Psychology Behavior

Creativity - The making of ideas that are valuable and novel; The making of the Mona Lisa was a creative masterpiece. This piece was very valuable to society because it shaped the art we have today. This piece is also very valuable. 

Concepts - Mental Grouping of things; The concept of a chair to a baby can mean many things such as a wooden chair, a reclining chair, a doctors’ chair. These are all chairs for the baby and she uses the concept to group them together. 

Prototypes - This is a mental image or best example of the concept you already know. For example when people hear “which is more bird-like? A crow or a penguin.” People will usually go for a crow because more people have the mental image of a crow to fit a bird’s description the best. 

Convergent Thinking - This is your ability to give a single correct answer. The SAT and ACT are examples of convergent thinking because they are multiple choice or written and they ask you to give them 1 specific answer.

Divergent Thinking - The ability to which you consider many different options and to think in novel ways. For example, creativity tests are like this they ask you to think of many different possibilities. 

Algorithms - This is list of instructions or a step-by-step procedure that gives a solution. For example if you have a coloring sheet that has instructions on it and where to color and will eventually produce an image. 

Heuristics - A thinking strategy that gives us “shortcuts” to solve complex problems efficiently. For example lets say you are trying to find as many words as possible in some random letters, you would group commonly grouped letters such as CH or SH. 

Insight - When you suddenly realize the solution to a problem. For example, think of a compound word or phrase that forms with pine, crab, and sauce. It’s difficult right? Here how about a clue - It’s a fruit. Now if the solution suddenly shot at you - that would be insight. 

Confirmation Bias - To search or research for information that backs up our theory or perception and ignoring any information or evidence that contrasts your views. For example,  lets say you want this specific type of phone, but your dad says to look at the reviews and see if it is good or bad, you will only look at the good reviews. 

Fixation - It is the inability to see a problem from a new perspective. For example, in the duck-rabbit illusion where some people might see a duck and others a rabbit. In fixation they won’t see the other side. 

Mental Set - A tendency to do a problem in a way that has worked in the past or you're comfortable with. For example, consider this sequence O - T - T - F - ? - ? -?. This is confusing right now so what if I told you that O stood for one and T for Tuesday and so on, now you will be able to solve the problem.

Intuition - Our feelings and thoughts that are spontaneous and unreasonable. Let’s your a quarterback at West Forsyth High School, your making a throw and you see your receivers, your intuition tells you to throw to the person that is more open than the rest of the players so it doesn’t get intercepted or become incomplete. 

Representativeness Heuristic - The likelihood of events in terms of how well they fit a certain prototype. This may lead us to ignore other relevant information. For example let's say someone asks you “There is someone who is short, slim, and likes to read poetry. Is this more like being an Ivy League university English professor or a truck driver?” Most people will say the second option not taking anything else into account because it fits the description of a professor, but they are ignoring the ratio of truck drivers to professors. There are 3.5 million truck drivers in the U.S.A alone making that the description was most likely a truck driver. 

Availability Heuristic - How common an event is based on its mental availability. For example let's say you are at a casino, gambling, if you win there will be loud noises and flashing lets let your mind know that you won. However, if you lose big nothing will happen, and you’ve known that you have lost. 

Overconfidence - When you overestimate your ability to complete a task. For example, let's say you took a test and you're telling all your friends “Oh yeah that test was easy, I probably got a 100 on it.” 

Framing - This is the way we present an issue. For example, let's take gun law into account. If the government calls the law “gun control” people will get very violent, but if they call it  “gun safety” people will follow it knowing the dangers of it. 

Factor Analysis - A statistical procedure that identifies groups of related items. For example, lets say you scored good on the verbal test. You could use factor analysis to assume that you would be good at any verbal related test. 

Existential Intelligence -  The ability to think about the larger or more complex questions in life (life, death, existence etc). For example, let's say you think about where you will go after you die and who created the Big Bang you will show evidence for this. 

Savant Syndrome - When a person has limited mental ability, but excels in another field such as drawing. For example, Joe has savant syndrome, he doesn’t talk to anyone, but is really good at memorizing things. 

Mental Age - A measure of intelligence test. If you are an average 8 year old, your mental age will also act like an 8 year old. 

Intelligence Quotient - The IQ was the person’s mental age divided by chronological age and multiplied by 100. 

Standardization - Defining uniform testing procedures and meaningful scores by comparison with the performance of a pretested group. Let's say you take the SAT you will take it with students that are in the same environment as you and use the same materials as you. 

Reliability - the extent to which a test or experiment gives the same, consistent results. SAT is an example of reliability because people get on average scores above a 1000. 

Metacognition - It refers to the awareness and understanding of one’s own thought processes. Students can improve their learning by becoming aware of their strengths and weaknesses in specific subjects. 

Accommodation - Adapting our current understandings to incorporate new information. For example, in our schema you have already seen a bird and what it looks like, but let’s say you go the zoo and you see a penguin you will accommodate it to fit your bird schema after learning it is a bird. 

Assimilation - When you are taking new information to new schemas. For example let’s say you know what a dog looks like, but you don’t know what a cat looks like so you build a different schema for the cat. 

Executive Functions - A set of cognitive processes that are essential for goal-directed behavior, decision-making, and problem-solving. You use your executive functions to plan your studies and manage deadlines. 

Priming - The activation, often unconsciously, of certain associations, thus predisposing one’s perception, memory, or response. Lets say you are learning about the environment in biology class your teacher might show pictures of animals or plants to get you in the mind of the environment and nature. 

Nudge - A small change in the way choices are presented that can influence people’s behavior. In a school cafeteria they put fruits and vegetables first subtly telling the students to choose healthier options. 

Gambler’s fallacy - When people think that past events can influence future random events. For example, if a coin landed on heads 5 times in a row you might think that 6th time might land on tails. 

Sunk-Cost Fallacy - when people continue to do something even though they think its not worth it anymore because they think they already so much time into it. For example lets say you paid 10 dollars to buy a movie ticket and the movie is boring you’d want to leave, but you’d think I already paid for it and I’ve already made it this far so what’s the point. 

Functional Fixedness - When people get stuck in a problem and they only think of the problem and don’t see beyond using any other object. For example lets say you are trying to hang a picture, but you can’t find the hammer. You only think about the hammer and nothing else. 

Belief Perseverance - When people continue to belief something is true even though the evidence says otherwise. For example, if someone thinks that eating chocolate causes acne. Even if doctors and studies say it’s not true. 

Intelligence - The ability to learn from experience and solve problems, and use knowledge to adapt to new experiences. For example, lets say that you got a bad grade on a quiz and you knew what you did wrong so on the test you got it right and got a better score overall. 

General Intelligence - All the mental abilities. Measured by every task on a intelligence test. For example, people who score well on math problems, can do well on memory. 

Crystallized Intelligence - The amount of information you obtain and the verbal skills you develop over time. For example the SAT measures crystallized intelligence. 

Fluid intelligence - Ability to reason in an abstract way. For example, If someone asked you to come up with different ways to use a tire you think abstractly about the different ways you could use a tire. 

Emotional intelligence  - The ability to perceive, understand, manage, and use emotions. For example, lets say one of your peers said something to your friend. Using your emotional intelligence you can see that he didn’t like what the peers said to him based on his voice and body language. 

Aptitude Tests - A test designed to predict a person’s future. The college entrance exam is a aptitude test, it seeks on how well you will do in college with the workload. 

Fixed Mindset -  believing that intelligence is innately fixed; decreased capacity for change and growth. For example, lets say you failed your test a fixed mindset would say theres nothing I can do about it because we all have the same intelligence. 

Achievement Test - A test designed to measure what a person has learned. For example, exams about what you have covered this week is a form of achievement test. 

Stanford-Binet - the widely used original intelligence test. For example, If I took this test I would know how much my IQ was. 

Normal Curve - a symmetrical, bell shaped curve that describes of many types of data; For example if your teach graphed your test score and it was a normal bell curve the average score would the highest point. 

Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale - An intelligent test that is used quite commonly and it measures the verbal and nonverbal abilities of adults. If someone got a big difference in this there is a big problem.

Standardization - Comparing testing procedures and meaningful scores with pretested groups. For example, the number of questions you answer correctly on an intelligence test would reveal almost nothing unless you compare the results with other test-takers. \

Valid - the test or experiment actually measures or predicts what it promises. For example, imagine using an inaccurate tape measure, each time you measured it you would get the same result that's reliable, but your faulty results would not be valid. 

Content Validity - When a test samples the behavior that is of interest. For example, the road test for your drivers license has content validity because it samples the tasks a driver routinely faces. 

Predictive validity -  When a test or experiment predicts something it is designed to predict. For example, a test that asks students about French movies is not a valid measure for student’s math abilities. 

Construct Validity - how much a test measures a concept or trait. For example if we wanted to know our height we would use a tape measure and not a weight scale. 

Stereotype Lift - opposite of Stereotype Threat. Ingroup members may perform better in believing the situation benefits them. For example, if the project everyone is doing is the best in the class, they will get donuts. 

Cohort - A group of people sharing a common characteristic such as from a given time period. For example, lets say that you give the same intelligence test to the same group of people over time that would be cohort. 

Cross-sectional study - compare people of different ages at the same point in time. For example, let say you want to test people’s athletic ability at different ages. 

Longitudinal Study - Follow and retest the same cohort over a period of years. For example, lets say you want to test which person has the best intelligence, you would test the same group over and over again in different periods of time.

Growth Mindset - Your brain grows as you learn new things. For example, if you’ve learned how to do a new math problem your knowledge would increase. 

Stereotype threat  - A concern that someone will judge them based on the negative stereotype. For example, when black students performed worse after being reminded of their race just before taking verbal aptitude tests. 

Test Retest Reliability - The practice of evaluating test subjects at different points in time over the course of the research. For example, when determining the effect of coloring on stress, a researcher may choose to evaluate the subjects’ blood pressure before, during and after coloring a set number of pages. 

Multiple Intelligences - Intelligence exists in a number of styles and abilities. For example, visual, spatial and verbal to name a few. 

Cattell-Horn-Carroll Theory (CHC) - A model that helps us understand how intelligence works. It covers the Fluid intelligence and crystallized intelligence 

Psychometrics -  Concentrates on and specializes in mental testing; IQ, educational achievements etc. Psychometric tools such as standaridezed test are used in school  to gain information abouit the people being evaluated. 

Flynn Effect - A increase intelligence test score averages over time. It began in the 1930’s. 

Grit - A personality trait which is encompassed by a passion and resilience to achieve one’s goals. 

Split-Half Reliability - A way to check if a test or measurement is consistent. For example imagine you take a 100 question test, researchers divide the test into two parts and make sure you get the same results both times to make sure it is reliable.