Psychology final exam
Terms
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- confabulation
- when a person "remembers" info that was never stored in the memory
- psychoanalysis
- Freud's theory of personality that attributes thoughts and actions to unconscious motives and conflicts; the technique used in treating psychological disorders by seeking to expose and interpret unconscious tensions.
- biofeedback
- the process of learning to control bodily states with the help of machines monitoring the states to be contorlled
- hindbrain
- A part of the brain located at the rear base of the skull that is invlved in the basic processes of life
- gerontology
- study of the elderly; aging
- rationalization
- Justification of behaviour through the use of plausible, but inaccurate, excuses.
- Id
- (psychoanalysis) primitive instincts and energies underlying all psychic activity
- Ageism
- discrimination against middle-aged and elderly people
- altruism
- the quality of unselfish concern for the welfare of others
- reliability
- The extent to which a test instrument consistently produces similar results.
- reinforcement
- any consequence that increases the likelihood of a behavior
- generativity
- A shift of attention away from oneself in the present to concern for future generation
- optic nerve
- nerve responsible for carrying impulses for the sense of sight from the retina to the brain
- forebrain
- A part of the brain that covers the brain's central core
- theory
- set of assumptions used to explain why something is the way it is and happens the way it does
- hallucinations
- false sensory experiences, such as seeing something in the absence of an external visual stimulus
- encoding
- the processing of information into the memory system--for example, by extracting meaning
- psychophysics
- The study of relationships between the physical characteristics of stimuli, such as their intensity, and our psychological experience of them. (p. 193)
- schemas
- Concepts or mental fromeworks that organize and interpret information.
- homeostasis
- tendency of a system to maintain relative stability
- bipolar
- mood swings
- hormones
- chemical "messengers" of the endocrine system that are released into the blood
- empathy
- capacity for warmth and understanding
- token economy
- conditioning in which desirable behavior is reinforced with valueless objects, which can be accumulated and exchanged for valued rewards
- superego
- (psychoanalysis) that part of the unconscious mind that acts as a conscience
- comparable worth
- comcept that women and men should get equal pay for equal jobs
- psychology
- the scientific study of mental processes and behavior
- psychotherapy
- the treatment of mental or emotional problems by psychological means
- delusions
- false beliefs, often of persecution or grandeur, that may accompany psychotic disorders
- meditation
- a systematic narrowing of attention that slows the metabolism and helps produce feelings of relaxation
- illusions
- perceptions that misrepresent physical stimuli
- obedience
- change in attitude of=r behavior brought about by social pressure to comply with people perceived to be authorities
- perception
- the process of organizing and interpreting sensory information, enabling us to recognize meaningful objects and events
- stereotype
- a generalized belief about a group of people
- stagnation
- discontinuation of development and a desire to recapture the past, characteristic of some middle-aged people
- sensation
- the stimulation of sensory receptors and the transmission of sensory information to the central nervous system (the spinal cord and the brain).
- intellectualization
- a coping mecanism in which the person analyzes situation from an emotionally detached viewpoint
- placebo effect
- Changes in health or perceived health that result from expectations that a "treatment" will produce an effect on health.
- withdrawal
- a period of adjustment when a person stops taking a drug
- psychiatry
- the branch of medicine dealing with the diagnosis and treatment of mental disorders
- algorithm
- a precise rule (or set of rules) specifying how to solve some problem
- heredity
- Passing traits from parents to offspring.
- persuasion
- an active attempt to change attitudes.
- addiction
- physical or emotional dependence on a drug
- socialization
- the adoption of the behavior patterns of the surrounding culture
- schizophrenia
- A severe disorder marked by hearing non existent voices, seeing hallucinations, and exhibiting inappropriate responses.
- internalization
- learning (of values or attitudes etc.) that is incorporated within yourself
- ego
- The part of the personality developed in early childhood that helps control the id and keep people's actions within the boundaries of social convention.
- structuralist
- psychologist who studied basic elements that make up conscious mental experiences
- narcolepsy
- A condition characterized by suddenly falling asleep
- thanatology
- The study of death.
- genes
- the basic untis of heredity
- consciousness
- an awareness of one's thoughts, feelings, and sensory perceptions
- introspection
- the contemplation of your own thoughts and desires and conduct
- catharsis
- (psychoanalysis) purging of emotional tensions
- insight
- the clear (and often sudden) understanding of a complex situation
- chunking
- Grouping individual bits of data into meaningful larger units
- recombination
- rearranging elements of a problem in order to arrive at an original solution
- insomnia
- an inability to sleep
- validity
- measures what it intended to measure
- gestalt
- The experience that comes from orgainizing bits and pieces of information into meaningful wholes
- midbrain
- A small part of the brain above the pons that integrates sensory information and relays it upward
- constancy
- the tendency for perceived objects to give rise to very similar perceptual experiences in spite of wide variations in the conditions of observation
- generalization
- a process in which an organism produces the same response to two similar stimuli
- complementarity
- the attraction that often develops between opposite types of people b/c of the ability of one to supply what the other lacks
- modeling
- the process of observing and imitating a specific behavior
- androgynous
- having both male and female characteristics
- anxiety
- umplesasant psychological state characterized by vague, generalized apprehension or feeling that one is in danger
- tolerance
- a state in which a drug user needs larger and larger amounts of the drug to get the same effect
- memory
- input,storage and retrieval of what has been learned or experienced
- extinction
- in classical conditioning, the deminishing of a learned response
- idealogy
- set of principles, atitudes and defied objectives for which a group stands
- interference
- the process that occurs when new information appears in short-term memory and replaces what was already there
- clique
- small exclusive group
- hypnosis
- state of conciousness in which the person is succeptible to suggestion
- autonomy
- independence
- neurons
- cell that carries messages throughout the nervous system
- pupil
- Opening in center of Iris; light passes through it
- resynthesis
- the process of combiniing old ideas w/ new one's and reoranizing feelings in order to renew one's identity
- syntax
- studies of the rules for forming admissible sentences
- eustress
- positive stress that leads to goals and acheivements
- archetype
- inherited idea, image or concept based on experiences of one's ancestors that shapes one's perception of the world
- hypothesis
- assumption or educated guess about behavior or about realtionship between 2 variables
- retina
- the light-sensitive inner surface of the eye, containing the receptor rods and cones plus layers or neurons that begin the processing of visual information
- phobia
- morbid fear
- heuristic
- Rules of thumb that often, but not always, help us find the solution to a problem. A shortcut.
- norms
- shared expectations about how the members of a group ought to behave
- conformity
- acting according to certain accepted standards
- semantics
- the study of language meaning
- discrimination
- the ability to distinguish between two similar signals or stimuli
- correlation
- measure of relationship between two or more quantitative variables
- resistance
- (psychiatry) an unwillingness to bring repressed feelings into conscious awareness
- transference
- (psychoanalysis) the process whereby emotions are passed on or displaced from one person to another
- kinesthesis
- Sense of the position and movement of the limbs
- psychologist
- scientist who studies the mind and behavior of human and animals
- lobes
- The different reginos into which the berebral cortex is divided
- visualization
- technique for behavior rehearsal that involves the imagining something
- shaping
- the process of gradually refining a response by successively reinforcing closer approximations of it
- groupthink
- poor group decision making that occurs as a result of a group emphasizing unity over critical thinking