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psychology module 10-17 kassin
modules 10-17
96
Psychology
Undergraduate 1
10/02/2006

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Term
consciousness
Definition
an awareness of the sensations, thoughts, and feelings that one is attending to at a given moment.
Term
attention
Definition
A state of awareness consisting of the sensations, thoughts, and feelings that one is focused on at a given moment.
Term
selective attention
Definition
the ability to focus awareness on a single stimulus to the exclusion of other stimuli, as in the cocktail party phenonemon.
Term
cocktail party phenomenon
Definition
the ability to attend selectively to one person's speech in the midst of competing conversations.
Term
divided attention
Definition
the ability to distribute one's attention and simultaneously engage in two or more activities.
Term
stroop test
Definition
a color naming task that demonstrates the automatic nature of highly practived activities
Term
priming
Definition
the tendency for a recently presented word or concept to facilitate or prime, responses in a subsequent situation.
Term
prosopaganosia
Definition
a condition stemming from damage to the temporal lobes that disrupts the ability to recognize familiar faces
Term
blindsight
Definition
a condition caused by damage to the bisual cortex in which a person encodes visual information without awareness
Term
biological rhythm
Definition
any periodic, mor or less regular fluctuation in a biological organism
Term
circadian rhythm
Definition
a biological cycle, such as sleeping and waking, that occurs approximately every twenty-four hours.
Term
microsleep
Definition
a brief episode of sleep that occurs in the midst of a waken activity
Term
REM sleep
Definition
the rapid eye movement stage of sleep associate with dreaming
Term
NREM sleep
Definition
the stages of sleep not accompanied by rapdid eye movements
Term
lucid dreaming
Definition
a semiconscious dream state in whicha sleeper is aware that he or she is draming
Term
lucid dreaming
Definition
a semiconscious dream state in whicha sleeper is aware that he or she is draming
Term
manifest content
Definition
accordint to Freud, the conscious dream content that is remembered in the morning.
Term
latent content
Definition
according to Freud, the unconscious censored meaning of a dream.
Term
activation-synthesis theory
Definition
the theory that dreams result from the brains attempt to make sense of random neural signals that fire during sleep
Term
insomnia
Definition
the inability to fall asleep, stay asleep or get the amount of sleep needed to function during the day.
Term
narcolepsy
Definition
a sleep disorder characterized by irresistible and sudden attacks of REM sleep during the day
Term
sleep apnea
Definition
a disorder in which a person repeatedly stops breathing during sleep and awakens gasping for air.
Term
REM sleep behavior disorder
Definition
a condition in which the skeletal muscles are not paralyzed during REM sleep, enabling a sleeper to act on his or her nighrmares, often violently.
Term
hypnosis
Definition
attention foucusing procedures in which changes in a persons behavior or mental state are suggested
Term
hypnotic susceptibility
Definition
the extent to which an individual is characteristically responsive to hypnosis
Term
posthypnotic suggestion
Definition
a suggestion made to a subject in hypnosis to be carried out after the induction session is over
Term
posthynotic amnesia
Definition
a reported tendency for hypnosis subject to forget events that occurred during the induction
Term
hypermnesia
Definition
a term referring to the unsubstaintiated claim that hypnosis can be used to facilitate the retrieval of past memories
Term
dissociation
Definition
a division of consciousness that permits one part of the mind to operate independently of another part
Term
psychoactie drug
Definition
a chemical that alters perceptions, thoughts, moods, or behavior
Term
physical dependence
Definition
a hysiological addiction in which a drug is needed to prevent symptoms of withdrawal
Term
psychological dependence
Definition
a condition in which drugs are neeeded to maintain a sense of well being or relief from negative emotions
Term
sedatives
Definition
a class of depressant drugs that slow down activitiy in the central nervous system
Term
stimulants
Definition
a mclass of drugs that excite the central nervous system and energize behavior
Term
hallucinogens
Definition
psychedelic drugs that distort perceptions an cause hallucination
Term
opiates
Definition
a class of highly addictive drugs that depress neural activity and provide tempory relief from pain and anxiety
Term
ethologists
Definition
scientists who study the behavior of animals in their natural habitat.
Term
ethologists
Definition
scientists who study the behavior of animals in their natural habitat.
Term
fixed action pattern
Definition
a species specific behavior that is built into an animals nervous system and triggered by a specific stimulus.
Term
learning
Definition
a relatively permanent change in knowledge or behavior that results from experience
Term
habituation
Definition
the tendency of an organism to become familiar with stimulus as a result of repeated exposure.
Term
classical conditioning
Definition
a type of learning in which an organism comes to associate one stimulus with another.(pavlovs)
Term
unconditoned response
Definition
an unlearned response (salvation) to an unconditioned stimulus (food)
Term
unconditoned stimulus
Definition
a stimulus (food) that triggers an unconditoned response (salvation)
Term
conditioned stimulus
Definition
a neutral stimulus that comes to evoke a classically conditioned response (salvation)
Term
conditioned response
Definition
a learnsed response (salvation) to a classically conditioned stimulus (bell)
Term
acquisition
Definition
the formation of a learned response to a stimulus thruough the presentation of an unconditioned stimulus (classical conditioning) or reinforcement (operant conditioning)
Term
extincion
Definition
the elimination of a learned repsonse by removal of the unconditioned stimulus or reinforcement
Term
spontaneous recovery
Definition
the reemergence of an extinguishe conditioned response after a rest period
Term
stimulus generalization
Definition
the tendency to respond to a stimulus that is similar to the conditioned stimulus
Term
discrimination
Definition
in classical and operant conditioning, the ability to distinguish between different stimuli
Term
law of effect
Definition
a law stating that responses followed by positive outcomes are repeated whereas those followed by negative outcomes are not
Term
skinner box
Definition
an apparatus invented by B.F. Skinner, used to study the effects of reinforcement on the behavior of laboratory animals
Term
skinner box
Definition
an apparatus invented by B.F. Skinner, used to study the effects of reinforcement on the behavior of laboratory animals
Term
operant conditioning
Definition
the process by which organisms learn to behave in ways that produce reinforcement
Term
reinforcement
Definition
in operant conditioning any stimulus that increases the likelihood of a prior response
Term
punishment
Definition
in operant conditioning, any stimulus that decreases the likelihood of a prior response
Term
shaping
Definition
a procedure in which reinforcements are used to gradually guide an animal or person toward a specific behavior
Term
parital reinfocement effect
Definition
the tendency for a schedule of partial reinforcement to strenghten later resistance to extinction
Term
discriminatives stimulus
Definition
a stimulus that signals the availability of reinforcement
Term
latent learning
Definition
learning that occurs but is not exhibited in performance until ther is an incentive to do so
Term
observational learning
Definition
learning that takes place when one observes and models the behavior of others
Term
information-processing model
Definition
a model of memory in which information must pass through discrete stages via the process of attention encoding storage and retrieval
Term
sensory memory
Definition
a memory storage system that records information from the senses for up to threee seconds
Term
short term memory
Definition
a memory storage system that holds about seven items for up to twenty secondes before the material is transferred to long term memory or is forgotten
Term
long term memory
Definition
a telatively permanent memory storage system that can hold vast amounts of information for many years
Term
iconic memory
Definition
a fleeting sensory memor for bisual images that lasts only a fraction of a second
Term
echoic memory
Definition
a brief sensory memory for auditory inplut that lasts only two to three seconds
Term
chunking
Definition
the process of grouping distinct bits of information into larger wholes, or chunks, to increase short term memory capacity
Term
maintenance rehearsal
Definition
the use of sheer repetition to keep information in short term memory
Term
working memory
Definition
the term used to describe short term memory as an active workspace where information is accessible for current use
Term
serial position curve
Definition
a u shape pattern indicating the tendency to recall more items from the beginning and end of a list tha from the middle
Term
lont term memory
Definition
a relatively permanent memory storage sstem that can hold vast amounts of information for many years
Term
elaborative rehearsal
Definition
a technique for transferring information into long term memory by thinking about it in a deeper way
Term
procedural memory
Definition
stored long term knowledge of learned habits and skill
Term
declarative memory
Definition
stored long term knowledge of fat about ourselves and the world
Term
semantic network
Definition
a complex web of semantic associations that link items in memory such that tretrieving one item triggers the retrieval of others as well
Term
lexical decision making
Definition
an experimental task that requires subjects to decide as quickly as bossible whether a string of letters briefly presented is a word or nonword
Term
hippocampus
Definition
a portion of the brain in the limbic system that plays a key role in encoding and transferring new information into long term memory
Term
anterograde amnesia
Definition
a memory disorder characterized by an inability to store new information in long term memory
Term
retrograde amnesia
Definition
a memory disorder characterized by an inability to retrieve long term memories from the past
Term
explicity memory
Definition
the types of memory elicited through the conscious retrieval of recollections in response to direct questions
Term
implicit memory
Definition
a nonconscious recollection of prior experience that is revealed indirectly, by its effects on performance
Term
free recall
Definition
a type of explicit memory task in which a person must reprodue information without the benefit of external cues
Term
recognition
Definition
a form of explicit memory retrieval in which tiems are represented to a person who must determine if they were previously encountered
Term
encoding specificity
Definition
the principle that any stimulus encoded alon with an experience can later jog ones memory of that experience
Term
forgetting curve
Definition
a consistent pattern in which the rate of memory loss for input is steepest right after input is reveived and levels off over time
Term
mnemonics
Definition
memory aids designed to facilitate the recall of new information
Term
proactive interference
Definition
the tendency for previouslyn learned material to disrupt the reacall of new information
Term
retroactive interference
Definition
the tendency for new information to disrupt the memory of previously learned material
Term
schemas
Definition
preconceptions about persons objects or events that bias the way new information is interpreted and recalled.
Term
misinformation effect
Definition
the tendency to incorporate false postevent information into ones memory of the event itself
Term
autobiographical memory
Definition
the recollections people have of their own personal experiences and observations
Term
flashbulb memories
Definition
highly vivid and enduring memories typically for events that are dramatic and emotional
Term
childhood amnesia
Definition
the inability of most people to recall events from before the age of three or four
Term
hindsight bias
Definition
the tendency to think after an event that we knew advance what was going to happen
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