| Term | Definition |
| Hindsight bias | thinking after an event has occurred that the event was more predictable than it actually was |
| illusory correlation | perceiving a relationship between variables even when none exists |
| scatter plots | a graph displaying data of two variables, an independent and a dependent variable |
| statistical significance | the probability that an event is not due to just chance alone |
| personal space | the space around a person which they claim as theirs; the closer a person allows someone else to come, the more intimate the relationship between these people |
| gender role | social and behavioral roles that are deemed appropriate for men and women to take on |
| cognitive neuroscience | study of how the psychological and cognitive functions are caused by the brain |
| inattentional blindness | failing to recognize an unexpected stimulus that is within the line of sight; not attributed to a vision problem but instead an attention problem |
| night terrors | a sever nightmare; a person quickly wakes up in a terrified state; a psychological disorder |
| REM rebound | after sleep deprivation, a person will enter REM sleep much faster, will have increased frequency and depth of REM sleep |
| Near-death experience | a personal experience of feeling dead, often accompanied by feeling weightless, seeing a white light, and detachment from one’s body |
| Primary sex characteristics | any part of the body involved in reproduction |
| Secondary sex characteristics | features that develop during sexual maturity and help distinguish between the sexes but are not part of the reproductive system |
| Cross-sectional study | data collection from a population gathered at one specific point in time |
| Longitudinal study | collects data from the same individuals over a long period of time |
| Place theory | a theory regarding auditory perception that states that our perception of sounds depends on where in the basilar membrane each component frequency vibrates |
| Frequency theory | the rate of the pulse traveling up the auditory nerve matches the frequency heard, we only experience the vibrations on the auditory nerve |
| Kinesthesis | the ability to feel movements and positions of the limb and body |
| Vestibular sense | located in the inner ear, the sense that helps us maintain balance and orientation |
| Phi phenomenon | perceiving continuous movement seemingly created by rapidly changing images |
| Parapsychology | field of psychology dealing with paranormal and psychic activity |
| Associative learning | process by which an association is created between stimuli or a behavior and a stimulus |
| Higher order conditioning | classical conditioning taken one step further |
| Cognitive map | a mental layout of one’s environment created in your mind to ease cognitive processing |
| Imagery | formation of mental images, visualizing something with your mind |
| Mood-congruent memory | a memory process that retrieves memories that match one’s mood |
| Misinformation effect | incorporating false information gathered after an event that your mind incorporates into its memory and believes to be true |
| Source amnesia | retaining information, but not being able to recall information about how/who/what/when/where/why you learned it |
| Belief perseverance | remaining steadfast in your beliefs even in the face of contradictory evidence |
| Intuition | the ability to understand something without the need for conscious reasoning of inference about the subject |
| Telegraphic speech | speech during the two word stage of language acquisition, very compressed and telegram like |
| Aphasia | disturbance in comprehension and production of language |
| Linguistic determinism | language limits and determines human thought |
| Factor analysis | used to determine which factors cause most of the variance in data from many possible variables |
| Emotional intelligence | ability to identify, assess, and control emotions of oneself and others |
| Stereotype threat | the threat that a person may confirm a negative stereotype about the group they belong to |
| Feel-good, do-good phenomenon | you are more likely to do good when you are in a good mood |
| Relative deprivation | being deprived of something the one feels they are entitled to have |
| Self-concept | a collection of beliefs about oneself |
| Social cognitive perception | how people form impressions of and make inferences about other people |
| Reciprocal determinism | behavior is both influenced by and influences personal factors and the environment |
| External locus of control | belief that events are beyond your control, fate or chance |
| Internal locus of control | belief that events are within one’s control and are due to ability, effort, attitude |
| Spotlight effect | overestimating the extent to which an audience is observing oneself when in a spotlight or other similar situation |
| Eclectic approach | drawing from several different sources, theories, ideas |
| Meta-analysis | a study of studies, comparing and contrasting different study results to see if common themes are present |
| Central route of persuasion | focuses on using facts and arguments to persuade an audience |
| Peripheral route of persuasion | using means other than facts and arguments to persuade, such as attire, sound of voice, fancy visual aids |
| Deindividualization | the loss of a persons sense of individuality, losing of self awareness |
| Scapegoat theory | groups that one does not like and is prejudiced against become scapegoats for this person to vent on |
| Just-world phenomenon | belief that the world is just and that people get what they deserve and deserve what they get |
| Frustration-aggression principle | aggression is the result of frustration |
| Mere exposure effect | people develop a preference for things simply because they are familiar with them |
| Self-disclosure | a person revealing themselves to another person, varies in breadth and depth of disclosure |
| Social-responsibility norm | people have an obligation to benefit society, norm that people will help those dependent upon them |
