Download Psychology midterm 1 2025 (110) (460 Questions and Answers). and more Exams Psychology in PDF only on Docsity!
Psychology midterm 1 2025 (110) (
Questions and Answers).
Sensation (chapter 2) - Correct answer simple stimulation of a sense organ. Basic registration of light, sound, pressure, odor, or taste as parts of your body interaction with the physical world. Perception - Correct answer occurs in your brain as sensation is registered there. It is the organization, identification, and interpretation of a sensation in order to form a mental representation Transduction - Correct answer The process whereby sense receptors convert physical signals from the environment into neural signals that are sent to the central nervous system Sensory adaptation - Correct answer the process whereby sensitivity to prolonged stimulation tends to decline over time as an organism adapts to current (unchanging) conditions Example: walking into bakery and smell is overwhelming but then smell fades. Diving into cold water but then you get used to it. Turning on lights and it blinds you but then you get used to it. Psychophysics - Correct answer methods that systematically relate the physical characteristics of a stimulation to an observer's perception Absolute threshold - Correct answer the minimal intensity needed to just barely detect a stimulus in 50% of trials Simplest quantitative measurement in psychophisics Sensitivity - Correct answer how responsive we are to faint stimuli acuity - Correct answer How well we can distinguish 2 very similar stimuli
just noticeable difference (JND) - Correct answer is the minimal change in a stimulus (eg. its loudness or brightness) that can just barely be detected Weber's Law - Correct answer states that for every sense domain, the change in a stimulus that is just noticeable is a constant ratio of the standard stimulus, over a range of standard intensities
- ex. If you picked up a 1 oz envelope, the a 2 oz envelope, you'd probably notice the difference between them. But if you picked up a 20 lb package and then a 20 lb 1 oz package, you'd probably detect no difference between them at all Signal detection theory - Correct answer is a way of analyzing psychophysics experiments that measures and individuals perceptually sensitivity (how effectively the perceptual system represents sensory events) while also taking noise, expectations, motivations, and goals into account visual acuity - Correct answer the ability to see fine detail Retina - Correct answer retina is a layer of light-sensitive tissue lining the back of the eyeball Accommodation - Correct answer the process by which the eye maintains a clear image on the retina the muscles change the shape of the lens to focus objects at different distances, making the lens flatter for objects that are far away or rounder for nearby objects 2 types of photoreceptor cells - Correct answer Cones and rods Cones - Correct answer 2 types of photoreceptors cells in the retina contain light-sensitive proteins that absorb light and transduce It into electrical signals.
illusory conjunction - Correct answer a perceptual mistake whereby the brain incorrectly combines features from multiple objects feature integration theory - Correct answer the idea that focused attention is not required to detect the individual features that comprise a stimulus (e.g. the color, shape, size, and location of the letters), but is required to bind those individual features together Attention - Correct answer The active and conscious processing of particular information perceptual constancy - Correct answer a perceptual principle stating that even as aspects of sensory signals change, perception remains consistent Perceptual contrast - Correct answer the phenomenon that occurs when the sensory information from two things may be very similar but we perceive the objects as different monocular depth cues - Correct answer aspects of a scene that yield information about depth when viewed with only one eye binocular disparity - Correct answer the difference in the retinal images of the two eyes that provides information about depth apparent motion - Correct answer the perception of movement as a result of alternating signals appearing in rapid succession in different locations spacial acuity - Correct answer ability to distinguish two features that are very close together in space temporal acuity - Correct answer the ability to distinguish two features that are very close together in time multisensory - Correct answer events that stimulate multiple senses at the same time ventriloquist illusion - Correct answer the fact that you depend on your visual system for reliable information about spatial location
change blindness - Correct answer failure to detect changes to the visual details of a scene inattentional blindness - Correct answer a failure to perceive objects that are not the focus of attention pitch - Correct answer How high or low a sound is Loudness - Correct answer a sound's intensity Timbre - Correct answer the quality of sound that allows you to distinguish 2 sources with the same pitch and loudness cochlea - Correct answer a fluid-filled tube that contains cells that transduce sound vibrations into neural impulses basilar membrane - Correct answer a structure in the inner ear that moves up and down in time with vibrations relayed from the ossicles, transmitted through the oval window traveling wave - Correct answer the up-and-down movement that sound causes in the basilar membrane inner hair cells - Correct answer specialized auditory receptor neurons embedded in the basilar membrane place code - Correct answer the process by which the brain uses information about the relative activity of hair cells across the whole basilar membrane to help determine the pitch you hear temporal code - Correct answer the process whereby the brain uses the timing of the action potentials on the auditory nerve to help determine the pitch you hear Phenomenology - Correct answer the study of how things seem to the conscious person problem of other minds - Correct answer the fundamental difficulty we have in perceiving the consciousness of others
rebound effect of thought suppression - Correct answer the tendency of a thought to return to consciousness with greater frequency following suppression ironic processes of mental control - Correct answer mental processes that can produce ironic errors because monitoring for errors can itself produce them dynamic unconscious - Correct answer an active system encompassing a lifetime of hidden memories, the person's deepest instincts and desires, and the person's inner struggle to control these forces Repression - Correct answer a mental process that removes unacceptable thoughts and memories from consciousness and keeps them in the unconscious cognitive unconscious - Correct answer all the mental processes that give rise to a person's thoughts, choices, emotions, and behavior even though they are not experienced by the person dual process theories - Correct answer theories that suggest that we have two different systems in our brains for processing information: one dedicated to fast, automatic, and unconscious processing, and the other dedicated to slow, effortful, and conscious processing altered state of consciousness - Correct answer a form of experience that departs significantly from the normal subjective experience of the world and the mind circadian rhythm - Correct answer a naturally occurring 24-hour sleep cycle philosophical dualism - Correct answer the view that mind and body are fundamentally different things Philosophical Materialism - Correct answer the view that all mental phenomena are reducible to physical phenomena
philosophical realism - Correct answer the view that perceptions of the physical world are produced entirely by information from the sensory organs philosophical idealism - Correct answer the view that perceptions of the physical world are the brain's interpretation of information from the sensory organs philosophical empiricism - Correct answer the view that all knowledge is acquired through experience philosophical nativism - Correct answer the view that some knowledge is innate rather than acquired reaction time - Correct answer the amount of time taken to respond to a specific stimulus Structuralism - Correct answer an approach to psychology that attempted to isolate and analyze the minds basic elements Introspection - Correct answer the analysis of subjective experience by trained observers 3 dimensions of sensation - Correct answer pleasure/pain, strain/relaxation, and excitation/quiescence Functionalism - Correct answer an approach to psychology that emphasized the adaptive significance of mental processes natural selection - Correct answer A process in which individuals that have certain inherited traits tend to survive and reproduce at higher rates than other individuals because of those traits. hysteria - Correct answer a loss of function that has no obvious physical origin unconscious - Correct answer the part of the mind that contains info of which people are not aware
construct validity - Correct answer the extent to which the thing being measured adequatley characterizes the property 2 key factors to a good detector - Correct answer power and reliability 2 things we must do when wanting to measure something - Correct answer 1. define the property we want to measure
- find a way to detect it Power - Correct answer a detector's ability to detect the presence of differences or changes in the magnitude of a property Reliability - Correct answer refers to a detector's ability to detect the absence or differences or changes in the magnitude of a property a good detector detects differences or changes in the magnitude of a property.........: - Correct answer when they do exist (power) but not when they do not (realiability) demand characteristics - Correct answer those aspects of an observational setting that cause people to behave as they think someone else wants or expects naturalistic observation - Correct answer a technique for gathering scientific information by unobtrusively observing people in their natural environments 2 reasons for observer bias - Correct answer 1. expectations can influence observations
- expectations can influence reality observer bias - Correct answer the tendency for observers' expectations to influence both what they believe they observed and what they actually observed double-blind study - Correct answer study in which neither the observer nor the participant knows how the participants are expected to behave Population - Correct answer a complete collection of people
Sample - Correct answer a partial collection of people drawn from a population frequency distribution - Correct answer a graphic representation showing the number of times in which the measurement of a property takes on each of its possible values normal distribution - Correct answer a mathematically defined distribution in which the frequency of measurements is highest in the middle and decreases symmetrically in both directions 2 most common kinds of descriptive statistics - Correct answer central tendency and variability 3 most common descriptions of central tendancy - Correct answer mode, mean, median Mode - Correct answer the value of the most frequently observed measurement mean - Correct answer the average value of all the measurements Median - Correct answer the value that is greater than or equal to half the measurements and less than or equal to half the measurements (the middle) simplest measurement of variability - Correct answer range range - Correct answer the value of the largest measurement in a frequency distribution minus the value of the smallest measurement standard deviation - Correct answer a statistic that describes how each of the measurements in a frequency distribution differs from the mean Variables - Correct answer properties that can take on different values Correlation - Correct answer variations in the value of one variable are synchronized with variations in the value of the other
manipulation - Correct answer a technique for establishing the casual relationship between variables 3 steps of experimentation - Correct answer manipulate, measure, compare independent variable - Correct answer The experimental factor that is manipulated; the variable whose effect is being studied. dependent variable - Correct answer the variable that is measured in an experiment and does depend on the participants self-selection - Correct answer a problem that occurs when anything about a person determines whether he or she will be included in the experimental or control group random assignment - Correct answer a procedure that lets chance assign people to the experimental or control group internal validity - Correct answer an attribute of an experiment that allows it to establish causal relationships (everything working exactly as it should for us to get a conclustion) external validity - Correct answer an attribute of an experiment in which variables have been defined in a normal, typical, or realistic way case method - Correct answer a procedure for gathering scientific information by studying a single individual random sampling - Correct answer a technique for choosing participants that ensures that every member of a population has an equal chance of being included in the sample Replication - Correct answer an experiment that uses the same procedures as previous experiment but with a new sample from the same population type I error - Correct answer when the researcher mistakenly rejects the null when it actually passes (false positive)
Type II error - Correct answer when researchers inaccurately conclude that there is no relationship among the independent and dependent variables when an actual relationship does exist; when the researcher accepts the null hypothesis when it should have been rejected (false negative) 2 natural human tendencies - Correct answer 1. to see what we expect or want to see
- to ignore what we cannot see Neurons - Correct answer cells in the nervous system that communicate with one another to perform information-processing tasks 3 basic parts of a neuron - Correct answer cell body, dendrites, axon cell body - Correct answer the largest component of the neuron that coordinates the information-processing tasks and keeps the cell alive functions of cell body - Correct answer protein synthesis, energy production, metabolism 2 types of cell specialized extensions - Correct answer axon and dendrite Dendrites - Correct answer parts of the neuron that receive info from other neurons and relay it to the cell body (look like tree branches) Axon - Correct answer part of the neuron that carries info to other neurons, muscles, or glands what is the axon covered by - Correct answer myelin sheath myelin sheath - Correct answer an insulating layer of fatty material (covers cell body) what is myelin sheath composed of - Correct answer glial cells glial cells - Correct answer support cells found in the nervous system
resting potential - Correct answer The difference in electric charge between the inside and outside of a neuron's cell membrane what is resting potential caused by? - Correct answer unequal distribution of ions on either side of the membrane action potential - Correct answer an electric signal that is conducted along the length of a neuron's axon to a synapse (only occurs when it reaches the threshold) action potential is - Correct answer all or none Why does action potential occur? - Correct answer due to changes in the axon's membrane channels 2 points that restore negative charge of resting potential - Correct answer
- axon refractory period
- rapid exit from the cell of K+ ions how does action potential move down the axon? - Correct answer domino effect (influx of Na+ ions triggers nearby channels to open up and process repeats down entire axon) terminal button - Correct answer knoblike structure at the end of the axon what are terminal buttons filled with? - Correct answer vesicles that contain neurotransmitters Neurotransmitters - Correct answer chemicals that transmit information across the synapse to a receiving neuron's dendrites what do dendrites of the receiving neuron contain? - Correct answer receptors Receptors - Correct answer parts of the cell membrane that receive the neurotransmitter and initiate or prevent a new electric signal chemical signaling - Correct answer how info moves from one neuron to the other
lock and key system - Correct answer neurotransmitters binding to specific receptor sites on a dendrite 3 Processes in which Neurotransmitters Leave the Synapse - Correct answer 1. reuptake
- enzyme deactivation
- diffusion Acetylcholine (ACh) - Correct answer a neurotransmitter involved in a number of functions, including voluntary motor control
- activates muscle movements and is part of paying attention, learning, sleeping, dreaming, and memory
- alzheimers is part of an issue w these Dopamine - Correct answer a neurotransmitter that regulates motor behavior, motivation, pleasure, and emotional arousal
- plays a role in drug addiction
- high levels = schitzo and low levels = parkinsons Glutamate - Correct answer major excitatory neurotransmitter, meaning it enhances info between neurons GABA (gamma-aminobutyric acid) - Correct answer the primary inhibitory neurotransmitter in the brain, meaning it tends to prevent the firing of neurons
- too much can cause seizures 2 related neurotransmitters that influence arousal and mood - Correct answer norepinephrine and seretonin Norepinephrine - Correct answer involved in states of vigilance, or a heightened awareness of dangers in the environment Seretonin - Correct answer involved in the regulation of sleep and wakefulness, eating, and aggressive behavior
- not enough = depression Endorphins - Correct answer chemicals that act within the pain pathways and emotion centers of the brain
- elevating moods
somatic nervous system - Correct answer a set of nerves that conveys information between voluntary muscles and the central nervous system
- humans control this autonomic nervous system - Correct answer a set of nerves that carries involuntary and automatic commands that control blood vessels, body organs, and glands
- regulates bodily systems out of control 2 major subdivisions of autonomic nervous system - Correct answer sympathetic nervous system and parasympathetic nervous system sympathetic nervous system - Correct answer a set of nerves that prepares the body for action in challenging or threatening situations parasympathetic nervous system - Correct answer helps the body return to a normal resting state 2 elements of the CNS - Correct answer brain and spinal cord what does spine do - Correct answer keeps your breathing, respond to pain, move muscles allowing us to walk spinal reflexes - Correct answer simple pathways in the nervous system that rapidly generate muscle contractions reflex arc - Correct answer a neural pathway that controls reflex actions 3 parts of the brain - Correct answer hindbrain, midbrain, forebrain Hindbrain - Correct answer An area of the brain that coordinates information coming into and out of the spinal cord controls of hindbrain - Correct answer respiration, alertness, and motor skills structures of the hindbrain - Correct answer medulla, pons, cerebellum Medulla - Correct answer an extension of the spinal cord into the skull that coordinates heart rate, circulation, and respiration
reticular formation - Correct answer regulates sleep, wakefulness, and levels of arousal Cerebellum - Correct answer A large structure of the hindbrain that controls fine motor skills. Pons - Correct answer a structure that relays information from the cerebellum to the rest of the brain midbrain 2 main structures - Correct answer tectum and tegmentum tectum - Correct answer orients an organism in the environment
- pushes toward the stimulus Tegmentum - Correct answer involved in movement and arousal Midbrin - Correct answer takes care of all bodily functions to sustain life, and orient you to or away from pleasure or threatening stimuli in the environment Forebrain - Correct answer highest level of the brain, controls complex cognitive, emotional, sensory, and motor functions 2 main sections of the forebrain - Correct answer cerebral cortex and subcortical structures cerebral cortex - Correct answer the outermost layer of the brain, visible to the naked eye and divided into two hemispheres subcortical structures - Correct answer areas of the forebrain housed under the cerebral cortex near the very center of the brain what is in the subcortical structures - Correct answer the thalamus, 3 components of the limbic system, the basal ganglia, and the putuitary gland 3 components of the limbic system - Correct answer hippocampus, amygdala, hypothalamus
