Psychological Science: Midterm 1

Probability Value (P-value)

-A p-value is a measure of the probability that an observed difference could have occurred just by random chance. -The lower the p-value, the greater the statistical significance of the observed difference.

How does chronic stress affect hormone levels and what hormones are present during chronic stress? How does chronic stress affect health?

-Adrenaline increases your heart rate, elevates your blood pressure and boosts energy supplies. CORTISOL, the primary stress hormone -Chronic Stress on health: coronary heart disease, diabetes, cancer, other such as fevers, colds, disorders, depression...

behavioral genetics

-Behavioral genetics tries to determine how behavior relates to both areas

What are the different kinds of stress and how are they adaptive/maladaptive?

-Distress -Eustress -Catastophes -Major Life Changes -Hassles -Psychological Stressors

What is meant by replication and what is the replication crisis?

-Doing the same thing over again and getting the same results -Gives more support for original findings -As researchers have tried to duplicate other studies, the results are not always similar -There is growing concern when even new studies ahve different findings when using similar designs

Key elements or characteristics of the scientific approach and how they are applied in research

-Emperical Methods: Approaches to inquiry that are tied to actual measurement and observation -Systemic Observation: The careful observation of the natural world with the aim of better understanding it

Edward Titchener

-England 1890s -Edward Bradford Titchener was an English psychologist who studied under Wilhelm Wundt for several years. -Titchener is best known for creating his version of psychology that described the structure of the mind: STUCURALISM -His first graduate student was Margaret Floy Washburn,

Wilhelm Wundt

-Father of experimental psychology -First psychology lab -Germany 1879

G. Stanley Hall

-First president of the American Psychological Association -He developed his influential concept of "genetic psychology," based on evolutionary theory, and solidified his reputation as a leading educational reformer. -In 1904, Hall published Adolescence: Its Psychology and Its Relation to Physiology, Anthropology, Sociology, Sex, Crime, Religion, and Education. -Had theory that mental growth proceeds by evolutionary stages

Margret Washburn

-First woman to earn psych Ph.D -studied under titchener

Cognitive Psychology

-Focuses on how people think, remember, store, and use information

What are the functions of glial cells?

-Form myelin sheath -Remove neuron waste, dead neurons, and neurons during development -coordinate brains immune response -carry nutrition to neurons -regulate the ions of extracellular fluid -form blood-brain barrier -creates cerebrospinal fluid

Case Study

an intensive study about a person, a group of people or a unit,

What is the main function of neurons?

cells responsible for receiving sensory input from the external world, for sending motor commands to our muscles, and for transforming and relaying the electrical signals at every step in between. -the cell body

Null Hypothesis

the hypothesis that there is NO SIGNIFICANT DIFFERENCE between specified populations, any observed difference being due to sampling or experimental error.

Falsifiability

the logical possibility that an assertion, hypothesis, or theory can be shown to be false by an observation or experiment.

Definition of psychology

the scientific study of the human mind and its functions, especially those affecting behavior in a given context.

Absolute Threshold

the smallest magnitude at which a sensory stimulus can reliably evoke a sensation.

Daily Dairy Method

Diary studies is a research method that collects qualitative information by having participants record entries about their everyday lives in a log, diary or journal about the activity or experience being studied.

Ecological Validity

Ecological validity examines whether the results of a study can be generalized to real-life settings

Cross- Sectional Study

One point in time with different age groups

What is the difference between sensation and perception?

Sensation: When sense organs are activated, yielding neural signals Perception: Perception involves the organization, interpretation, and conscious experience of those sensations.

Type 1 Error

A type I error (false-positive) occurs if an investigator rejects a null hypothesis that is actually true in the population

Psychoanalysis

a method of analyzing psychic phenomena and treating emotional disorders that involves treatment sessions during which the patient is encouraged to talk freely about personal experiences and especially about early childhood and dreams.

External Validity

-refers to how well the outcome of a study can be expected to apply to other settings. -lab studies...less realistic, less generalizable -Field Studies....more realistic and generalizable

Brain Stem

-responsible for the neural functions that keep us alive -life support will be needed if damaged -includes the medulla, pons, midbrain, and diencephalon (which consisits of the thalamus and hypothalamus) -Collectively, these regions also are involved in our sleep-wake cycle, some sensory and motor function, as well as growth and other hormonal behaviors

contributions of these people to the study of intelligence: Francis Galton

-Galton believed that intelligence and most other physical and mental characteristics of humans were inherited and biologically based -Eugenics

Functionalism

-How mind allows us to function -According to functionalism, mental states are identified by what they do rather than by what they are made of -Contrasted with behaviorism, functionalism retains the traditional idea that mental states are internal states of thinking creatures

Humanism

-Humanist believe people have "free will" and choose thier own behavior or destiny

Describe the role inductive reasoning plays in scientific (and everyday) reasoning.

-Inductive reasoning is a form of logical thinking that uses related observations to arrive at a general conclusion -helps forms hypothesis based from observation

In what ways is intelligence measured?

-Intelligence Quotient (Binet-Simon Test) -Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale (WAIS) -Standardized tests

Behaviorism

-Ivan Pavlov and John B. Watson and B. F. Skinner -Trying to understand reflexes and responses to stimulus -Wanted to focus on observable behaviour...not unconcious -Behaviour can be conditioned by reinforcing those desired behaviors

John Locke

-John Locke (1632-1704) was an English philosopher, often classified as an 'empiricist', because he believed that knowledge was founded in empirical observation and experience -the claim that all knowledge comes from experience and that there are no innate ideas that are with us when we are born.

Internal Validity

-Lab studies: you have more control over variables, so you can limit confounding factors and focus more on casual inferences -Field Studies: it is harder to control outside variable -Internal validity is the extent to which a study establishes a trustworthy cause-and-effect relationship between a treatment and an outcome

Max Wertheimer

-Max Wertheimer was one of the founding members of Gestalt psychology -He is known for his book, Productive Thinking

Sigmeund Freud

-Neurologist that focused on disorders of nervous system -Developed Psychoanalysis

Difference between Experimental/quasi-experimental and Correlational/ non-experimental

-Non-experimental research means there is a predictor variable or group of subjects that cannot be manipulated by the experimenter -Experimental design, on the other hand, allows for researchers to manipulate the predictor variable and subjects.

Day Reconstruction Method

-Put together at end of day -less burden of time during day

Evolutionary Psychology

-Seeks to understand biological bases for universal mental characteristics that are shared by humans across time culture

Psychodynamic

-Seeks to understand how unconcious mind influences concious behavior -Focus today is more on development of self and social relationships; motivation -Less focus on sex and sexual motivations

contributions of these people to the study of intelligence: Charles Spearman

-Spearman inveted the Spearman 'G' or general factor -General intelligence, also known as g factor, refers to a general mental ability that, according to Spearman, underlies multiple specific skills, including verbal, spatial, numerical and mechanical

Structuralism

-Structure of the conscious mind sensations emotions (he built on Wundt's work) -a method of interpretation and analysis of aspects of human cognition, behavior, culture, and experience that focuses on relationships of contrast between elements in a conceptual system that reflect patterns underlying a superficial diversity.

Sociocultural Psychology

-Study of culural norms, values, expectations

William James

-U.S Harvard 1870s -First Educator of a psychology course in the U.S -Father of American Psychology -James established the philosophical school known as pragmatism, and is also cited as one of the founders of functional psychology

What is General Adaptation syndrome? What are the stages?

-a description of the process of how your body responds to stress. 1. Alarm: reaction to a stressor, nervous system is activated 2. Resistance: stress continues so the body settles into stress response/hormones to continue to help fight or flight 3. Exhaustion: body's resources are gone, body is worn out, can lead to illness or death of organism

Explain what the heritability coefficient is and some of its pitfalls

-cannot be used to determine the causes of differences between populations -nor can it be used to determine the extent to which an individual's phenotype is determined by genes versus environment.

ependymal cells

-ciliated-epithelial glial cells that develop from radial glia along the surface of the ventricles of the brain and the spinal canal. -protects brain and spinal cord from trauma

Cerebellum

-critical for coordinated movement and posture -range of cognitive abilities including language -contains greatest # of neurons than any other part of the brain

contributions of these people to the study of intelligence: Alfred Binet

-developing the first widely used intelligence test

Objective Introspection

-measure own thoughts -Introspection is a process that involves looking inward to examine one's own thoughts and emotions. -The experimental use of introspection is similar to what you might do when you analyze your own thoughts and feelings but in a much more structured and rigorous way

Know possible solutions for the replication crisis

-open data -open source -open access journals -open methodology -open peer reviews -open educational resources

Gestalt Psychology

-psych should be understood as a whole "an organized whole" or "configuration" -school of psychology founded in the 20th century that provided the foundation for the modern study of perception -Gestalt theory emphasizes that the whole of anything is greater than its parts.

How do neurons function? (action potentials, creation of neurotransmitters, postsynaptic potentials, resting membrane potential, flow of positively and negatively charged ions, etc.)

1. Dendrites receive signal from presynaptic neurons 2. All of the EPSPs and IPSPSs aggregate in the soma. If the change in potential depolarizes from the resting membrane potential and hits the threshold of excitation, an action potential is generated (in an all-or-nothing fashion) 3. Action potentials travel down the axon 4. Ion channels in the nodes of Ranvier recharge the action potential 5. Neurotransmitters are released into the synaptic gap and bind to receptors on the dendrites of the postsynaptic neuron

Ethics of Psychology

1. Informed Consent 2. Confidentiality 3. Privacy 4. Benefits 5. Deception

What percentage of energy does the human brain require to properly function?

20%

What percentage of people experience GAD?

3.1% of American population

Cross-Sequential Study

A mix of longitudinal and corss-sectional study

Ambulatory Assessment

Ambulatory assessment is computer-assisted methodology for self-reports, behavior records or psychological measurements

Random Assignment

Assigning paritcipants to receive different conditions of an experiment by chance

Describe how tradition, anecdote, intuition, authority, empiricism, and reasoning are or are NOT consistent with science and scientific thinking.

Because those are all based off the sources of hypothesis while science and scientific thinking is new knowledge

bottom-up processing

Bottom-up processing begins with the retrieval of sensory information from our external environment to build perceptions based on the current input of sensory information.

How does the ratio of the human brain to the human body compare with the ratio of other animals' brains and their bodies?

Brain:body mass ration= 1:40

What is the effect of CBT on anxiety disorders?

CBT (Cognitive Behavioral Therapy) for anxiety disorders is moderately effective for improving quality of life, especially in physical and psychological domains

Corpus Collosum

Connects two hemispheres of the cerebral cortex

What is the difference between an exact and conceptual replication?

Exact replication: A scientist attempts to exactly recreate the scientific methods used in conditions of an eariler study to determine whether the results come out the same Conceptual replication: A scientific attempt to copy the scienctific hypothesis used in an earlier study in an effort to determine whether the results will generalize to different samples, times, and situations. The same or similar resulst are an indication that the findings are generalizable

Francis Cecil Sumner

First African American to get psych Ph.D

Longitudinal Study

Following participants over time

Identify characteristics of good research

Good research is replicable, reproducible, and transparent.

What effect does sustained stimuli (such as long term construction noise) have on our conscious experience of the stimuli?

Habituation: Your brain stops attending to the same stimuli after a while

contributions of these people to the study of intelligence: David Weschler

He developed the Wechsler-Bellevue Intelligence Scale,

What are the relationships between the different areas or structures of the brain? (think about what controls/influences what)

Left cerebral hemispher is responsible for the right side of the body and vice versa for sensory and motor cortices

Identify some limitations in the study of psychology, and explain why there has been skepticism about psychology as a science.

Limitations may refer to the subject matter (e.g. overt behavior versus subjective, private experience), objectivity, generality, testability, ecological validity, ethical issues and philosophical debates

Correlation

Measures the association between two variables or how they go together

Frontal lobe and what damage to this region would affect as far as functioning

Motor execution, higher-order thinking (planning, speech, decision making...)

Cerebral Cortex

Much of our "thinking" (sensory, motor, decision making, planning)

Understand and describe the difference between nature and nurture

Nature: the influence of our inherited characteristics (our genetics) Nurture: The influence of the environment

Understand in which ways the brain can change

Neuroplasticity

What is the primary function of neurotransmitters?

Neurotransmitters are often referred to as the body's chemical messengers. They are the molecules used by the nervous system to transmit messages between neurons, or from neurons to muscles. -the chemical compound that the neuron realese

Explain Karl Popper's great contribution to science.

Pop-per's principal contribution to the philosophy of science rests on his rejection of the inductive method in the empirical sciences. -According to this traditional view, a scientific hypothesis may be tested and verified by obtaining the repeated outcome of substantiating observations. -Falsification is important

Causation

Relation that holds between two temporally simultaneous or successive events when the first event (the cause) brings about the other (the effect)

What is the differential threshold?

The 'differential threshold' or 'just noticeable' difference, is the minimum increase in a stimulus required to detect a difference in the perception.

Biopsychosocial Model

The biopsychosocial model is a general model positing that biological, psychological (which includes thoughts, emotions, and behaviors), and social (e.g., socioeconomical, socioenvironmental, and cultural) factors, all play a significant role in health and disease.

Know the basic components and structures of the Central Nervous System

The brain and the spinal cord are the central nervous system, and they represent the main organs of the nervous system. The spinal cord is a single structure, whereas the adult brain is described in terms of four major regions: the cerebrum, the diencephalon, the brain stem, and the cerebellum.

What is the HPA axis?

The hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis, or HPA axis, is a term used to represent the interaction between the hypothalamus, pituitary gland, and adrenal glands

Typer 2 Error

a type II error (false-negative) occurs if the investigator fails to reject a null hypothesis that is actually false in the population.

Where in the body is norepinephrine produced?

adrenal medulla

Electronically Activated Radar

an ecological assessment tool for the naturalistic observation of everyday social life

Know the nervous system component necessary for conscious movement and perception of environment

The somatic nervous system is responsible for coordinating the body's movements, and also for receiving external stimuli.

Independent Variable

The variable the researcher manipulates and controls in an experiment

Dependant Variable

The variable the researcher measures but does not manipulate in an experiment

How do pressure and control influence our experience of stress?

They are psychological stressors....along with frustration, aggression, and conflict

top-down processing

Top-down processing is the interpretation of incoming information based on prior knowledge, experiences, and expectations.

How do sensations or stimuli become neural signals and what is the process called? Be able to explain the process through which various sensory organs process stimuli.

Transduction: process of converting outside stimuli into neural signals

Understand studies used in the nature vs. nurture debate

Twin and adoption studies are two instances of a much broader class of methods for observing nature-nurture

heritability coefficient

a measure of how much of the variation you see in a certain trait can be attributed to genetic variation

Generalizability

a measure of how useful the results of a study are for a broader group of people or situations.

Goal of Psychology

four primary goals of psychology are to describe, explain, predict, and change behavior. In many ways, these objectives are similar to the kinds of things you probably do every day as you interact with others.

Webers Law

important psychological law quantifying the perception of change in a given stimulus.

Empericism

the theory that all knowledge is derived from sense-experience. Stimulated by the rise of experimental science, it developed in the 17th and 18th centuries, expounded in particular by John Locke, George Berkeley, and David Hume.