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Principles/Ethics
Physiology & Behavior
Physiology & Behavior
Genetics
Misc.
100
This principle looks to find the cause of behavior, emotion and thought within the human body.
Behavior has a physiological basis
100
The attempt to make inferences about ones personality and intelligence by examining skull formation.
What is phrenology?
100
A cognitive disorder that involves a neurological impairment that renders a person incapable of recognizing faces
What is prosopagnosia
100
This debate within psychology is concerned with the extent to which particular aspects of behavior are a product of either inherited (i.e. genetic) or acquired (i.e. learned) characteristics.
What is the nature-nurture debate?
100
Those who adopt an extreme heredity position
What is a nativist?
200
Participants must know what they are agreeing to in the study they are part of
informed consent
200
Different parts of the brain carry out different functions therefore damage to a specific part of the brain results in a drastic loss in its corresponding function.
What is localisation of function?
200
non-invasive procedures which can be used to measure brain activity, look at brain structures and discover the function of brain areas.
What is brain imaging technology?
200
Come from the same egg and share 100% of their genes.
What is MZ twins?
200
Their basic assumption is that at birth the human mind is a tabula rasa (a blank slate) and that this is gradually “filled” as a result of experience
What is an empiricist?
300
Clarifying the research results afterwards and discussing or rectifying any consequences of the study to ensure that they leave the study in as similar a state as possible to when they entered
what is deception
300
List 3 ways that drugs can alter the process of neurotransmission.
Some drugs can encourage or prevent the production and release of neurotransmitters, increasing or decreasing the amount of neurotransmitter available in the synapse (eg. L-dopa); Some drugs can occupy the receptor sites thereby preventing neurotransmitter communication (eg. Caffeine); Some drugs can prevent the reuptake of neurotransmitters, allowing them more time to bind with receptor sites (eg. Prozac)
300
How do PET scans investigate brain structures?
PET scans allow one to observe blood flow or metabolism in any part of the brain. The subject is injected with a very small quantity of radioactive glucose. Brain cells use glucose as fuel, and PET works on the theory that if brain cells are more active, they will consume more of the radioactive glucose.
300
What methods are used to study genetic inheritance of behaviors?
twin, adoption, linkage
300
the likelihood or probability that if one individual has the trait the other will also have it
What is concordance rate?
400
Mention 2 strengths and 2 limitations of the experimental method.
Clear cause and effect; Increases control and objectivity; Greater ability to replicate. Artificial conditions – lack of ecological validity; Results biased by sampling; May raise ethical problems (sometimes deception is necessary)
400
Fischer states that being in love is like being addicted. How did she investigate her hypothesis?
fMRI scans were used to investigate blood flow in the brains of 20 men and women who were madly in love when they looked at photos of their beloved and of a neutral acquaintance The results showed that the brain’s reward system was particularly active when the pps looked at pictures of the object of their love – they also found that the more passionate they were, the more active the brain’s reward circuitry was.
400
Outline 2 strengths and 2 limitations of MRI
strengths: higher resolution that PET scanning; very few ethical implications involved due to the harmless and non-invasive, safe, painless nature of the technique. limitations: very expensive, any movement can affect the pictures, and they cannot say anything about cause-effect relationships.
400
How do adoption studies investigate genetics and environmental influences?
Adopted or foster children share none of their genes with their adoptive parents, but they do share 50 percent of their genes with their natural mother.  if the heritability of a behavior is high and environment has little part to play, then the behavior of adopted children should correlate more strongly with the behavior of their natural mother than their adoptive mother. If, however, the environment has the strongest role to play, the reverse pattern should be found.?
400
the genes that benefit survival most are passed on to the next generation
What is evolution?
500
What is a case study and why is it useful in psychology?
It is the in-depth and detailed study of an individual or particular group. Often applied to unusual or valuable examples of behavior which may provide important insights into psychological function or refutation of psychological theory.
500
Ditzen investigated how oxytocin reduces the stress hormone cortisol in arguing couples. Describe this study
They asked 47 couples aged between 20 and 50, in a laboratory, to argue about a typical subject of conflict for them. Couples that received oxytocin behaved more positively than couples with the placebo. In addition, cortisol levels of couples who received oxytocin were lower after the conflict than those of the placebo group.
500
Describe the Baumgartner study and which brain imaging technology was used to support the results?
investigated the role of oxytocin after breaches of trust in a trust game. The fMRI scans showed decreases in the responses in the amygdala, which has many oxytocin receptors and is involved in emotional processing and fear learning.
500
Identify 3 limitations in genetic research
genes interact with environmental factors in complex ways. It is therefore difficult to measure the relative influence of genes and environment; -knowledge about genes is still limited; there are problems in genetic research (eg. concordance rates in twin studies cannot say anything about cause-effect relationships).
500
the brain was thought to be fixed, but research has demonstrated that environmental enrichment can modify the brain, especially the cerebral cortex.
What is neuroplasticity?