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Exam 2!
Consciousness, Memory, and Thinking, Intelligence and Language
107
Psychology
Undergraduate 2
10/26/2012

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Term
How did William James describe consciousness?
Definition
He described the mind as a stream of consciousness- a continuous flow or constant change in sensation, images, thoughts and feelings
Term
What is consciousness?
Definition
-is an individual's awareness of external events and internal sensations under a condition of arousal
-includes awareness of the self and thoughts about one's experiences
Term
What is is meant by arousal in relation to consciousness?
Definition
Arousal is a physiological stated determined by the reticular activating system which is a network of structures including the brain stem, medulla, and thalamus.
Term
What are the 5 Levels of Awareness?
Definition
-Higher-Level Consciousness
-Lower-Level Consciousness
-Altered State of Consciousness
-Subconscious Awareness
-No Awareness
Term
It is the most altered states of human consciousness, during which individuals actively focus their efforts toward a goal.
Definition
Controlled Processing
Term
This states pf consciousness requires little attention and do not interfere with other ongoing activities
-requires less consciousness effort than controlled processes
Definition
Automatic Processing
Term
What was Freud's interpretation of the unconscious mind?
Definition
He viewed the unconscious as a storehouse for vile thoughts
Term
Watching a classmate as he struggling to master the unfamiliar buttons on his new smart phone. He does not hear you humming or notice the intriguing shadow on the wall, What is this an example of?
Definition
Controlled Processing
Term
Is a natural state of rest for the body and mind that involves the reversible loss of consciousness
Definition
Sleep
Term
-are daily behavioral or physiological cycles
-involves the sleep/wake cycle
-body temperature
-blood pressure
-blood sugar level
Definition
Circadian Rhythm
Term
-Takes up about 1/2 or 1/3 of our lives
-tied to biological rhythms(fluctuations in temp., hormones, and brain activity)
Definition
Sleep
Term
-tied to the Suprachiasmatic Nucleus (SCN)
-Desynchronizing and resetting the Biological Clock
Definition
Circadian Rhythm
Term
Plays a major role in keeping our biological clock running on time
Definition
Suprachiasmatic Nucleus
Term
How does sleep deprivation effect us?
Definition
-Have poor memory
-Reduced Alertness and Performance
-Injury
-Health Problems
-decreases brain activity in thalamus and prefrontal cortex
Term
5 stages of sleep:
Definition
-Stage 1: drowsy or light sleep with theta waves
-Stage 2: light sleep forming sleep spindles with continued theta waves
-Stage 3 and 4: beginning of (slowest and highest brain waves during sleep) delta waves; deep sleep; relaxed muscles
-Stage 5: REM (rapid eye movement); dreaming occurs; fast waves similar to wakefulness
Term
-the inability to sleep
-common sleep problem
-are common in women who are thin, stressed or depressed
Definition
Insomnia
Term
-immediately enter into REM sleep
-involves the sudden, overpowering urge to sleep
-individuals who have this disorder are often tired during the day or may fall asleep during talking or standing up
Definition
Narcolepsy
Term
-is the dream's surface content which contains dream symbols that disguise the dream's true meaning
Definition
Manifest Dream Content
Term
Types of Sleep Disorders
Definition
-Insomnia
-Narcolepsy
-Sleep talking or walking
-Sleep Apnea
-Nightmares or terrors
Term
Freud's Psychodynamic Aproach to dreaming:
Definition
-Manifest Content
-Latent Content
Term
- is the dream's hidden content, its unconscious and true meaning
Definition
Latent Content
Term
-The need to take increasing amounts of a drug to get the same effect
Definition
Tolerance
Term
The two types of addiction
Definition
-physical dependence
-psychological dependence
Term
-is the strong desire to repeat the use of a drug for emotional reasons
-ex. feeling of well being or stress reduction
Definition
Psychological dependence
Term
-the physiological need for a drug that causes unpleasant withdrawal symptoms such as physical pain and a craving for the drug when discontinued
Definition
Physical dependence
Term
-psychoactive drugs that slow down mental and physical activity
ex. alcohol, barbiturates, tranquilizers and opiates
Definition
Depressants
Term
-called psychedelics, psychoactive drugs that modify a person's perceptual experiences and produce visual images that are not real

-ex. marijuana, LSD
Definition
Hallucinogens
Term
-involves controlled processing, in which individuals actively focus their efforts on attaining a goal
-the most alert state of consciousness
Definition
Higher-Level Consciouness
Term
-includes automatic processing that requires little attention as well as daydreaming
Definition
Lower-Level Consciousness
Term
-can be produced by drugs, trauma, fatigue, possible hypnosis, and sensory deprivation
Definition
Altered State of Consciousness
Term
-can occur when people are awake, as well as when they are sleeping and dreaming
Definition
Subconscious Awareness
Term
Freud's belief that some unconscious thoughts are too laden with anxiety and other negative emotions for consciousness to admit them
ex. being knocked out
Definition
No Awareness
Term
is the retention of information or experience over time as the result of three key processes
-encoding
-storage
-retrieval
Definition
What is memory?
Term
-Is the first step in memory
-the process by which information gets into memory storage
Definition
Encoding
Term
-requires attention
-works on different levels of processing
-elaboration
-imagery
Definition
Encoding
Term
-focusing on a specific aspect of experience while ignoring others
-brain's resources are limited
Definition
selective attention
Term
-involves concentrating on more than one activity at the same time
ex. listening to music or watching tv while reading a book at the same time
(multi - taskers)
Definition
divided attention
Term
-(called vigilance) is the ability to maintain attention to a selected stimulus for a prolonged period of time
-ex. paying close attention to your notes while studying for an exam
Definition
Sustained attention
Term
-a continuum of memory processing from shallow to intermediate to deep, with deeper processing producing better memory
-memorizing a word:
*shallow: physical features
*Intermediate: labeling
*deep: giving meaning and relate to oneself
Definition
Levels of processing
Term
-the formation of a number of different connections around a stimulus at a given level of memory encoding
-deep processing involves making connections
-can work through self-reference
Definition
elaboration
Term
-is one of the most powerful methods to encode memories
-(pavio)make for better memories
Definition
imagery
Term
-is the retention of information over time and how this information is represented in memory
-(Atkinson-Shiffrein Theory)involves three systems
-sensory memory
-short term memory
-long term memory
Definition
Storage or stored memory
Term
-limited capacity memory system
-information is retained for only as long as 30 sec
-can be extended with different strategies
Definition
Short term memory
Term
-memory involves holding information from the world in its original sensory form
-incredibly short
-only lasts as a little longer than we see or hear
-has 2 subtypes of memory:
*echoic memory: auditory memory
*visual sensory memory
Definition
Sensory Memory
Term
-is a relatively permanent type of memory
-estimated at 280 quintillion bits
-broken down into several structures to help explain how it works.
*Explicit: (who, what, where, when, and why)
*Implicit: (how)
Definition
Long term memory
Term
What 3 parts of working memory did Baddeley define?
Definition
-phonological loop
-visuospatial working memory
-the central executive
Term
-is specialized to briefly store speech-based information about the sounds of language
-it has 2 separate components (acoustic code and rehearsal)
Definition
Phonological loop
Term
-stores visual and spatial information including visual imagery
-capacity working memory is limited
-functions separately from the Phonological loop
Definition
Visuospatial working memory
Term
-integrates information from the phonological, visuospatial, and long term working memory
-plays an important role in attention, planning, and organizing
-monitors what needs to be ignored or deserves our attention
-limited; are generally on what we decide to recall
Definition
Central Executive
Term
-maybe also called declarative memory
-is the conscious recollection of information, such as facts and events and, at least in humans, information that can be verbally communicated
Definition
Explicit memory
Term
Explicit memory has two subtypes
Definition
-episodic memory
-semantic memory
Term
-is the retention of information about the where, when, and what of life's happening
-basically how we remember life's episodes
Definition
Episodic memory
Term
-knowledge about the world including his or her areas of expertise;
-general knowledge such as of things learned in school and everyday knowledge
Definition
semantic memory
Term
-known as non declarative memory
-is memory in which behavior is affected by prior experience without a conscious recollection
Definition
implicit memory
Term
the 3 subtypes in implicit memory
Definition
-procedural memory
-classical conditioning
-priming
Term
is the activation of information that people already have in storage to help them remember new information better and faster
Definition
priming
Term
a form of learning
-involves the automatic learning of associations between stimuli so that one comes to evoke the same response as the other
Definition
classical conditioning
Term
-memory for skills
Definition
procedural memory
Term
schemas for particular events, often containing information about physical features, people, and typical occurrences
Definition
scripts
Term
preexisting mental concepts or frameworks that help people to organize and interpret information
Definition
schemas
Term
-the memory process that occurs when information that was retained in memory comes out of storage
Definition
memory retrieval
Term
is a special form of episodic memory, consisting of a person's recollections of his or her own life experiences
Definition
Autobiographical Memory
Term
has 3 three levels consisting of; life time periods,general events, and event specific knowledge
Definition
Autobiographical Memory
Term
-memories of emotionally significant events that people often recall with more accuracy and vivid imagery than everyday event
-memories of traumatic events
Definition
flashbulb memory
Term
-is a defense mechanism by which a person is so traumatized by an event that he or she forgets it and then forgets
Definition
Repressed memory
Term
-when the information was never entered into long-term memory
Definition
encoding failure
Term
-theory that people forget not because other information gets in the way
-consist of proactive and retroactive inference
Definition
Inference Theory
Term
-material that was learned earlier disrupts the recall of later material
Definition
Proactive Interference
Term
-material that was learned later disrupts the retrieval of information
Definition
Retroactive Inference
Term
-when we learn something new, neurochemical memory trace forms but over time this trace disintegrate
-suggests that the passage of time always increases forgetting
Definition
Decay Theory
Term
forgetting about yourself but can take in new information
Definition
Retrograde Amnesia
Term
can not form new memory
Definition
Anterograde Amnesia
Term
-the way in which information is processed and manipulated in remembering, thinking, and knowing
Definition
Cognition
Term
-the cognitive process of manipulating information mentally by:
-forming concepts
-solving problems
-making decisions
-reflecting critically or creatively
Definition
thinking
Term
How do we use concepts?
Definition
-allow us to generalize
-allow us to make associations
-aid memory
-provide clues about our environment
Term
What is the prototype model?
Definition
emphasizes that when people evaluate whether a given item reflects a certain concept
-compare and look for family resemblance
Term
4 steps that make good problem solvers:
Definition
-find and frame problems
-develop good problem-solving strategies
-evaluate solutions
-rethink and redefine problems and solutions over time
Term
involves reasoning from specific observations to make generalizations
Definition
inductive reasoning
Term
is reasoning from a general case that we know to be true to a specific instance
Definition
deductive reasoning
Term
-tendency to search for and use information that supports our ideas rather than refutes them
-ignoring relevant information
-ex. Bush knew about the 9/11 but didn't avoid it
Definition
confirmation bias
Term
When you're not looking beyond a common use
Definition
Functional fixation
Term
-tendency to ignore information about the general principles favor of very specific but vivid information
-easy to remember isn't always the best information
-comes down to what we encode
Definition
Base Rate Fallacy
Term
-tendency to report falsely, after the fact, that we accurately predicted an outcome
-" I knew it all along"
-tend to ignore all the predictions that didn't come true
Definition
Hindsight bias
Term
-tendency to make judgements based on a stereotype rather than on available based rate information
-not taking into an account individual differences
Definition
representative-ness heuristic
Term
-prediction about the probability of an event based on the ease of recalling or imagining certain events
-can effect occupational choice
-fear of flying after reports of plane crashes
Definition
availability heuristic
Term
-thinking reflectively and productively and evaluating the evidence
-requires mindfulness and open-mindedness
Definition
Critical thinking
Term
The 5 biases and heuristics that were discussed
Definition
-representative-ness Heuristic
-base rate fallacy
-hindsught bias
-availability heuristic
-confirmation bias
Term
the state of being alert and mentally present for one's everyday activities
Definition
mindfulness
Term
the state of being receptive to other ways of looking at things
Definition
open-mindedness
Term
when referring tot he ability to think about something in novel and unusual ways and to devise unconventional solutions to problems
-consist of divergent and convergent thinking
Definition
thinking creatively
Term
thinking that produces many solutions to the same problem
Definition
divergent thinking
Term
thinking that produces the single best solution to a problem
Definition
convergent thinking
Term
what 4 traits do creative thinkers have?
Definition
-flexibility and playful thinking
-inner motivation
-willingness to face risk
-objective evaluation of one's own work
Term
-known as the difficult term to define
-can be influenced by one's culture
-all purpose ability to do well on cognitive tasks, to solve problems, and to learn from experience
Definition
intelligence
Term
what traits must good intelligence test have?
Definition
-validity
-reliability
-standardization
Term
what is the calculation of mental age?
Definition
IQ=(MA/CA)x 100
Term
How heritable is intelligence?
Definition
heritability tells us how much of the differences we observe in intelligence is attributable to differences in genes
-highest degree is 100 percent
Term
What is Flynn Effect?
Definition
-one effect of education on intelligence is evident in rapidly increasing IQ test scores globally
Term
is a form of communication; can be spoken, written, or signed that is based on a system of symbols
-have infinite generativity
Definition
Language
Term
5 basis rules of language
Definition
-phonology
-morphology
-syntax
-semantics
-pragmatics
Term
What did Noam Chomsky say concerning language?
Definition
-language is universals
-primed from birth to learn language
-we are hardwired for the basics of language
-does not come from imitation alone
-support from neuroscience
Term
The sound system of a language
Definition
phonology
Term
a languages of rules for combining words to form acceptable phrases and sentences
Definition
syntax
Term
the language's rules for word formation
Definition
morphology
Term
the meaning of words and sentences in a particular language
Definition
semantics
Term
the useful character of language and the ability of language to communicate more meaning than is said
Definition
pragmatics
Term
what 3 things can parents do to impact language development in their children?
Definition
-be an active communication partner
-talk to the infant as if he or she understands what you are saying
-use a language style in which you feel comfortable
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