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General Psychology Midterm
Psychology - Scientific study of behavior and mental processes What are the two Schools of psychology? - Structuralism and Functionalism Structuralism - Edward Titchner's belief that every experience could be broken down into individual emotions and sensations. Ex. What are the memories and sensations you get when you smell a flower? Functionalism - Early perspective in psychology associated with William James. He studied how the mind allows people to adapt, live, work, and play. 7 Modern Perspectives - Psychodynamic, Behavioral (or learning), humanistic, cognitive, sociocultural, biological, and evolutionary Psychodynamic Perspective - Focuses on the development of a sense of self and the discovery of motivations behind a persons behavior other that sexual motivations. Behavioral Perspective - Focuses on how people learn new behaviors. Humanistic Perspective - Focuses on how people have free will and strive for self-actualization. Cognitive Perspective - Focuses on memory, intelligence, perception, thought processes, problem solving, language, and learning. (Thinking) Sociocultural Perspective - Focuses on the relationship between social behavior and culture. (Ex: you can act differently with friends, or because of the culture where you live) Biological Perspective - Focuses on the link between social behavior and biological events occurring (Ex: heredity, hormones, tumors, and diseases). Evolutionary Perspective - Focuses on the biological basis of universal mental characteristics that all humans share (Ex: why all humans generally like music and dancing)
Cognitive Neuroscience - Study of the physical workings of the brain and nervous system when engaged in thinking. What is a psychologist? - No medical training but a doctorates degree. Can work in many different vocational settings. What is a psychiatrist? - Has a medical degree and is a medical doctor who specializes in diagnoses and treatment of psychological disorders. Includes prescribing medication. What is the purpose of the scientific method? - To reduce bias and error in the measurement in error. What are the steps in the scientific method? -
- Ask/perceive a question
- Form a hypothesis
- Test the hypothesis
- Draw a conclusion
- Report the results Theories - Organized system of assumptions that try to explain phenomena and their interrelationships. Case Study - A detailed description of a particular individual being studied or treated which may be used to formulate broader research hypotheses. (Genie) Observational Study - Observe and record behavior without interfering with behavior. Naturalistic Observation - Observing how people or animals behave in their natural environment. Laboratory Observation - Observe people or animals in a control setting. Psychological Tests - Used to measure personality traits, emotional traits, aptitude, interests, abilities, and values. (Personality or IQ Test) Surveys - Questionnaires and interviews that ask people directly about their experiences, attitudes, or opinions. Correlational Study - Study that look for a consistent relationship between two phenomena. Positive Correlation - When two variables (phenomena) are directly proportional.
Axon - Transmits information to other cells, covered in myelin Myelin - Fatty substance used to insulate, protect, and speed up the neural impulse Nerves - Bundles of axons coated in myelin that travel together through the body How do neurons communicate? - Electrochemically! Steps to neuron commmunication -
- Axon terminals release neurotransmitters
- Neurotransmitters enter synaptic gap
- Neurotransmitters bind to receptors that fit Action Potential - A brief change in electric voltage which occurs between the inside and outside of an axon when a neuron is stimulated. It produces an electric impulse. Neurotransmitters - A chemical substance that is released by a transmitting neuron at the synapse and alters the activity of the receiving neuron. Neuroplasticity - The ability to change both structure and function of many of the cells in the brain in response to experience and trauma. What does neuroplasticity mean for the brain? - This means that damage to the CNS doesn't have to be permanent. Using stems cells to repair damaged or diseased brain tissue is a new way to repair the brain after trauma. Structures in the brain stem - Pons, medulla, recticular activating system Pons - Involved in sleeping, waking, and dreaming Medulla - Controls automatic functions like breathing and heart rate Recticular Activating System - Arouses cortex and screens incoming information Cerebellum - Involved with learning simple skills, regulating movement and balance, and analyzing sensory information.
Structures of the Limbic System - Thalamus, hypothalamus, amygdala, and hippocampus Thalamus - Relays sensory messages to cerebral cortex, "traffic cop" Hypothalamus - Regulates the amount of fear, thirst, sexual drive, and aggression we feel. (Survival and Motivation) Amygdala - Emotional regulation. Plays a big role in mediating anxiety and depression Hippocampus - "Gateway to Memory", Stores new information in memory Cerebrum - Largest brain structure with two hemispheres. In charge of most sensory, motor, and cognitive processes. Structures of the cerebral cortex - Occipital lobes, parietal lobes, temporal lobes, frontal lobes. Occipital Lobes - Vision Parietal Lobes - Body sensations/movements Temporal Lobes - Memory, perception, emotion, and auditory Frontal Lobes - Higher-order thinking. Thinking, planning, creating, ect. Corpus Callosum - Where millions of axons connect the brains hemispheres, allowing them to communicate. Right Hemisphere Specialization - Nonverbal language, visual-spatial perception, music/art, emotions, processes the whole, pattern and facial recognition Left Hemisphere Recognition - Spoken and written language, Math calculations, logical thought processes, analysis of detail, reading. Ways to map the brain - Case Studies, EEGs, PETs, and MRIs
Extrasensory Perception (ESP) - The ability to perceive something without ordinary sensory information. (Ex: Telepathy) Telepathy - Mind-to-mind communication Clairvoyance - Perception of remote events Precognition - Ability to see future events Why is memory a reconstructive process? - We often don't remember everything that happens in a memory, so we fill in the gaps in recall. We are often unaware that we do this. Confabulation - A belief that you remember something when it happened to someone else or never happened at all. (Will Graham) Flashbulb Memory - Memory that's like a photograph. Often a memory of an unusual, shocking, or tragic event. Recell - Where memories are retrieved with few or no external cues. (Ex: Fill in the blank questions) Recognition - Looking at or hearing information and matching it to what is already in memory. (Ex: multiple choice questions) Memory Process - Encoding, Storage, Reteival Encoding - Preparing or encoding information for storage in memory Storage - Retaining information in memory Retreival - Recovering information from memory for use Shallow processing - Memory or information is never encoded Sensory Memory - Momentarily preserves extremely accurate images of sensory information (2-4 sec)
Short-term memory - Used for short-term storage of memories/information and for processing information/thinking. (20-30 sec) Long-term memory - Memory is stored here for later use, no known limits of capacity. Chunking - Composing smaller units of information into a larger, meaningful unit Procedural Memories - Memories for performance of actions or skills (Ex: riding a bike) Declarative Memories - Memories of facts, rules, concepts, and events. Elaborative rehearsal - Associating new information into something already known. Making information meaningful. Mnemonics - Strategies and tricks for improving memory, such as the use of jingles, acronyms, etc. Maintenance rehearsal - Repeating information to retain it in short-term memory Distributed practice - Frequently "activating" information in memory Decay Theory - Theory that memories fade over time if not accessed. Applies more to STM than LTM. Ineffective encoding - When information what never fully encoded into LTM Cue-dependent forgetting - Inability to retrieve information stored in memory because of insufficient cues for recall. Where you were, or the mood you were in to learn the information can be a cue for recall. Replacement - theory that new information entering memory can wipe out old information. Similar to interference Motivated forgetting - We are motivated to forget unpleasant events. Circadian Rythms - Something that occurs every 24 hours (Ex: sleep)
How does light travel through the parts of the eye? - Light enters the eye and is focused through the cornea, passes through the aqueous humor, and then through the pupil. The lens also focuses light on the retina, where is passes through ganglion and bipolar cells to stimulate the rods and cones. How does sound travel through the ear? - Sound travels through the visible outer structure (pinna), and travels through the eardrum and then to the small bones of the middle ear. The stirrups rest on the oval window, causing the cochlea and basilar membrane to vibrate with sound. How does smell work? - The olfactory receptors in the upper part of the nasal passages receive molecules of substances and create neural signals that then go to the olfactory bulbs under the frontal lobes. How does taste work? - Taste buds in the tongue receive molecules of substances, which fit into receptor sites. What are the two chemical senses? - Smell and taste Depth perception - the ability to see the world in 3 dimensions Monocular cues - Cues for perceiving depth based on one eye only. (Linear perspective, relative size, overlap, aerial perspective, texture gradient, motion parallax, accomodation) Binocular cues - Cues for perceiving depth based on both eyes. (Convergence, binocular disparity) Linear perspective - Where parallel lines appear to converge on each other. Relative size - When people/objects look smaller, they are presumed to be a farther distance away. Overlap - If one object is behind another, the object in front is assumed to be closer than the one in back. Aerial Perspective - The farther away an object is, the hazier it seems. Texture Gradient - Textured surfaces appear to be smaller and finer as distance from the viewer increases. Motion parallax - Noticing how fast/slow other things move in comparison to you.
Accomodation - Changing thickness of the lens in the eye in response to looking at objects that are far away. Convergence - When both eyes move to focus on an object Binocular disparity - The right and left eye don't see the exact same image. Illusion - A perception that doesn't correspond with reality. Visual Illusion - Errors in perception, misunderstandings that occur because we apply common rules for processing information to situations to which those rules are inappropriate. Visual Constancies - Perceiving objects as stable or unchanged despite changes in sensory imput. (Shape, size, brightness, and color constancies)
