you can only choose one though)

• Approach avoidance conflict: win – lose situation; outcome has positive and negative aspects (marriage)

• Avoidance avoidance conflict : lose – lose; both outcomes are bad but you have to choose one (clean your room or do your homework)

• Multiple approach avoidance conflict: two (or more) win-lose situations; conflict is which to choose (College A is good for your major but no scholarship, College B is bad for your major but has a scholarship)

SOCIAL SELF

• Self-concept bias: what we consider important in ourselves is what we consider important in others

• False-consensus effect: we overestimate the degree to which everyone else thinks / acts the way we do

• Self-fulfilling prophecy: a belief that leads to its own fulfillment (I expect you all to pass, you know this, you study – fulfilling my prophecy)

• Self-serving bias: readiness to perceive ourselves as favorably

• Spotlight effect (self-objectification) : tendency of an individual to overestimate the extent to which others are paying attention to them