5 Steps to a 5 AP Psychology, 2010-2011 Edition (83 page)

Antidepressant drugs
—
medicines which elevate mood states; three main categories include tricyclics (such as Elavil), MAO inhibitors (such as Nardil), and SSRI inhibitors (such as Prozac).

Antipsychotic drugs
—
powerful medicines that lessen agitated behavior, reduce tension, decrease hallucinations and delusions, improve social behavior, and produce better sleep behavior especially in schizophrenic patients (also called neuroleptics).

Antisocial personality disorder
—
a disorder characterized by a failure to conform to standards of decency; repeated lying and stealing; a failure to sustain lasting, loving relationships; low tolerance of boredom; and a complete lack of guilt.

Anxiety hierarchy
—
a listing of frightening events in increasing order of severity used in systematic desensitization treatment for phobias.

Anxiolytics
—
anti-anxiety drugs (tranquilizers) such as benzodiazepines including Librium, Valium, Xanax; and Buspirone.

Aphasia
—
impairment of the ability to understand (receptive) or use (expressive) language.

Approach-approach conflict
—
a conflict in which the individual must choose between two positive stimuli or circumstances.

Approach-avoidance conflict
—
a conflict in which the individual must decide whether or not to choose a circumstance involving a single stimulus that has both positive and negative characteristics.

Aptitude test
—
test that measures what our potential should be and whether or not we will benefit from some training; predicts our future capacity to learn and develop.

Archetypes
—
according to Jung, a number of universal themes that are part of the collective unconscious.

Arousal
—
level of alertness, wakefulness, and activation caused by activity in the central nervous system; optimal level varies with the person and the activity.

Artificial intelligence (AI)
—
a field of study in which computer programs are designed to simulate human cognitive abilities such as reasoning, learning, and understanding language.

Artificialism
—
the belief of the preoperational child that all objects are made by people.

Assimilation
—
process by which we incorporate new information into our existing cognitive structures or schemas.

Association areas
—
regions of the cerebral cortex that do not have specific sensory or motor functions, but are involved in higher mental functions such as thinking, planning, and communicating.

Atkinson-Shiffrin model of memory
—
assumes three different memory systems: sensory memory, short-term memory (STM), and long-term memory (LTM).

Attachment
—
a close emotional bond or relationship between the infant and the caregiver.

Attention
—
set of perceptual processes by which you choose from among the various stimuli bombarding your senses at any instant, allowing some to be further processed by your senses and brain.

Attention deficit hyperactive disorder (ADHD)
—
a disorder in which the individual is unable to focus attention for a normal length of time, and often shows an elevated level of activity.

Attitude
—
learned predisposition to respond favorably or unfavorably to certain people, objects, or events.

Attribution theory
—
a study of our causal explanations of behavior. We attribute behavior to the individual’s disposition or to the situation.

Audition
—
the sense of hearing.

Auditory nerve
—
axons of neurons in the cochlea converge, transmitting sound messages through the medulla, pons, and thalamus to the auditory cortex of the temporal lobes.

Authoritarian parenting style
—
absolute and restrictive rules accompanied by punishment for disobedience.

Authoritative parenting style
—
flexible rules for which reasons are generally given. Parents are warm and nurture independence within guidelines.

Autism
—
an early-onset developmental disorder characterized by markedly abnormal or impaired development in social interaction, communication, and the restricted repertoire of activity and interests.

Automatic processing
—
unconscious encoding of information about space, time, and frequency that occurs without interfering with our thinking about other things.

Autonomic nervous system (ANS)
—
subdivision of PNS that includes motor nerves that innervate smooth (involuntary) or heart muscle. Its sympathetic nervous system prepares the body for “fight or flight”; the parasympathetic nervous system causes bodily changes for maintenance or rest.

Availability heuristic
—
a tendency to estimate the probability of certain events in terms of how readily they come to mind.

Aversive conditioning
—
learning involving an unpleasant or harmful unconditioned stimulus or reinforcer; also a form of behavior therapy (aversion therapy) in which the client is trained to associate physical or psychological discomfort with behaviors, thoughts, or situations the client wants to stop or avoid.

Avoidance behavior
—
behavior that results in the removal of an ongoing event, or prevents a future event from occurring.

Avoidance-avoidance conflict
—
a conflict in which the individual must choose between two unattractive stimuli or circumstances.

Avoidant attachment
—
infant neither seeks support or comfort from nor shows distress toward caregivers in the Strange Situation.

Axon
—
a long, single conducting fiber (usually covered in myelin) extending from the cell body of a neuron that transmits an action potential and that branches and ends in tips called terminal buttons (a.k.a. axon terminals, or synaptic knobs) that secrete neurotransmitters.

Babbling
—
a stage of speech development that is characterized by spontaneous utterance of speech sounds; begins around 4 months old.

Backwards conditioning
—
in classical conditioning, presenting the unconditioned stimulus before the conditioned stimulus.

Basal ganglia
—
clusters of neurons deep in the brain (including the caudate nucleus, putamen, globus pallidus, and substantia nigra) that regulate initiation of movements, balance, eye movements, and posture.

Basic-level category
—
a concept that makes important distinctions between different categories—between a superordinate and subordinate category.

Behavior modification
—
therapy in which the client selects a goal and as he/she gets closer to that goal receives small rewards until finally reaching the intended goal; also a field that applies the behavioral approach scientifically to solve problems (applied behavior analysis).

Behavior therapy
—
treatment approach that uses applications of learning principles to eliminate unwanted behaviors.

Behavioral approach
—
psychological perspective concerned with behavioral reactions to stimuli, learning as a result of experience.

Behaviorism
—
the view that psychology should be an objective science based on observable and measurable behaviors.

Belief bias
—
the tendency for our preexisting beliefs to distort logical reasoning, making illogical conclusions seem valid or logical conclusions seem invalid.

Belief perseverance
—
the tendency for people to cling to a particular belief even after information that led to the formation of that belief has been discredited.

Big 5 or OCEAN
—
trait theory of personality that says our personalities are composed of
different amounts of common traits—openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism.

Binocular cues
—
clues about distance that require two eyes and that include retinal disparity and convergence.

Biofeedback
—
a system for electronically recording, amplifying, and giving back information regarding a subtle physiological state.

Biological preparedness
—
the species-specific predisposition to learn in certain ways but not in others.

Bipolar cells
—
second layer of neurons in the retina that transmit impulses from rods and cones to ganglion cells.

Bipolar disorder
—
a mood disorder characterized by extreme mood swings from unusual excitement to serious depression.

Bisexuality
—
a tendency to direct sexual desire toward people of both sexes.

Blastula
—
the hollow ball stage of cell division during first two weeks after conception.

Blind spot
—
region of the retina, without receptor cells or vision, where the optic nerve leaves the eye.

Blocking
—
the inability to condition a second stimulus because of prior conditioning to another stimulus that is also present during training.

Blood-brain barrier
—
a collection of cells that press together against the walls of capillaries to block many substances from entering the brain, while allowing others to pass.

Borderline personality disorder
—
maladaptive behavior characterized by rapidly shifting and unstable mood, self-concept, and interpersonal relationships, as well as impulsiveness; self-mutilation and anger directed inwards; promiscuity and other self-destructive habits like drug addiction common.

Bottom-up processing
—
data-driven information processing that begins with sensory receptors and works up to the brain’s integration of sensory information to construct perceptions.

Brain
—
portion of the central nervous system above the spinal cord.

Brainstem
—
also called the hindbrain, includes the medulla, pons, and cerebellum.

Brainstorming
—
a popular technique practiced during creative problem solving that encourages the generation of many ideas in a nonjudgmental environment.

Broadbent filter theory of memory
—
inputs are analyzed for each stage of memory and most filtered out; only the most important are encoded.

Broca’s area
—
region in left frontal lobe that controls production of speech.

Bulimia nervosa
—
an eating disorder characterized by a pattern of eating binges involving intake of thousands of calories, followed by purging either by vomiting or using laxatives.

Bystander effect
—
tendency for an observer to be less likely to give aid if other observers are present.

Cannon-Bard theory
—
theory that emotions and physiological states occur simultaneously.

Cardinal trait
—
defining personality characteristic, in a small number of us, that dominates and shapes our behavior (according to Allport).

Case study
—
intensive investigation of the behavior and mental processes associated with a specific person or situation.

Catastrophes
—
stressors that are unpredictable, large-scale disasters which threaten us.

Catatonic schizophrenia
—
a psychotic disorder characterized by bizarre motor behavior which sometimes takes the form of an immobile stupor and waxy flexibility.

Catharsis
—
in Freudian psychoanalysis, the release of emotional tension after remembering or reliving an emotionally charged experience from the past; as a coping device for stress, the release of pent up emotions through exercise or other means.

Cell body
—
also called the cyton or soma, the part of the neuron that contains cytoplasm and the nucleus which directs synthesis of such substances as neurotransmitters.