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| popular psychology industry |
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| sprawling network of everyday sources of information about human behavior |
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| belief that we see the world precisely as it is |
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| growth of popular psychology , there is scant quality control over what the industry produces |
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| messages that are not consciously perceived but that supposedly affect behavior |
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| willingness to share our findings with others |
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| attempt to be objective when evaluating the evidence |
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| a person must pick two cards to test the hypothesis that all cards have a vowel on one side and an odd number on the other side , goes along with conformation bias |
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| tendency to seek out evidence that supports our hypotheses and neglect or distort evidence that contradicts them |
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| tendency to stick to our initial beliefs even when evidence contradicts them |
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| explanation for a large number of findings in the natural world |
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| testable prediction derived from a theory |
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| approach of evaluating all claims with an open mind but insisting on persuasive evidence before accpeting them |
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| derives form greek "skeptikos" meaning "to consider carefully" |
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| tendency to dismiss any claims that contradict our beliefs |
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| the tendency to seek out evidence inconsistent with a hypothesis we don't believe and neglect evidence consistent with it |
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| premise that we should keep our minds open, but not so open that our brains fall out |
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| pseudoscience that claims to predict people's personalities and futures from the precise date and time of their birth |
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| set of skills for evaluating all claims in an open-minded and careful fashion |
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| the form of thinking that allows us to evaluate scientific claims , not only in the laboratory , but also in every day life |
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| the more a claim contradicts what we already know, the more persuasive the evidence for this claim must be before we should accept it. ex. big foot |
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| claims must be capable of being disproved. ex. can not prove whether or not the human body contains a soul |
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| if two hypotheses explain a phenomenon equally well, we should generally select the simpler one. ex. crop circles , aliens or people? |
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| a finding must be capable of being duplicated by independent researchers following the same " recipe" |
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| ruling out rival hypotheses |
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| findings consistent with several hypotheses require additional research to eliminate these hypotheses. |
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| correlation vs. causation |
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| the fact that two things are associated with each other doesn't mean that one causes the other. ex. people eat more ice cream on days crimes are committed, eating ice cream does not cause crime , is due to a third fact temperature |
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| capable of being disproved |
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| forecast that stands a good chance of being wrong |
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| demand that a study's findings be duplicated, ideally by independent investigations |
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| correlation-causation fallacy |
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| error of assuming that because one thing is associated wit another it just might cause the other |
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| case in which a third variable causes the correlation between two other variables |
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| set of claims that seems scientific but isn't. |
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| assertions about the world that are unfalsifialbe |
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| facilitated communication |
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| a facilitator sits next to an autistic child , and the child sits in front of a computer keyboard or keypad. supposedly autism was only a motor disorder ,facilitators helped children figure out what to say. turned out to be false, facilitators were unknowingly guiding the children's hands , like a modern ouija board. Douglas Biklen, Harvard. |
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| surgical procedure that severs fibers connecting the frontal lobes of the the brain from the underlying thalamus |
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| mental short cuts that help us to streamline our thinking and make us sense our world |
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| heuristics that involves judging the probability of a event by its superficial similarity to a prototype |
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| we are people who are mentally lazy and try to conserve our mental energies by simplifying the world |
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| how common a characteristic or behavior is in the general population. |
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| heuristic that involves estimating the likelihood of an occurrence bases on the ease with which it comes to our minds. |
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| when people neglect to consider the base rate |
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| our natural tendency to seek our evidence that supports our hypotheses, and to ignore, downplay, or distort evidence that doesn't |
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| systematic errors in thinking |
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| tendency to overestimate how well we could have successfully forecasted known outcomes |
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| tendency to overestimate our ability to make correct predictions |
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| watching behavior in real world settings |
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| extent to which we can generalize findings to real-world settings |
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| extent to which we can draw cause and effect inferences from a study |
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| research design that examines one person or a small number of people in depth, often over an extended time period |
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| demonstrations that a given psychological phenomenon can occur |
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| research design that examines the extent to which two variables are associated |
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| grouping of points on a two dimensional graph in which each dot represents a single persons data |
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| perception of a statistical association between two variables where none exists |
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| fallacy of positive instances |
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| error of honing in on occurences that match what we expect to find. |
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| research design characterized by random assignment of participants to conditions and manipulation of an independent variable |
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| randomly sorting participants into two groups |
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| in an experiment, the group of participants that receives the manipulation |
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| in an experiment,the group of participants that doesn't receive the manipulation |
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| variable that an experimenter manipulates |
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| variable that an experimenter measures to see whether the manipulation has an effect |
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| confound or confounding variable |
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| any difference between the experimental and control groups other than the independent variable |
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| investigations of the consistency of patterns of results across large numbers of studies conducted in different laboratories |
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| tendency for negative findings to remain unpublished |
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| from latin " I will please", sugar pill or "dummy pill", given to control group. |
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| patients don't need to know who is taking placebo or real pill. patients receiving placebo may become resentful and try to "beat out" the patients in the experimental group. named after legendary railroad worker who collapsed from exhaustion after outcompeting a steel drill in a contest of man versus machine. |
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| improvement resulting from the mere expectation of improvement |
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| unaware of whether one is in the experimental or control group |
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| harm resulting from the mere expectation of harm |
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| experimenter expectancy effect or rosenthal effect |
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| phenomenon in which researchers hypotheses lead them to unintentionally bias the outcome of a study |
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| when neither the researchers nor participants are aware of who's in the experimental or control group |
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| phenomenon in which participants' knowledge that they're being studied can affect their behavior |
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| cues that participants pick up from a study that allow them to generate guesses regarding the researcher's hypotheses |
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| people who know they're being studied may act differently than they would otherwise |
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| where researchers conceal themselves and participants do not know that they are being watched |
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| investigators become members of a group and then observe the behavior of other group members. |
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| procedure that ensures every person in a population has an equal chance of being chosen to participate |
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| how we assign our participants after we have already chosen them. |
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| consistency of measurement |
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| extent to which a measure assesses what it purports to measure |
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| reliable questionnaires' yield similar scores over time |
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| the extent to which different people who conduct an interview , or make behavioral observations, agree on the characteristics that they are measuring. |
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| tendencies of research participants to distort their responses to questionnaire items |
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| questionnaires, used to assess a variety of characteristics, such as personality , traits, mental illness, and interests. |
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| used by psychologists use to measure people's opinions and attitudes. |
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| positive impression management |
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| the tendency to make ourselves look better than we actually are |
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| the tendency to make ourselves appear psychologically disturbed with the aim of achieving a clear cut personal goal. |
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| the tendency of ratings of one positive characteristic to "spill over" to influence ratings of other positive characteristics. |
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| where the ratings of one negative trait , such as arrogance , spill over to influence the ratings of other negative traits. |
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| the tendency of raters to provide ratings that are overly generous |
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| error of central tendency |
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| an unwillingness to provide extreme (either very low or very high) ratings. |
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| institutional review board |
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| reviews all research carefully with and eye toward protecting participants against abuses. |
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| informing research participants of what is involved in a study before asking them to participate |
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| a research assistant who plays the part of a participant |
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| a process whereby researchers inform participants what the study was about |
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| research in which investigators cause physical harm to animals |
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| application of mathematics to describing and analyzing data |
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| numerical characterizations that describe data |
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| measure of the "central" scores in a data set , or where that gap tends to cluster |
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| average: a measure of central tendency |
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| middle score in a data set:a measure of central tendency |
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| most frequent score in a data set; a measure of central tendency |
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| measure of how loosely or tightly bunched scores are |
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| difference between the highest and lowest scores ; a measure of dispersion |
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| measure of dispersion that takes into account how far each data point is from the mean |
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| mathematical methods that allow us to determine whether we can generalize findings from our sample to the full population |
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| a numerical value that lies way outside of the other values |
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| statistically significant |
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| when a finding would have occurred by chance less than 1 in 20 times. believable , probably a real difference |
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| separates the inside from the outside of the cell, encases the entire neuron. |
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| the central region of the neuron that manufactures new cell components, consisting of small and large molecules. |
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| portions of neurons that receive signals |
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| space between two connecting neurons where neurotransmitters are released |
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| portions of neurons that send signals |
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| spherical sacs containing neurotransmitters |
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| chemical messengers specialized for communication and released at the end of the synapse |
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| support cells in nervous system that play roles in the formation of myelin and blood-brain barrier, respond to injury, and remove debris |
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| glial cells forming a fatty coating that prevents certain substances from entering the brain |
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| glial cell-wrappers around axons that act as insulators of the neurons signal |
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| state of being unable to move just after falling asleep or right before waking up |
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| our subjunctive experience of the world, our bodies, and our mental perspectives |
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| cyclical changes that occur on roughly 24 hour basis in many biological processes |
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| term for the suprachiasmatiac nucleus (SCN) in the hypothalamus that's responsible for controlling our levels of alertness |
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| darting of the eyes underneath the closed eyelids during sleep |
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| stages 1-4 of the sleep cycle, during which eye movements do not occur and dreaming is less frequent and vivid |
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| stage of sleep during which the brain is most active and during which vivid dreaming most often occurs |
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| used to measure muscular activity |
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| produced during stage one sleep ,4-7 times per second |
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| produced during active alert states , 8-12 times per second, occur when we are quiet and relaxed |
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| scrambled, bizarre , and dreamlike images that flit in and out of consciousness |
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| sudden muscle contractions while sleeping |
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| during stage 2 sleep , sudden intense bursts of electrical activity , about 12-14 cycles a second |
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| sudden sharply rising and falling waves |
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| occur is deeper slow wave sleep , which are as slow as 1 0r 2 cycles a second |
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| stage 5 of sleeep , rem sleep |
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| experience of becoming aware that one is dreaming |
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| when humans are deprived or rem sleep for several nights |
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| middle ear muscle activity |
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| the muscles of our middle ears become active during sleep, almost as though they are assisting us to hear sounds in a dream |
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| where a person acts our their dreams |
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| difficulty falling and staying asleep |
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| urge to move our legs or other body parts , often while attempting to sleep |
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| disorder characterized by the rapid and often unexpected onset of sleep |
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| disorder caused by a blockage of the airway during sleep, resulting in daytime fatigue |
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| the longstanding use of many sleeping pills can make it more difficult to sleep once people stop taking them |
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| a complete loss of muscle tone |
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| appears to trigger sudden attacks of sleepiness |
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| sudden waking episodes characterized by screaming, perspiring, and confusion followed by a return to a deep sleep |
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| walking while fully asleep |
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| activation-synthesis theory |
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| theory that dreams reflect inputs from brain activation originating in the pons, which the forebrain then attempts to weave into a story |
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| chemicals similar to those found naturally in our brains that alter our consciousness by changing chemical processes in neurons |
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| drug that exerts a calming effect |
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| drug that exerts a sleep-inducing effect |
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| increased activity of the central nervous system. tobacco, cocaine, amphetamines, methamphetamine |
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| decreased activity of the central nervous system. alcohol, barbiturates, quaaludes, valium |
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| sense of euphoria, decreased pain, sleep. heroin, morphine, coedine |
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| dramatically altered perception, mood, and thoughts, hallucinations. marijuana, LSD, ecstasy |
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| beliefs and expectancies about the effects of drugs |
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