AP Psych Unit 7 Personality, Motivation, and Emotion
Flashcard Definitions
Personality: A person's unique patterns of thinking, feeling, and behavior.
The Barnum Effect: The tendency to believe vague, general statements as personally meaningful.
Psychodynamic Theories: Views personality as influenced by unconscious motives and conflicts.
Psychoanalysis: Freud's method for exploring the unconscious through free association and dream analysis.
Unconscious: A reservoir of thoughts, feelings, and desires below conscious awareness.
Free Association: A technique where a person says whatever comes to mind to uncover the unconscious.
Id: The part of personality driven by instinctual desires and seeks immediate gratification.
Ego: The rational part of personality balancing desires and reality.
Superego: The moral conscience of personality, striving for perfection.
Defense Mechanisms: Unconscious strategies to protect from anxiety by distorting reality.
Denial: Refusing to acknowledge reality.
Displacement: Redirecting emotions to a safer target.
Projection: Attributing your feelings to others.
Rationalization: Justifying actions with logical excuses.
Reaction Formation: Acting opposite to true feelings.
Regression: Returning to an earlier, comforting behavior.
Repression: Pushing painful thoughts into the unconscious.
Sublimation: Redirecting unacceptable impulses into positive activities.
Projective Tests: Personality assessments using ambiguous stimuli to reveal the unconscious.
TAT: A test where people create stories about ambiguous pictures.
Rorschach Inkblot: A test interpreting inkblots to uncover thoughts and feelings.
Humanistic Theories: Focus on personal growth and self-fulfillment.
Hierarchy of Needs: Maslow's pyramid of needs, from basic survival to personal growth.
Self-Actualization: Fulfilling one's potential.
Self-Transcendence: Finding meaning beyond oneself.
Unconditional Positive Regard: Total acceptance of a person regardless of their actions.
Self-Concept: How you perceive and feel about yourself.
Trait: A consistent characteristic of behavior or emotion.
Trait Theories: Focus on identifying and measuring personality traits.
Factor Analysis: A statistical method to find patterns in data, like grouping related traits.
Personality Inventories: Questionnaires measuring personality traits.
MMPI: A widely used test to assess psychological traits and disorders.
Empirically Derived: Developed by testing a pool of items and selecting those that differentiate groups.
Big Five Factors: Five key personality traits: openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, neuroticism.
Person-Situation Controversy: Debate over whether personality or situation influences behavior more.
Social-Cognitive Perspective: Views personality as influenced by interactions between thoughts and environment.
Reciprocal Determinism: The interplay of behavior, personal factors, and environment.
Spotlight Effect: Overestimating how much others notice you.
Self-Esteem: How much you value yourself.
Self-Efficacy: Belief in your ability to succeed in specific situations.
Self-Serving Bias: Tendency to see oneself in a favorable light.
Motivation: The drive to act towards a goal.
Instinct: An innate, fixed pattern of behavior.
Drive-Reduction Theory: Behavior motivated by the need to reduce physiological drives.
Homeostasis: Maintaining internal stability.
Incentive: An external stimulus that motivates behavior.
Arousal Theory: People seek an optimal level of excitement or arousal.
Yerkes-Dodson Law: Performance improves with arousal up to a point, then declines.
Sensation-Seeking Theory: The drive to seek thrilling or novel experiences.
Experience: Seeking new sensory experiences.
Thrill/Adventure: Seeking exciting physical activities.
Disinhibition: Seeking unrestrained or impulsive activities.
Boredom Susceptibility: Avoiding routine or dull experiences.
Self-Determination Theory: Motivation stems from autonomy, competence, and relatedness.
Intrinsic Motivation: Doing something because it’s enjoyable.
Extrinsic Motivation: Doing something for external rewards.
Achievement Motivation: The drive to excel and succeed.
Lewin’s Motivational Conflicts: Different types of decision-making conflicts.
Approach-approach: Choosing between two desirable outcomes.
Approach-avoidance: A choice with both positive and negative aspects.
Avoidance-avoidance: Choosing between two undesirable outcomes.
Glucose: Sugar providing energy to the body and brain.
Ghrelin: Hormone that signals hunger.
Leptin: Hormone that signals fullness.
Emotion: A response involving physiological arousal, behaviors, and feelings.
James-Lange Theory: Emotions arise from physical reactions.
Cannon-Bard Theory: Physical reactions and emotions occur simultaneously.
Schachter-Singer Theory: Emotions depend on physical arousal and cognitive labeling.
Zajonc-LeDoux: Emotions can occur instantly, without conscious thought.
Lazarus: Emotions arise after appraising a situation as harmless or threatening.
Universal Emotion: Basic emotions like happiness and anger are shared across cultures.
Display Rules: Cultural norms for expressing emotions.
Facial Feedback Effect: Facial expressions influence emotional experiences.
Behavior Feedback Effect: Body movements or behaviors can influence emotions.
Broaden-and-Build Theory: Positive emotions expand thinking and help build resources.