Exploring Psychology Chapter 11

Catharsis

In psychology, the idea that "releasing" aggressive energy (through action or fantasy) relieves aggressive urges.

Adaptation-Level Phenomenon

Our tendency to form judgements (of sounds, of lights, of income) relative to a neutral level defined by our prior experience.

Feel-Good, Do-Good Phenomenon

People's tendency to be helpful when already in a good mood.

Self-Control

The ability to control impulses and delay short-term gratification for greater long-term rewards.

Coronary Heart Disease

The clogging of the vessels that nourish the heart muscle; the leading cause of death in many developed countries.

Learned Helplessness

The hopelessness and passive resignation an animal or human learns when unable to avoid repeated aversive events.

External Locus of Control

The perception that chance or outside forces beyond our personal control determines our fate.

Relative Deprivation

The perception that one is worse off relative to those with whom one compares oneself.

Internal Locus of Control

The perception that you control your own fate.

Stress

The process by which we perceive and respond to certain events, called stressors, that we appraise as threatening or challenging.

Positive Psychology

The scientific study of optimal human functioning; aims to discover and promote strengths and virtues that enable individuals and communities to flourish.

Psychoneuroimmunology

The study of how psychological, neural, and endocrine processes together affect the immune system and resulting health.

Tend and Befriend

Under stress, people (especially women) often provide support to others (tend) and bond with and seek support from others (befriend).

Type A

Friedman and Rosenman's term for competitive, hard-driving, impatient, verbally aggressive, and anger-prone people.

Type B

Friedman and Rosenman's term for easygoing, relaxed people.

Health Psychology

A subfield of psychology that provides psychology's contribution to behavioral medicine.

Coping

Alleviating stress using emotional, cognitive, or behavioral methods.

Emotion-Focused Coping

Attempting to alleviate stress by avoiding or ignoring a stressor and attending to emotional needs related to one's stress reaction.

Problem-Focused Coping

Attempting to alleviate stress directly — by changing the stressor or the way we interact with that stressor.

Subjective Well-Being

Self-perceived happiness or satisfaction with life. Used along with measures of objective well being (physical and economic indicators) to evaluate people's quality of life.

General Adaptation Syndrome (GAS)

Selye's concept of the body's adaptive response to stress in three phases — alarm, resistance, and exhaustion.

Aerobic Exercise

Sustained exercise that increases heart and lung fitness; may also alleviate depression and anxiety.