Psychology 202 midterm

• Psychiatrists: MDs, go to medical school and specialize in psychiatry, can prescribe medication.
• Clinical Psychologists: PhDs, go to graduate school in pyschology, generally cannot prescribe medication.
• BOTH work with people with mental illness.

In depth observation of one person or a small group.

Unknown background or history.

• Describe
• Predict
• Explain
• Control

A hypothetical account for explaining a phenomenon.

Proposed, testable relationship between two or more variables.

Things that can vary.

• Values are different members of a category.
• Ex: Nationality

• Values vary in magnitude along some dimension.
• Ex: Income

Variable that is hypothesized to produce a change in...

Variable hypothesized to show a difference when value of predictor is changed.

Predictor variables that the researcher controls and changes.

Experimenter manipulates (controls and changes the value of) the independent variable; everything else is held constant.

Variable the experimenter manipulates while holding all other starting conditions constant (varies independently of everything else).

Variable whose value is hypothesized to vary according to value of independent variable (value depends on independent variable).

When the predictor variable is not manipulated.

• Non-manipulated variables (often predictors) associated with qualities of the subjects in your study
• Ex: IQ, nationality, virgin/not virgin

When one changes, the other does too.

• Measure of how closely the values of two variables are related to each other.
• *Ranges from -1.0 to 1.0

When one number goes up, the other goes up.

When one number goes up, the other goes down.

One variabel can be EXACTLY predicted from the other (-1.0 or 1.0 correlation).

When two (or more) variables are correlated it means there is a relationship between them, it does not mean one caused the other.

• a causes b (watching violent tv causes aggressive kids)
• b causes a (aggression causes kids to watch violent tv)
• c causes a & b (third variable explanation: lack of parental supervision causes violent tv watching AND aggressive kids)

• Yes because if something causes something else, it should be correlated with it.
• Ex: if dancing causes me to sweat, then whenever I dance, I should sweat.

Variable that produces an effect that is confused (confounded) with the effects of the intended predictor variable.

When we don't manipulate the independent variable or don't hold everything else constant.

Experimental condition that research participants think or expect will have some effect, but which in fact is inhert (has no effects).

To turn an abstract concept into a variable that can be measured or manipulated.

• Only good if report is honest
• Social desirability bias
• Some people can't report

• Stability or consistency in measurement.
• The extent to which a measure is stable and consistant over time in similar conditions.

If an experiment has test-retest reliability you will get the same results at two different points in time.

The degree to which two (or more) raters or observers agree that they have seen the same thing.

The extent to which the data collected address the research hypothesis in the way intended.

Stimulus that prompts a person to act in a particular way.

• 5. Self-Actualization
• 4. Esteem
• 3. Affiliation
• 2. Safety & Security
• 1. Basic, Physiolgical

• Lateral Hypothalamus: ("on" switch) stimulating it increases motivation to eat; destroying it causes rats to stop eating (for a while)
• Ventromedial hypothalamus: ("off" switch) part of the brain that is related to messages to stop eating

• "mechanical cues" - stomach walls contract
• glucose and lipid sensors in blood
• social cues

We all have a natural weight that our body tends toward.

• Mostly women (90%)
• More common among college women
• Related to anxiety, depression, impulse control
• Problems with serotonin regulation?

• Mostly women
• Rarer than bulimia
• 15-30% die of complications
• Culturally specific
• Related to OCD and perfection
• More genetic?

• Avoid womanhood (secondary sex characteristics, menstral periods may stop, stay "small")
• Struggle for control

• Happiness
• Anger
• Sadness
• Disgust
• Fear

• All languages have a word for the emotion
• Universal correlates of the emotion (social expression)

What is considered appropriate expression of emotions and when, vary across culture.

• 1. stimulus
• 2. physiological response (bodily changes) to stimulus
• 3. interpretaion of bodily changes producess emotion

• Body reaction too slow - emotion perceived faster than body reacts
• Physical changes alone don't produce powerful emotions
• Not a unique physiological response for each emotion

stimulus leads simultaneously to physiological state and emotion.

Attributing arousal to wrong source.

• 1. subtle differences in physiological responses for different emotions
• 2. real source of arousal can't be salient (ambiguity helps)
• 3. arousal not necessary for emotion

Not just event, but our perception of event causes emotions.

Pattern of responses an organism makes to stimulus events that disturb its equilibrium and tax or exceed its ability to cope.

Stimulus events that cause stress.

• Eustress-good
• Distress-bad

• Stage 1: alarm reaction, "fight or flight" (Taylor's "tend and befriend")
• Stage 2: Resistance
• Stage 3: Exhaustion

• 1. Fight or flight pattern more pronounced in men than women.
• 2. Androgens (male hormones) are important in fight option; higher level in men than women.
• 3. Oxytocin - "calming" hormone that inhibits flee response-present in higher levels in women than men.
• 4. Women not fleeing or fighting may have helped protect offspring.
• 5. Women's survival advantages may be tied to being socially well-connected.

If you are exposed to a cold virus, your chances of getting sick are only 20-60%

An Individual's attempt to deal with stress.

• Pattern of non-response following exposure to non-contingent, inescapable aversive stimuli.
• State where we perceive no control over our fate and thus no longer try to take control.

Changes in processes of the mind.

Changes in interactions and relationships with other people.

Changes in the body and physiology.

Intellectual capacities that have no specific content, but are used in processing info; problem solving ability.

People's store of knowledge.

• 1. Memory for new info worse than memory for old
• 2. Declines in fluid intelligence but not crystallized intelligence
• 3. Slower on timed tasks
• 4. Recall declines more than recognition
• 5. Decline in tasks that require divided attention

• Recall - fill in the blank
• Recognition - multiple choice

Older people pare down number of activities to deal with deficits, but concentrate attention in areas that most interest them.

• CSD - different age groups are measured at the same point in time.
• LD - research design in which one group is studied repeatedly over a period of time.

Shared experience of a group.

Swiss developmental psychologist; landmark work in cognitive development.

Descrete stages, not continuous develpment.

• Birth to 2
• No concept of object permanence
• Before development of "symbolic thought"

Ability to think about things you are not actually sensing.

What babies are interested or surprised by.

• 2 - 7
• Egocentrism
• Start to use symbolic thought

Understanding about the mind; understanding beliefs, intentions and desires - and particularly that OTHER people's minds guide their behaviors.

3 - 5

7 - 11

• 11 - 12
• abstract thought
• analogies

• 1. Observation of limited sample
• 2. Stages not as rigid, descrete
• 3. Skills may appear in particular form earlier

Structure of language.

• 1. babbling (6 months to 1 year)
• 2. one word utterances (1 to 1.5 years)
• 3. telegraphic speech (18 to 20 months)

Slower, simpler, shorter, more clearly enunciated, repetitive, higher voice.

"window of time" in development of organism during which particular development MUST occure.

Periodds when developmental change is most efficient and effective.