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all ap psych terms
ap psych terms
| Term | Definition |
|---|---|
| 24 Character Strengths And Virtues | A classification system to identify positive traits; organized into categories of wisdom, courage, humanity, justice, temperance, and transcendence. |
| Absolute Threshold | The minimum stimulus energy needed to detect a particular stimulus 50 percent of the time. |
| Accommodation | (1) in sensation and perception, the process by which the eye's lens changes shape to focus images of near or far objects on the retina. (2) in developmental psychology, adapting our current schemas (understandings) to incorporate new information. |
| Achievement Motivation | A desire for significant accomplishment, for mastery of skills or ideas, for control, and for attaining a high standard. |
| Achievement Test | A test designed to assess what a person has learned. |
| Acquisition | In classical conditioning, the initial stage, when one links a neutral stimulus and an unconditioned stimulus so that the neutral stimulus begins triggering the conditioned response. In operant conditioning the strengthening of a reinforced response. |
| Action Potential | A neural impulse; a brief electrical charge that travels down an axon. |
| Active Listening | Empathic listening in which the listener echoes, restates, and seeks clarification. A feature of Rogers' person-centered therapy. |
| Actor-Observer Bias | The tendency for those acting in a situation to attribute their behavior to external causes, but for observers to attribute others' behavior to internal causes. This contributes to the fundamental attribution error. |
| Acute Schizophrenia | (also called reactive schizophrenia) a form of schizophrenia that can begin at any age; frequently occurs in response to a traumatic event, and from which recovery is much more likely. |
| Adaptation-Level Phenomenon | Our tendency to form judgements (of sounds, lights, income) relative to a neutral level defined by our prior experience. |
| Addiction | An everyday term for compulsive substance use (and sometimes for dysfunctional behavior patterns, such as out-of-control gambling) that continue despite harmful consequences. |
| Adolescence | The transition period from childhood to adulthood, extending from puberty to independence. |
| Aerobic Exercise | Sustained exercise that increases heart and lung fitness; also helps alleviate anxiety. |
| Affiliation Need | The need to build and maintain relationships and to feel part of a group. |
| Aggression | Any physical or verbal behavior intended to harm someone physically or emotionally. |
| Agonist | A molecule that increases a neurotransmitter's action. |
| Agoraphobia | Fear it avoidance if situations, such as crowds or wide open places, where one may experience a loss of control and panic. |
| Algorithm | A methodical, logical rule or procedure that guarantees solving a particular problem. Contrasts with the usually speedier - bus also more error-prone- use of heuristics. |
| All-Or-None Response | A neuron's reaction of either firing (with a full-strength response) or not firing. |
| Alpha Waves | The relatively slow brain waves of a relaxed, awake state. |
| Altruism | Unselfish regard for the welfare of others. |
| Amygdala | Two Lima bean sized neural clusters in the limbic system; linked to emotion. |
| Androgyny | Displaying traditionally masculine and traditionally feminine psychological characteristics. |
| Anorexia Nervosa | An eating disorder in which a person (usually an adolescent female) maintains a starvation diet despite being significantly underweight, and has an inaccurate self-perception; sometimes accompanied by excessive exercise. |
| Antagonist | A molecule that inhabits or blocks a neurotransmitter's action. |
| Anterograde Amnesia | An inability to form new memories. |
| Antianxiety Drugs | Drugs used to control anxiety and agitation. |
| Antidepressant Drugs | Drugs used to treat depressive disorders, anxiety disorders, obsessive- compulsive and related disorders, and posttraumatic stress disorder. (several widely used antidepressant drugs are selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors- SSRIs) |
| Antipsychotic Drugs | Drugs used to treat schizophrenia and other forms of severe thought disorders. |
| Antisocial Behavior | Negative, destructive, harmful behavior. the opposite of prosocial behavior. |
| Antisocial Personality Disorder | A personality disorder in which a person (usually a man) exhibits a lack of conscience for wrongdoing, even toward friends and family members; may be aggressive and ruthless or a clever con artist. |
| Anxiety Disorders | A group of disorders characterized by excessive fear and anxiety and related maladaptive behaviors. |
| Aphasia | Impairment of language, usually caused by left hemisphere damage either to broca's area (impairing speaking) or to Wernicke's area (impairing understanding) |
| Approach And Avoidance Motives | The drive to move toward (approach) or away from (avoid) a stimulus. |
| Aptitude Test | A test designed to predict a person's future performance; aptitude is the capacity to learn. |
| Asexual | Having no sexual attraction toward others. |
| Assimilation | Interpreting our new experiences in terms of our existing schemas. |
| Association Areas | Areas of the cerebral cortex that are not involved in primary motor or sensory functions; rather, they are involved in higher mental functions such as learning, remembering, thinking, and speaking. |
| Associative Learning | Learning that certain events occur together. the events may be two stimuli (as in classical conditioning) or a response and its consequence ( an in operant conditioning) |
| Attachment | An emotional tie with others; shown in young children by their seeking closeness to caregivers and showing distress on separation. |
| Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) | A psychological disorder marked by extreme inattention and/or Hyperactivity and impulsivity. |
| Attitudes | Feelings, often influenced by our beliefs, that predispose us to respond in a particular way to objects, people, and events. |
| Attribution Theory | The theory that we explain someone's behavior by crediting either the situation ( a situational attribution) or the person's stable, enduring traits ( a dispositional attribution) |
| Audition | The sense or act of hearing. |
| Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) | A disorder that appears in childhood and is marked by limitations in communication and social interaction, and by rigidly fixated interests and repetitive behaviors. |
| Autokinetic Effect | The illusory movement of a still spot of light in a dark room. |
| Automatic Processing | Unconscious encoding of identical information, such as space, time, and frequency, and of familiar or well-learned information, such as sounds, smells, and word meanings. |
| Autonomic Nervous System (ANS) | The part of the peripheral nervous system that controls the glands and the muscles of the internal organs(such as the heart). its sympathetic division arouses; its parasympathetic division calms. |
| Availability Heuristic | Judging the likelihood of events based on their availability in memory; if instances come readily to mind (perhaps because of their vividness), we presume such events are common. |
| Aversive Conditioning | Associates an unpleasant state (such as nausea) with an unwanted behavior (such as drinking alcohol). |
| Axon | The segmented neuron extension that passes messages through its branches to other neurons or to muscles or glands. |
| Babbling Stage | The stage in speech development, beginning around 4 months, during which an infant spontaneously utters various sounds that are not all related to the household language. |
| barbiturates | drugs that depress central nervous system activity, reducing anxiety but impairing memory and judgement. |
| Basal Metabolic Rate | The body's resting rate of energy output. |
| Basic Trust | According to Erik Erikson, a sense that the world is predictable and trustworthy; said to be formed during infancy by appropriate experiences with responsive caregivers. |
| Behavior Feedback Effect | The tendency of behavior to influence our own and others' thoughts, feelings, and actions. |
| Behavior Genetics | The study of the relative power and limits of genetic and environmental influences on behavior. |
| Behavior Therapy | Therapy that uses learning principles to reduce unwanted behaviors. |
| Behavioral Approach | Focuses on the effects of learning on our personality development. |
| Behaviorism | The view that psychology (1) should be an objective science that (2) studies behavior without reference to mental processes. Most research psychologists today agree with (1) but not with (2). |
| Belief Perseverance | The persistence of one's initial conceptions even after the basis on which they were formed has been discredited. |
| Big Five Factors (Five Factor Model) | Five traits- Openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism- that describe personality |
| Binocular Cue | A depth cue, such as retinal disparity, that depends on the use of two eyes. |
| Biological Psychology | The scientific study of the links between biological (genetic, neural, hormonal) and psychological processes. (some biological psychologists call themselves behavioral neuroscientists, neuropsychologists, behavior geneticists, ect. |
| Biomedical Therapy | Prescribed medications or procedures that act directly on the person's physiology. |
| Biopsychosocial Approach | An integrated approach that incorporates biological, psychological, and social-cultural levels of analysis. |
| Bipolar Disorders (Manic-Depressive Disorder) | A group of disorders in which a person alternated between the hopelessness and lethargy of depression and the overexcited state of mania. |
| Bipolar I Disorder | The most severe form, in which people experience a euphoric, talkative, highly energetic, and overly ambitious state that lasts a week or longer. |
| Bipolar II Disorder | A less severe form of bipolar in which people move between depression and a milder hypomania. |
| Blind Spot | The point at which the optic nerve leaves the eye, creating a "blind" spot because no receptor cells are located there. |
| Blindsight | A condition in which a person can respond to a visual stimulus without consciously experiencing it. |
| Bottom-Up Processing | Information processing that begins with the sensory receptors and works up to the brain's integration of sensory information. |
| Brainstem | The central core of the brain, beginning where the spinal cord swells as it enters the skull; the brainstem is responsible for automatic survival functions. |
| Broaden-And-Build Theory | Proposes that positive emotions broaden our awareness, which over time helps us build novel and meaningful skills and resilience that improve well-being. |
| Broca's Area | A frontal lobe brain area, usually in the left hemisphere, that helps control language expression by directing the muscle movements involved in speech. |
| Bulimia Nervosa | An eating disorder in which a person's binge eating (usually of high-calorie foods) is followed by inappropriate weight-loss-promoting behavior, such as vomiting, laxative use, fasting, or excessive exercise. |
| Burnout | Physical, emotional, or mental exhaustion, brought on by an overburdening workload, which may negatively impact motivation, performance, and attitude. |
| Bystander Effect | The tendency for any given bystander to be less likely to give aid if other bystanders are present. |
| Case Study | A non-experimental technique in which one individual or group is studied in depth in the hope of revealing universal principles. |
| Catharsis | In psychology, the idea that "releasing" aggressive energy (through action or fantasy) relieves aggressive urges. |
| Cattell-Horn-Carroll Theory (CHC) | The theory that our intelligence is based on g as well as specific abilities, bridged by Gf and Gc. |
| Cell Body | The part of a neuron that contains the nucleus; the cell's life-support center. |
| Central Executive | A memory component that coordinates the activities of the phonological loop and visuospatial sketchpad. |
| Central Nervous System (CNS) | The brain and spinal cord. |
| Central Route Persuasion | Occurs when interested people's thinking is influenced by considering evidence and arguments. |
| Cerebellum | The hindbrain's "little brain" at the rear of the brainstem; its functions include processing sensory input, coordinating movement output and balance, and enabling nonverbal learning and memory. |
| Cerebral Cortex | The intricate fabric of interconnected neural cells covering the forebrain's cerebral hemispheres; the body's ultimate control and information-processing center. |
| Change Blindness | Failing to notice changes in the environment; a form of inattentional blindness. |
| Character Strengths And Virtues | A classification system to identify positive traits; organized into categories of wisdom, courage, humanity, justice, temperance, and transcendance |
| Chronic Schizophrenia (Process Schizophrenia) | A form of Schizophrenia in which symptoms usually appear by late adolescence or early adulthood. As people age, psychotic episodes last longer and recovery periods shorten. |
| chunking | Organizing items into familiar, manageable units; often occurs automatically. |
| Circadian Rhythm | Our biological clock; regular bodily rhythms (for example, of temperature and wakefulness) that occur on a 24-hour cycle. |
| Classical Conditioning | A type of learning in which we link two or more stimuli; as a result, to illustrate with Pavlov's classic experiment, the first stimulus (a tone) comes to elicit behavior (drooling) in anticipation of the second stimulus (food). |
| Cochlea | A coiled, bony, fluid-filled tube in the inner ear; sound waves traveling through the cochlear fluid trigger nerve impulses. |
| Cochlear Implant | device for converting sounds into electrical signals and stimulating the auditory nerve though electrodes threaded into the cochlea. |
| Cognition | All the mental activities associated with thinking, knowing, remembering, and communicating. |
| Cognitive Dissonance Theory | The theory that we act to reduce the discomfort(dissonance)we feel when two of our thoughts(cognitions)are inconsistent.For example, when we become aware that our attitudes and our actions clash, we can reduce the resulting dissonance by changing our atti |
| Cognitive Learning | The acquisition of mental information, whether by observing events, by watching others, or through language. |
| Cognitive Map | a mental representation of the layout of one’s environment. For example, after exploring a maze, rats act as if they have learned a cognitive map of it. |
| Cognitive Neuroscience | The interdisciplinary study of he brain activity linked with cognition. |
Created by:
bmwarmund