Psychology Chapters 1 and 2
Terms
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- psychology
- scientific study of behaviors and mental processes (based on empirical evidence)
- 4 Goals of science
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1. describe
2. explain/understand (develop theories)
3. make predictions
4. control - scientific method
- gathering of data by use of research methods
- research methods (6)
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1. naturalistic observation
2. surveys/questionairres/interviews
3. psychological tests
4. case study
5. physiological measures
6. experimental method (determins cause/effect relationships) - behavior
- what we can observe and record
- mental processes
- what we infer from behavioral data (thoughts, hopes, etc)
- naturalistic observation pros
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1. observes real life situations as they occur in natureal environment (vs artificial conditions of a lab)
2. unobtrusive (subject dont know they are being studied)
3. can study probs hard to recreate in a lab
4. does not rely on self report
5. get much info - helpful generating new guesses about relationships between variables - naturalistic observation cons
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1. little or no control - your just recording events and looking for relationships among variables
2.describes vs. explains - says what is happening but not why - cant determine causes
3. time prob/cost/ethical limitations - must wait for behavior to occur
4. observer influence and bias - must remain unobtrusive and no influence - case study - define and pros
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1. allows study of one person in detail (in depth and comprehensive)
2. focus on all aspects of a single individual
3. often over a long period of time
4. incorporates many methods of data collection
5. helps generate hypothesis and confirm with large population study - case study cons
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1. small # of subjects (usually 1)
2. single case may be misleading or unrepresentative of general pop
3. findings may only apply to the particular individual studied
4. low generalizability
5. subjective interpretation of data is often necessary since many vars and less control - self report: define and cons
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tests -objective projective - surveys - questionnaires - interviews
Problems: 1.may not remember
2. may lie
3. dont reveal information
4. dont think before answering
5. try cooperate and give "good" socially desirable responses vs. honest answers
6. interviewer may misunderstand or distort subjects responses and vice versa - psychological tests
- are standadized and norms - allows an individuals performance to be compared to the performance of others
- surveys pros/cons
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pro: 1. large # of subjects
2. how people think and feel about certain issues - opinions, beliefs, preferences,
3. practical cost and time
con:
relies on self report - interview pros
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1. follow up and clarify subjects answers
2. able to observe non verbal cues
3. flexible so broad range of subjects
4. feelings and thoughts/attitudes are measured - how to take sample that is rep of whole pop
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1. randomly select subjects
2. select large number of subjects - control group
- treated liek experimental group in every way excpet not exposed to experimental variable. This group is used for comarison.
- 3 types of variables
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1. independent variable - manipulated (the cause)...if ____
2. dependent variable - measure (the effect)...then ____
3. control/extraneous variables - placebo control group
- placebo is an inert substance or treatment that is similar in all other repsect to the experimental treatment
- demand characteristics
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subject and experimentor may be pulled to act in ways based on cues about nature of experiment
they have expectations about what is giong to happen and the proper way to respond - double blind technique
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controls for demand characteristis action on experimentor and subject
- neither e nor s knows whether s is in the experimental or control group
- blind to hypothesis and treatment condition
- so e & s dont behave in ways to fulfill expectations of research
- helps prevent bias - correlation
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- are variables x and y related?
- make scatter diagram
- r = correlation coefficient
- r = +/- (sign tells direction)
- r = 0-1.0 (number tells strength)
does not tell whether variables are causally related (A can cause B, B can cuase A, or C can cause both A and B) - code of ethics in research
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1. protect human welfare
2. informed consent
3. voluntary participation
4. confidentiality (HIPPA)
5. deception (only used if no other alternative and only if justifiable)
6. debriefing - reveal true purpose/discuss results - tell why used deception if used - check and provide for any help needed - central nervous system
- consists of brain and spinal cord
- peripheral nervous system
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nerves that branch out from CNS to rest of body
consists of two parts - somatic nervous system and autonomic nervous system - somatic nervous system
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- voluntary
- infrom from sense organs to CNS
- voluntary muscle control - autonomic nervous system
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- involuntary
- controls involuntary muscles and glands (ex breathing and digesting)
- consists of sympathetic nervous system (arousing - prepares for emegency - fight or flight) and Parasympathetic nervous system (calming - restores balance - calms and relaxes) - neurons
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- the building blocks of the brain
- receive,analyze, and transmit information
- single nerve cell
- more than 100 billion (most in brain) - dendrites
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receive chemical signals from cell
- have receptor sites that receieve specific neuro transmitters - axon
- carries electrical signal from cell body to axon terminals
- axon terminals
- contain chemicals called neurotransmitters
- neurotransmitter
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- in the axon terminals
- either stimulate/excite next neuron or inhibit it
- some neurons produce and release more than 1 type of neurotransmitter - myelin sheath
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- on SOME axons
- insulating white fatty layer
- send impulses faster
- accounts for 1/2 of brain volume
- if destroyed/deteriorated - multiple sclerosis (MS)- jerking - differences in axons
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- some have myelin sheath
- lenght (1/1000 inch to 1 inch to 3 ft long)
- thickness (thicker = faster impulse) - synapse
- space between neurons - neurons dont touch
- three types of neurons
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1. sensory/afferent neurons - message from sense organ to CNS
2. motor/efferent nuerons - message from CNS to muscles/glands
3. association/inter neuron - carry messages from one nueron to another (about 99.98% of all neurons in CNS) - stages of nueron action
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1. resting/polarized state (pos outside; neg inside) - need enough stimulation to reach threshold level for neuron to "fire"
2. nueral impulseaction potention - depolarized state - all or non principle
3. absolute refactory period (neuron will NOT fire)
4. relative refractory period - neruon will fire but must be stimulated ABOVE threshold level bc it is in the process of getting back to polarized state
*once cell fires - electrical impulse travels down axon - causes neurotransmitters to be released - two effects of neurotransmitters
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1. excite/stimulate
2. inhibit - two types of brain cells
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1. glial cells (more common)
2. neurons - 3 divisions of major structures of brain
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1. hind brain - oldest most primitive part
- contains automatic survival functions
2. mid brain
3. forebrain - newest and largest part
- has the most brain neurons
- convultions (folds) - medulla
- in hing brain - controls breathing, heartbeat, etc
- cerebellum
- in hind brain - controls balance and coordination
- hypothalamus
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in forebrain
-hunger/how much we eat
- thirst/drinking behavior
- rage/agressive behavior
- pleasure center - cerebral cortex
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- bark, outer covering
- convoluted in humans vs smooth in rats
- if spread out woudl b 2-3 ft
- most recently evolved part
- largest part of brain in humans
- 2 hemispheres
- each hemisphere controls opposite side of brain - corpus callosum
- connects two hemispheres of the brain
- 4 lobes of brain
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frontal lobe - motor (higher intellectual reasoning...planning, judgement, mother movements)
parietal lobe - sensory
occipital lobe - vision
temporal lobe - hearing - reticular formation
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- bundle of neurons
- spinal cord thru brain stem to frontal lobes
- governs overall activity level of cerebral cortex
- controls level of alertness (consciousness and attention)
- wake - sleep
- filters info to brain - left hemisphere
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- manages right side of the body
- controls language in most cases - methods for studying the brain
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1. electrical stimulation
2. case studies (injury , birth defects)
3. eeg
4. ablation (removal of parts of the brain)
5. cat pet mri - endocrine system
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1. consists of ductless glands
2. produce hormones - chemicals - process of human reproduction
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1. mother - egg cell (23 chromosomes)
2. father - sperm cell (23 chromosomes)
3. zygote - fertilized egg cell (23 PAIRS of chromosomes) - chromosome
- 23 pairs in every cell in body except the egg and sperm cell which have 23 chromosomes
- genes
- located on chromosomes - contain DNA
- sperm cell
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determines the gender (male /female) of the newborn
1/2 sperm cells carry and X and 1/2 carry a Y - human genome project
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1. genome: the complete set of instructions for making an organism
2. project wanted to find location and function of each gene - dominant/recessive gene principle
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- if one gene of a pair is dominant and oen is recessive the dominant genee exerts its effects, overriding the potentioal influence of teh recessive gene
2. a recessive gene exerts its influence only if two genese of a pair are both recessive - genotype
- an individuals genetic make up
- phenotype
- what you see - the way an individuals genotype is expressed in observed and measurable characteristics (ex eye color and height)
- polygenic inheritance
- the generic principle that many genes can interact to produce a particular characteristic