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Paper 1 Complete
All terms and studies that could appear on AQA Psych Paper 1
| Term | Definition |
|---|---|
| Levels of the independent variable | The different conditions in the experiment |
| Objectivity | Remaining impartial and not biased |
| Replicability | When an experiment or investigation can be repeated multiple times (and by others) with the same findings |
| Empiricism | Gathering actual evidence for the theory |
| Falsifiability | Being able to give a scenario in which the theory could be proved wrong |
| Hypothesis testing | Creating a clear testable statement and then comparing it to experiment |
| Theory construction | Creating a general explanation or model for a specific phenomenon which can be tested |
| Paradigm | A set of assumptions shared by the majority of people in a scientific field |
| Paradigm shift | A significant change to the agreed upon set of assumptions, such as the finding that the Earth orbits the sun rather than the other way around |
| Quantitative Data | Information in the form of numbers |
| Qualitative Data | Information which is not in the form of numbers; e.g. in text |
| Quasi experiment | A study involving an independent variable which has already occurred, where the IV is a characteristic |
| Laboratory Experiment | A controlled study carried out in an artificial setting |
| Field Experiment | A controlled study carried out in a natural setting |
| Natural Experiment | A study involving an independent variable which has already occurred, where the IV is an experience |
| Correlational Analysis | A test of the relationship between two continuous variables, usually plotted on a scattergram |
| Observation | Research which involves directly recording the behaviour of participants (can be natural/controlled, participant/non-participant, and overt/covert) |
| Self-Report Techniques | Research methods whereby the participants provide the information about themselves |
| Questionnaire | Self-report method where participants are given a written set of questions to answer |
| Open question | Where the person responding has freedom over what to say - their choices are not restricted |
| Closed question | Forced-choice questions with limited number of options |
| Interview | Self-report method where participants are usually asked questions face:face |
| Structured interview | Interviews which follow a set list of questions, with no follow-up questions |
| Unstructured interview | Interviews with a theme and topic, but no set questions that allow for elaboration and discussion |
| Case Study | An in-depth analysis of one person or a small group of people |
| Aims | What the research intends to discover |
| Hypothesis | A testable statement - you must operationalise the variables within it |
| Directional Hypothesis | AKA 'one-tailed': A testable statement which predicts that there will be a difference/correlation and can state the direction |
| Non Directional Hypothesis | AKA 'two-tailed': A testable statement which predicts that there will be a difference/correlation but does not state the direction |
| Null hypothesis | A testable statement which predicts that there will be no difference/correlation |
| Independent Groups | Experimental design where participants take part in only one level of the IV |
| Repeated Measures | Experimental design where participants take part in all levels of the IV |
| Matched Pairs | Experimental design where participants take part in only one level of the IV, but are paired with another participant with similar characteristics before being separated into their conditions |
| Behavioural Categories | Coding units used in an observation or content analysis - what the researchers are going to tally |
| Operationalisation | Making variables specific and measurable |
| Independent Variable (IV) | The difference between conditions (what you change) |
| Dependant Variable (DV) | What the researcher measures |
| Pilot Study | A small-scale test carried out before the main study to identify and solve any issues or to make specific decisions |
| Extraneous Variables (EV) | Something has an impact on the DV, which is not the IV |
| Confounding Variables | A third variable which explains a correlation - it changes proportionally with the two other variables |
| Control Variable | A factor that researchers ensure is the same in all conditions to make the study replicable and to avoid extraneous variables |
| Participant Variables | Differences between the people taking part in the study which act as Extraneous variables |
| Situational Variables | Differences between the environments of each condition in the study which act as Extraneous variables |
| Social Desirability Bias | Where participants change their behaviour or answer to make themselves look better |
| Reliability | How consistent the study is |
| Inter-rater reliability | The extent to which different assessors would score the participants in the same way |
| Test-retest reliability | The extent to which the study could be repeated in the same way with the same results |
| Internal Validity | The extent to which the study measures what it claims to measure |
| External Validity | The extent to which the findings can be generalised beyond the study |
| Population Validity | The extent to which the sample can be generalised to the target population |
| Ecological Validity | The extent to which the study can be generalised to realistic settings |
| Temporal/Historical Validity | The extent to which the study can be generalised to modern times |
| Concurrent validity | Whether or not the measure of the IV agrees with a more established measure - e.g. does a person's score correlate with their score on a widely-accepted valid test? |
| Face validity | Whether the measure of the IV seems accurate - usually volunteers are asked to rate its internal validity |
| BPS Code of Ethics | The official guide to ethical issues in Psychology |
| Deception | Ethical issue - Lying to participants |
| Informed Consent | Ethical issue - getting permission from your participants to take part |
| Protection of Participants | Ethical issue - must ensure participants suffer no damage from the study |
| Right to Withdraw | Ethical issue - participants are allowed to leave at any point |
| Debrief | Ethical issue - participants must be told the aim and details of the study at the end |
| Sampling Techniques | Ways in which researchers gather participants |
| Target Population | The group of people who need to be represented by a good sample |
| Random Sample | Sampling method - each person has an equal chance of taking part |
| Opportunity Sample | Sampling method - the people who are in the right place at the right time |
| Stratified Sample | Sampling method - the demographics of the population are reflected in the sample |
| Systematic Sample | Sampling method - list the group and pick every nth person |
| Volunteer Sample | Sampling method - place an advertisement and use the people who select themselves |
| Demand Characteristics | Changes in the participant behaviour due to taking part in the study |
| Investigator Effects | When the researcher has an impact on the outcome |
| Counterbalancing | A method for reducing order effects by ensuring different groups participate in conditions in different orders |
| Order effects | Taking part in one condition affects performance in another condition |
| Practice effects | When you get better in the second condition due to taking part in the first |
| Fatigue effects | When you get worse in the second condition due to taking part in the first |
| Random Allocation | Reducing bias by placing participants in conditions indiscriminately - e.g. by picking names out of a hat |
| Standardisation | Ensuring that the controlled variables are the same in each condition of an experiment - e.g. giving recorded or typed instructions to participants |
| Scattergram | A method of representing correlational data in a visual form |
| Histogram | A method of representing a test of difference where the IV is on a continuous scale (e.g. height) |
| Bar chart | A method of representing a test of difference where the IV is NOT on a continuous scale (e.g. With music/Without music) |
| Measures of Central Tendency | Averages |
| Mean | Adding up all scores and dividing by how many scores there are |
| Median | The middle value |
| Mode | The most common value |
| Measures of Dispersion | Ways of seeing how spread out the data is |
| Range | The highest value - the lowest value |
| Standard Deviation | A measure of how spread out the data are, by finding the average difference from the mean |
| Positive Correlation | As one variable increases, so does the other |
| Negative Correlation | As one variable increases, the other decreases |
| Correlation Coefficients | A measure of the relationship between variables, ranging from -1 to 1. It is the calculated value of a Spearman's rho or Pearson's r test |
| Content Analysis | A method of turning qualitative data into quantitative data by establishing coding units and tallying their occurrence |
| Thematic analysis | When a researcher reviews qualitative data and records recurring patterns or motifs - they do not tally their occurrences however |
| Peer review | A scientific process whereby other scientists check work before it is published |
| Normal distribution | When the mean, median and mode are the same |
| Positively skewed distribution | When the mean is higher than the median and the mode |
| Negatively skewed distribution | When the mean is lower than the median and the mode |
| Abstract | Appears at the beginning of a scientific journal. Summarises the entire study, including aim, method, results and conclusions |
| Introduction | Scientific report section which explains key terms and previous research to justify the current study |
| Method | Scientific report section which outlines the participants, materials and procedure |
| Results | Scientific report section which outlines the raw data from the study, with some descriptive and inferential statistical analysis |
| Discussion | Scientific report section which includes the conclusions and some evaluation of the research, with recommendations for future research |
| References | List of sources used in a scientific report |
| Descriptive statistics | Ways of analysing data that give more information about patterns in the data, e.g. averages, percentages, ratios etc. |
| Level of measurement | Whether the DV is nominal, ordinal or interval |
| Nominal data | Category data without a numeric value (e.g. hair colour) |
| Ordinal data | Level of measurement where there is a scale containing unequal gaps (data may be ranked, subjective or otherwise not equal in gap size) |
| Interval data | Level of measurement where there is a scale containing equal gaps (e.g. height in cm) |
| Inferential statistics | A way of analysing data to determine the likelihood that any difference/correlation is statistically significant |
| Statistical significance | Suggests that results are not due to chance - or it is extremely unlikely they are |
| p Value | The probability that results were due to a chance result. In psychology we accept 5% (or 0.05) |
| Type I error | A false positive - When the alternate hypothesis is accepted incorrectly and the null hypothesis rejected incorrectly |
| Type II error | A false negative - When the alternate hypothesis is rejected incorrectly and the null hypothesis is accepted incorrectly |
| Calculated value | The result of an inferential statistical test |
| Critical value | The number in a data table that you must compare with your calculated value |
| Related design | An experimental design where the participants in one condition are similar to those in another - either repeated measures or matched pairs |
| Unrelated design | Independent groups design - the participants in one condition are not similar or related to those in the other condition |
| Test of difference | A comparison between conditions |
| Test of association | An investigation into a correlation or relationship between co-variables |
| Compliance | Superficial type of conformity where people conform publicly by privately disagree |
| Internalisation | Where people change their beliefs permanently |
| Identification | Where people change their beliefs (sometimes temporarily) to fit in with a group or want to appear to belong to the group |
| Normative social influence | An explanation for conformity which says we conform in order to fit in |
| Informational social influence | An explanation for conformity which says we conform in order to make the correct decisions |
| Task difficulty | A situational variable affecting conformity; the harder the challenge, the more people conform (due to ISI) |
| Group size | A situational variable affecting conformity; the bigger the majority, the more we conform (due to NSI and/or ISI) |
| Unanimity of the majority | A situational variable affecting conformity; if the group all agree, we are more likely to conform (due to NSI and/or ISI) |
| Proximity | A situational variable affecting obedience; the closer the authority and the further away the victim, the more we obey |
| Location | A situational variable affecting obedience; the more official the environment (e.g. a University lab), the more we obey |
| Uniform | A situational variable affecting obedience; a person’s official clothing may signify high status |
| Allies | A situational variable affecting obedience; if other people are disobeying, we are less likely to obey |
| Legitimacy of authority | An explanation for obedience which says we follow people who have power over us because they are higher up the social hierarchy, especially if they have the support of an institutional framework |
| Institutional framework | The backing needed to lend legitimacy to an authority - for example, the military is the institutional framework helping superior ranks to be legitimate. |
| Agentic state | Individual carries out the orders of another person, acting on their behalf – feeling no personal responsibility |
| Moral strain | Negative feelings brought on by following a command that goes against our values and beliefs |
| Binding factors | Factors in a study which reduce moral strain and allow us to obey (e.g. not being held responsible) |
| Authoritarian Personality | A dispositional explanation for obedience that says some are taught to have extreme respect for authority, while having contempt for inferior social status. |
| F Scale | Adorno’s questionnaire scale method of measuring a person’s level of authoritarianism |
| Social support | An explanation for resistance to social influence which states it is easier to resist if other people are resisting – since negative consequences are shared. |
| Internal locus of control | An explanation for resistance to social influence which focuses on individual beliefs. Those with this mindset believe that they are responsible for their future and prefer to be leaders, so are less likely to obey or conform. |
| Consistency | A characteristic needed by a minority to be influential. Keeping the same goals throughout. |
| Commitment | A characteristic needed by a minority to be influential. Being willing to take risks and stick to your cause. |
| Flexibility | A characteristic needed by a minority to be influential. Being reasonable and able to compromise |
| Drawing attention to the issue | The first step needed for a social change to occur; the minority must be visible and vocal, by making protests |
| Cognitive conflict | When the majority have to consider the minority's views, and it creates a debate |
| Augmentation principle | A vital stage in social change whereby the minority takes risks and is willing to make sacrifices |
| Snowball effect | Where the members of the majority slowly begin to agree with the minority, who convince other members, who then convince other members in an exponential way |
| Capacity | The amount of data a store can hold |
| Serial recall | A method of testing memory by asking participants to ask them to repeat information in order (usually a list of numbers) |
| Duration | The length of time a store can hold data |
| Coding | The way in which information is changed in order to be stored in memory |
| Sensory memory | The first store in the MSM. Picks up information from the senses for a very limited time |
| Short term memory | A temporary memory store which holds information that has had attention paid to it for roughly 18-30 seconds |
| Long term memory | A permanent and virtually unlimited memory store from the MSM |
| Maintenance rehearsal | Repeating information over and over again to transfer from STM to LTM |
| Decay | When a memory disappears over time |
| Displacement | When a memory store runs out of capacity and information is 'pushed out' by other information |
| Retrieval | When information is recalled from LTM back to STM |
| Central executive | The master store of the WMM, responsible for directing information to the appropriate slave system |
| Phonological loop | A slave system of the WMM used for processing sounds and auditory information |
| Visuospatial sketchpad | A slave system of the WMM used for processing visual and spatial information |
| Episodic buffer | The most recently added slave system of the WMM, responsible for integrating information to make sense for the LTM |
| Semantic memories | Memories of the meaning of things |
| Episodic memories | Memories of events |
| Procedural memories | Memories of skills and processes |
| Explicit/Declarative memories | Memories that you have to consciously think about, including episodic and semantic |
| Implicit/Non-declarative memories | Memories that are unconscious, and do not need to be explicitly thought about, including procedural |
| Interference | An explanation for forgetting that claims information is lost due to confusion with other, similar information |
| Proactive interference | When old information affects our ability to learn new information |
| Retroactive interference | When new information affects our ability to remember old information |
| Retrieval failure | When information is unable to be transferred from LTM to STM due to a lack of cues |
| Context-dependent forgetting | An explanation of why trying to recall something in a different situation to when you learnt it is difficult |
| State-dependent forgetting | An explanation of why trying to recall something in a different mental state or emotion to when you learnt it is difficult |
| Misleading information | Incorrect information/ideas presented to a witness, usually after the event. Examples include leading questions and post-event discussion |
| Leading questions | A question which implies or favours a particular answer - e.g. 'Was he wearing a brown jacket?' |
| Post-event discussion | The idea that your memory of an event can be affected by talking to people about it after the event, perhaps due to memory conformity |
| Anxiety | A factor affecting EWT - the stress a witness felt during the event |
| Weapon focus | The theory that people tend to focus on threatening objects rather than faces |
| Cognitive interview | A technique for improving eye witness testimony |
| Report everything | Asking the witness to recall every aspect of an event, even if it seems irrelevant |
| Change perspective | A cognitive interview technique where the witness is asked to recall the events from another witness' point of view |
| Change order | A cognitive interview technique where the witness is asked to recall events in a non-chronological order to disrupt schema |
| Context reinstatement | When the witness is asked to put themselves back in the same mental state they were in during an event |
| Reciprocity | Parent and infant respond to the other’s signals and each elicits a response from the other, like a sustained conversation. It is a two-way, mutual process involving turn-taking, from 3 months old |
| Interactional Synchrony | Mother and infant reflect / mirror both the actions and emotions of the other and do this in a co-ordinated (synchronised) way. Seen from two weeks. |
| Play | Quality of fathers’ play with infants (not their initial bond) is linked to quality of later attachments – therefore fathers have a different role to mothers, to be a stimulating play mate not meeting emotional needs (Grossman) |
| Responsiveness | Fathers can be effective primary caregivers (PCG). Research by Field shows PCG Fathers adopt behaviours typical of PCG mothers, e.g. smile more. So key to attachment is responsiveness of adult (e.g. smiling) not gender. |
| Stages of Attachment | A child's development phases with regards to attachment. Who they respond to the most and how they respond to strangers. A longitudinal study conducted by Schaffer and Emerson |
| Asocial stage of attachment | In the first few weeks of life babies respond in the same way to humans and objects |
| Indiscriminate attachment | After 2-6 months, babies have a preference for familiar people but show no stranger/separation anxiety |
| Specific attachment | Around 7 months, babies have particular preferences for individual people and develop stranger anxiety shortly after. |
| Multiple Attachments | Attachments to two or more people. This starts happening soon after specific attachment with one carer. For most babies they have multiple by 12 months. |
| Animal Studies | Experiments carried out on non-humans, usually because it would be unethical to study humans experimentally in some behaviours. Influenced theories of attachment with people. |
| Imprinting | Goslings follow whatever is the first large moving thing they see. Lorenz defined this. |
| Sexual imprinting | The first bond (imprinting) affects mating preferences in later life. Lorenz found this with geese. |
| Critical period (animal studies) | A key window of time in which the initial bond formed has long term impact on animals future. In geese if they didn't imprint in the first few hours they never would (Lorenz). In monkeys, the critical period was 90 days (Harlow). |
| Contact comfort | Infant monkeys preferred cloth covered surrogate wire monkeys to wire monkeys that provided milk. Harlow said it was because they provided comfort. |
| Learning Theory of attachments | An approach to explaining why we form attachments that focuses on nurture - believes that children learn to associate parents with food, which is an unconditioned stimulus |
| Cupboard Love | The belief that children learn to love whoever gives them food (Dollard & Miller) |
| Classical conditioning (attachment) | UCS (food) produces UCR (feeling of pleasure). Caregiver (NS) is paired with food (UCS) and is associated with UCS. NS becomes CS, and produces pleasure (CR). |
| Operant conditioning (attachment) | Behaviours which bring the caregiver near (e.g. crying) are reinforced because produces caregiver response. Negative reinforcement – caregiver’s response also reinforced as crying stops. |
| Primary / secondary reinforcers | The association of the mother with the food (primary reinforcer) means the mother becomes reinforcing in her own right (secondary reinforcer) |
| Drive reduction | Infants are driven to reduce hunger (a primary drive). Attachment is secondary drive learned by association of caregiver with hunger satisfaction. |
| Monotropic theory | The belief that we have an innate need to form attachments and that we must form a special attachment to one caregiver in particular, within a key window of time. This bond is influential in later relationships. |
| Adaptive | Adaptive means when a trait gives a survival or reproductive advantage in a particular environment. In the context of monotropic theory, attachment gives a survival advantage |
| Social releasers | Innate 'cute' features and behaviours, which encourage attachment behaviour from parents |
| Monotropy | Special, intense bond with the mother (or ever present adult mother substitute) that is important for the development of internal working models. |
| Critical Periods (Bowlby) | This refers to the time within which an attachment must form if it is to form at all (2 years / 30 months in humans) |
| Internal Working Models | The mental representations / schema of relationships, based of our attachment to our primary caregiver. These affect our future relationships because they become our expectations for what relationships are like |
| Continuity hypothesis | The belief that your initial attachment will correlate with your future adult relationships. Furthermore, that this will affect parenting style and so attachment types will continue over generations. |
| Strange Situation | A controlled observation to test attachment type devised by Ainsworth. Infants are assessed on their willingness to explore and reactions to being left alone, left with a stranger and reunion with a caregiver. Assigned as type A, B or C. |
| Willingness to explore | The extent to which an infant is comfortable using their caregiver as a secure base from which to look around their environment |
| Separation distress | Upset caused by a caregiver leaving the room |
| Stranger anxiety | Worry caused by an unknown person entering the room |
| Reunion behaviour | The actions of an infant once their caregiver returns to the room |
| Secure Attachment | Moderate separation distress; moderate separation anxiety; joy at reunion; explores freely; uses mother as secure base. Positive long term outcomes. |
| Insecure-Avoidant Attachment | Low separation distress; low stranger anxiety; little response to reunion ('avoidance' of the caregiver); explores freely but doesn't use mother as secure base. Negative long term outcomes. |
| Insecure-Resistant Attachment | High levels of separation distress; high levels of stranger anxiety; not easily comforted and 'resists' comfort at reunion; doesn't explore much; clingy and cries a lot. Negative long term outcomes. |
| Cultural Variations | The differences between nations (or groups within a nation) in relation to a particular thing, e.g. Van Ijzendoorn looked at differences in rates of attachment types |
| Meta-analysis | A study which compiles all of the research using the same or similar methodology, e.g. Van Ijzendoorn analysed 32 studies to identify cultural variations in attachment type |
| Maternal Deprivation Hypothesis | Bowlby's theory that loss of a primary caregiver in the critical period would have negative consequences for a child's future emotional and intellectual development |
| Maternal deprivation | Loss of emotional care from mother during the critical period |
| Critical period (Maternal deprivation) | A key window of time (2 years / 30 months). Disruption to bond within this will have inevitable negative effects. Bowlby said the first 5 years mattered too. |
| Law of accumulated separation | Many periods of separation can add up to be deprivation with the associated negative effects. |
| Affectionless psychopathy | A condition caused by maternal deprivation, according to Bowlby, which is characterised by a lack of empathy or guilt |
| Institutionalisation | The effects of living in a an orphanage or children's home (e.g. orphanage, hospital) for a long time with insufficient emotional care |
| Orphan studies | These concern children placed in care because their parents cannot look after them |
| Disinhibited attachment | An effect of institutionalisation identified by Rutter et al. An attachment disorder characterised by lack of inhibition around strangers. Often seen in children who have experienced neglect and abuse. |
| Disorganised attachment | An effect of institutionalisation identified by Zeanah et al. An attachment disorder where infants display behaviours of different attachment types. Often seen in children who have experienced neglect and abuse. |
| Childhood relationships | Research on influence of infant bond on childhood interactions, i.e. bullying and friendships. Securely attached infants tend to have better friendships in childhood and not be involved in bullying, unlike insecure attachment. |
| Adult relationships | Research on influence of infant bond on adult relationships, particularly romantic relationships and parenting. It seems secure attachment in infancy is correlated with better later relationships, unlike insecure attachment. |
| Temperament hypothesis | Criticises the continuity hypothesis by suggesting that infants are born with an innate personality - which explains the correlation between initial attachment and adult relationships (Kagan) |
| Socially sensitive | This means when research findings have implications for certain groups. For instance, attachment research is often socially sensitive as it puts pressure on parents, especially women to make choices such as saying at home. |
| Statistical infrequency | Behaviour or thinking that is numerically uncommon / rare. Behaviours are compared to numeric averages (mean, median mode) anything that is a long way from these is abnormal, i.e. 2 or more standard deviations from the mean. |
| Deviation from Social Norms | Behaviour that violates / breaks the rules and accepted standards of behaviour in a community or group. These can be implicit (implied) or explicit (laws) and vary between places and over time. |
| Failure to Function Adequately | Behaviour or thinking which means someone is unable to cope with the demands of day-to-day living, which often leads to distress. Rosenhan and Seligman identified examples such as maladaptive behaviour, personal distress, observer discomfort. |
| Deviation from Ideal Mental Health | When someone's thinking or behaviour does not meet the standards / criteria needed for good psychological well being. The fewer criteria met, the greater the abnormality. Jahoda identified a number of criteria (try to remember the mnemonic S P E A R S). |
| Self-actualisation | Fulfilling one's potential. Each person is driven to grow and achieve this. One of Jahoda's criteria for ideal mental health |
| Personal autonomy | The ability to make choices regarding the direction of one's life. One of Jahoda's criteria for ideal mental health |
| Environmental mastery | Being able to adapt to new situations and thrive. One of Jahoda's criteria for ideal mental health |
| Accurate perception of reality | Being able to see the world in the same way as other people - accurate view of the world and of themselves. One of Jahoda's criteria for ideal mental health |
| Resistance to stress | Being able to handle difficult times and distressing situations, without becoming overwhelmed. One of Jahoda's criteria for ideal mental health |
| Self-esteem | Having a positive attitude towards oneself. One of Jahoda's criteria for ideal mental health |
| Phobia | An anxiety disorder characterised by excessive fear of an object or situation out of proportion to any real threat. |
| Depression | A mental disorder characterised by low mood and low energy levels |
| OCD (Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder) | A condition characterised by reoccurring and intrusive thoughts that cause anxiety and repetitive, rigid actions that temporarily reduce anxiety. |
| Behavioural characteristics | Ways in which people act |
| Emotional characteristics | Ways in which people feel |
| Cognitive characteristics | Refers to the process of thinking - knowing, perceiving, believing |
| Avoidance | A behavioural characteristic of phobias and OCD where the individual stays away from/ doesn't put themselves in situations that cause anxiety, e.g. germs or the phobic stimulus |
| Fear | An emotional characteristic of phobias, feelings of terror, that is out of proportion to any real threat |
| Panic | A behavioural characteristic of phobias such as screaming or running away. |
| Selective attention | A cognitive characteristic of phobias. The phobic stimulus consumes a persons attention, they can think or and focus on nothing else. |
| Irrational beliefs | A cognitive characteristic of phobias and depression. Thoughts not based on reality or logic, e.g. this spider will hurt me, or I am worthless. |
| Changes to activity levels | A behavioural characteristic of depression. Lethargy involves a reduction movement, energy and not completing tasks that were once enjoyable (anhedonia) |
| Changes to sleep | A behavioural characteristic of depression. Hypersomnia is sleeping more and insomnia is sleeping less. |
| Changes to eating | A behavioural characteristic of depression often associated with changes in weight |
| Low mood | An emotional characteristic of depression when a person feels sad. |
| Anger | An emotional characteristics of depression when a person feels hostility |
| Anxiety | An emotional characteristic that can be found in all three disorders in psychopathology. It is an unpleasant state of high arousal / feelings of worry. |
| Poor concentration | A cognitive characteristic of depression. People find it hard to focus on tasks |
| Difficulty making decisions | A cognitive characteristic of depression. People find it hard to choose between different options. |
| Compulsions | A behavioural characteristic of OCD, where people ritually repeat behaviours. |
| Guilt | An emotional characteristic of OCD where person feels remorse, often because of thoughts or feelings they feel bad about. |
| Disgust | An emotional characteristic of OCD where a person is repulsed by stimuli, e.g. themselves or external things such as dirt |
| Behavioural Approach | A way of explaining behaviour in terms of what is observable and in terms of learning |
| Two-process model | Suggested by Mowrer, whereby classical conditioning helps to develop a phobia and operant conditioning helps to maintain it |
| Classical Conditioning | Learning by association. Occurs when two stimuli are repeatedly paired together |
| Operant Conditioning | A form of learning in which behaviour is shaped and maintained by its consequences, e.g. rewards and punishments |
| Systematic Desensitisation (SD) | A behavioural therapy designed to reduce an unwanted response, such as anxiety, to a stimulus. It involves drawing up a hierarchy of anxiety-provoking situations related to the phobic stimulus, teaching the patient to relax and working up the hierarchy. |
| Relaxation techniques | In systematic desensitisation patients learn techniques to help them remain and become calm when faced with phobic stimuli, such as progressive muscle relaxation or meditation. |
| Anxiety hierarchy | A list of situations involving the phobic stimulus from least to most scary, created by the patient and therapist together. |
| Counter conditioning | The process that underpins systematic desensitisation - replacing a stimulus-response association with a new, more positive, learned response |
| Reciprocal inhibition | The theory that two conflicting emotions (e.g. fear and relaxation) cannot co-exist at the same time. |
| Flooding | A behavioural therapy in which a phobic patient is exposed to an extreme form of a phobic stimulus in order to reduce anxiety triggered by that stimulus. This takes place across a small number of long therapy sessions |
| Exposure | Therapies which prevent the avoidance of the phobic stimulus by putting the patient in a situation where they encounter the phobic stimulus. |
| Extinction | Conditioned stimuli aren't permanent unless they are occasionally paired with the UCS. In phobias this doesn't happen when the phobic encounters the phobic stimulus for an extended time so the learnt response will go be unlearnt. |
| Exhaustion | Patients cannot maintain high levels of fear for prolonged periods of time. When facing a phobic stimulus eventually they become too tired to maintain high levels of anxiety and fear. |
| Cognitive Approach | An approach that is focused on how our mental processes (e.g. thoughts, perceptions, attention) affect behaviour |
| Faulty information processing | Thinking which isn't logical, e.g. depressives attend to the negative or blow small problems out of proportion |
| Negative self-schema | Beck said depressives interpret information about themselves in a negative way. Schema is a ‘package’ of information based on experience, used to interpret the world. |
| Negative Triad | Beck proposed that there were three kinds of negative thinking that contributed to becoming depressed: negative views of the world, the future and the self. Such negative views lead a person to interpret their experiences in a negative way. |
| ABC Model | Ellis proposed that depression occurs when an activating event (A) triggers an irrational belief (B) which in turn produces a consequence (C), i.e. an emotional response like depression. The key to this process in the irrational belief |
| Irrational Thoughts | Ellis said these are beliefs that are likely to interfere with a person's happiness. Such dysfunctional thoughts lead to mental disorders such as depression |
| Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT) | A method for treating mental disorders based on both cognitive and behavioural techniques, such as challenging negative thoughts. The therapy also includes behavioural techniques such as behavioural activation. |
| Empirical dispute | Ellis used vigorous argument to challenge irrational thoughts including seeking evidence for a persons thoughts then challenging this evidence. |
| Logical dispute | Ellis used vigorous argument to challenge irrational thoughts including questioning the logic of a persons thoughts (do they make sense) then challenging this. |
| Biological Approach | A perspective that emphasises the importance of physical processes in the body, such as genetic inheritance and neural function |
| Genetic Explanations | A way of explaining a characteristic based on inherited traits through DNA |
| Candidate genes | Specific alleles that are identified as being the cause of a given trait or characteristic |
| Polygenic | When there are several alleles involved in the development of a trait, where the presence of each one increases the chances of the trait a little bit more |
| Aetiologically heterogeneous | One group of genes cause a condition in some people, different groups of genes cause it in others. Also different genes might cause different types of OCD, e.g. hoarding. |
| Neural Explanations | The view that physical and psychological characteristics (e.g. OCD and schizophrenia) are determined by the behaviour of the nervous system, in particular the brain as well as individual neurons as well as the function of neurotransmitters. |
| Drug Therapy | Treatment involving medication, i.e. chemicals that have a particular effect on the functioning of the brain or some other body system. In the case of psychological disorders such drugs usually affect neurotransmitter levels |
| Serotonin | An inhibitory neurotransmitter thought to be linked with OCD - its chances of diffusion are increased by SSRIs |
| SSRIs | Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors. They stop serotonin being reabsorbed into the presynaptic nerve, so that it has another chance to diffuse into the receptors on the post synaptic nerve. |
| Fluoxetine | An example of an SSRI with a typical dose of between 20 and 60mg |
| Tricyclics | An older type of antidepressant than SSRIs that work In a similar way but with more side effects e.g. clomipramine |
| SNRIs | A newer type of antidepressant than SSRIs that work in a similar way but increase both serotonin and noradrenaline levels |
| Jenness | Participants guessing the number of beans in a jar would change their second guess to be closer to the group estimate |
| Asch | Participants conformed to confederates and said the wrong answer in a simple line-matching task 33% of the time |
| Asch variations | Changed the difficulty of the task, the group size, the unanimity of the majority and whether they answered out loud or in private |
| Zimbardo | Created a fake prison environment at Stanford University to see if student participants would conform to their roles |
| Milgram | Got 65% of participants to 'shock' a confederate to 450Vs, just because of the presence of an authority figure in a lab coat |
| Milgram variations | Changed the proximity of the authority and victim, tried with and without the lab coat, and moved the experiment to a run-down office |
| Hofling | Studied obedience in real life hospital, where 21/22 nurses broke strict rules because an unknown doctor told them to over the phone |
| Adorno | Created the Authoritarian Personality explanation of obedience, claiming some are just more likely to be obey because of their parents |
| Elms & Milgram | Discovered that obedient participants in the original shock study were likely to have a higher F score |
| Avtgis | Discovered that people with a high internal locus of control were significantly less likely to be persuaded, influenced or to conform - compared to high external LoC |
| Moscovici | Found that a consistent minority (8%) were significantly more influential than an inconsistent one (1%) in a colour perception test |
| Nemeth & Brilmayer | Jurors were more likely to be influenced by a confederate juror who was willing to compromise over the level of compensation given to the victim |
| Miller | Used a serial recall task to determine STM capacity and found that most people could remember between 5-9 items (magic number 7) |
| Peterson & Peterson | Found that 90% of participants could remember a 3-consonant trigram after 3 seconds, but only 2% could recall it after 18 seconds |
| Bahrick | Investigated the duration of LTM by asking people to recall people from their high school. Even after 48 years, they scored 70% on photo recall |
| Baddeley | Found that STM and LTM are coded differently - STM are coded acoustically and LTM coded semantically |
| Glanzer & Cunitz | Discovered the Serial Position Effect, where people are more likely to remember words at the beginning (primacy effect) and end (recency effect) of a list |
| Patient KF | Had a motorcycle accident and afterwards had a normal visual STM capacity, but an abnormally low verbal STM capacity |
| Patient HM | Had his hippocampus removed and afterwards was unable to form new declarative memories (episodic and semantic), but able to form new procedural memories |
| Gathercole & Baddeley | Dual task technique. Found that we can do visual and verbal tasks simultaneously but not 2 visual tasks. |
| Underwood | Participants who memorised one list could recall 70% of it the next day, but if they memorised 10+ lists they only recalled 20% |
| Muller | Recall of nonsense syllables was worse for participants given a distraction task during the retention interval |
| Godden & Baddeley | Participants learnt word lists on ground or underwater (scuba). Recall was best if the conditions were the same as during learning - whether back on ground or underwater |
| Goodwin et al | Participants who were drunk when learning word lists were better at recalling them if they were drunk again. If sober at learning, recall was best when sober again |
| Loftus & Palmer | Altered the verb they used during questioning witnesses to a car crash. If using the word 'smashed', their speed estimates averaged 41mph, compared to 32mph for 'contacted' |
| Yuille & Cutshall | Used leading questions on witnesses to a real life armed robbery. They found that in real life cases, leading questions did not affect memory. |
| Gabbert | Showed different participants two videos of the same event and then allowed them to discuss what they had seen. 71% of them later recalled things that they couldn’t have seen |
| Loftus (or Johnson & Scott) | Studied the Weapon Focus Effect. 33% of participants correctly identified a man if he was carrying a knife, but 47% recalled if he carried a pen |
| Christianson & Hubinette | Studied real life bank robberies and, contrary to the Weapon Focus Effect, found that the best recall was from witnesses who experienced the threat close up |
| Kohnken | Compared cognitive and standard interview. Cognitive was better (though it also led to more incorrect information being reported). |
| Meltzoff & Moore | Infants as young as two weeks old were able to imitate specific facial and hand gestures by a caregiver model |
| Brazelton et al | Still face experiment |
| Schaffer & Emerson | Carried out a study on families in Glasgow and from their observations they developed a 4-stage model of attachment formation, such as indiscriminate and discriminate attachments |
| Harlow | Found that monkeys provided with two surrogate mothers (one made of wire that provided food and one covered in a cloth) were more attached to the one that gave comfort rather than food |
| Lorenz | Demonstrated 'imprinting' by being the first thing that baby geese saw. They treated him as a caregiver and followed him around until adulthood |
| Bowlby | Tested his Maternal Deprivation Hypothesis by studying juvenile thieves. Found a significantly high proportion of them had been maternally deprived in early life. |
| Ainsworth | Created the Strange Situation Method, from which she categorised three attachment types (secure, insecure-avoidant and insecure-resistant) |
| Van Ijzendoorn & Kroonenberg | Conducted a meta-analysis of different Strange Situation experiments from around the world and found secure attachment was always the most common, with variations between countries |
| Rutter | Carried out longitudinal research of Romanian orphans and found significant differences in the recovery and progress of those adopted before and after 6 months of age |
| Zeanah | Institutionalised (Romanian) orphans who had spent 90% or more of their lives in an institution were significantly more likely to show disinhibited attachment type than a 'normal' control who had not been in an institution |
| Hazan & Shaver | Conducted the 'love quiz', which was a retrospective questionnaire asking participants about their earliest attachments. Found a correlation between early attachment type and later romantic relationships. |
| Simpson | Conducted a longitudinal study over 25+ years and found a positive correlation between participants' earliest attachments (using Strange Situation method) and future relationships, both friendship and romantic. |
| Jahoda (not a study) | Developed the characteristics of ideal mental health, including high self-esteem and self-actualisation |
| Rosenhan and Seligman | Characteristics/ signs a person isn’t coping; observer discomfort, personal distress, maladaptive behaviour |
| Mowrer (not a study) | Came up with the two-way process in explaining phobias, involving both classical conditioning for phobia initiation and operant conditioning for phobia maintenance. |
| Watson and Raynor | Little Albert study – conditioned to fear a rat |
| Choy et al | Compared treatments for phobias. Systematic and flooding both effective, but flooding slightly better. |
| Gilroy et al | Tested systematic desensitisation – three sessions, followed up three and 33 months later. Effective. |
| Beck (not a study) | Developed the Negative Triad theory of depression, which states that sufferers have a negative view of themselves, the world and the future. |
| Ellis (not a study) | Developed the ABC model for explaining depression, with A = activating event, B = belief about that event, and C = the consequence of that belief. |
| Ellis | Claimed a 90% success rate for REBT, a form of CBT, at treating depression |
| March et al | Compared the efficacy of CBT, antidepressants, and a combination. CBT and antidepressants both had an 81% success rate, whilst a combination had 86% success. |
| Elkin | Found that CBT was significantly less effective for people who have high levels of irrational beliefs |
| Nestadt | Found that those who were first-degree relatives of sufferers of OCD were 5x more likely to develop the condition than the general population |
| Soomro | Reviewed 17 studies and found that SSRIs were more effective (70% success) than a placebo at reducing symptoms after 3-months |
Created by:
SBlakeley
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