General
What is psychology?
The study of the mind and behaviour
psyche = mind
logos = the study of
Which theory suggests psychology should study individual cases (idiographic) and the not the average performance of groups (nomothetic)?
Humanism
In operant conditioning, what does punishment mean?
decrease chances of a certain behaviour occurring
What was the purpose of the Asch experiment?
To investigate the extent to which social pressure from majority of group could affect a person to conform
Who established the first psychology lab and when?
William Wundt in 1879
What was the significance of the Rosenhan Experiment?
To test the reliability of psychiatric diagnoses
What is the difference between classical and operant conditioning?
Classical: Neutral stimulus paired with naturally-occurring stimulus
• Eventually, neutral stimulus evokes same response as naturally occurring stimulus
• Associated stimulus is conditioned stimulus
• Learned behavior is conditioned response
Operant: method of learning that occurs through reinforcements and punishments
What are some critiques of the theory of behaviourism?
• One-dimensional approach to understanding human behavior, neglects free will and internal influences such as moods, thoughts, and feelings
• Does not account for other types of learning that occurs without the use of reinforcement and punishment
List and give and example for each of the 2 types of influence.
Normative influence: people want to fit in with the group
Informational influence: people believe the group is better informed than they are
Who was Carl Rogers?
contributed to humanism theory
Provide 4 strategies to help deal with stress.
Answers may vary.
1. Do your part and establish Tawakkul (trust in God)
2. Strengthen ties with family and community
3. Identify what is causing stress, document it and try to eliminate it
4. Rest your mind
What is Humorism? What are the 4 fluids and their significance?
• Theory of fluids in our body, a system of medicine detailing the composition and function of the body
• Excess or deficiency of 4 bodily fluids (called humors) directly influence a person’s temperament and health
Blood: produced by liver
Yellow bile: excess produces aggression, causes liver imbalances
Black bile: excess causes depression
Phlegm: associated with apathetic behaviour
What is Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs? Provide examples for each stage.
1st: Biological and physiological needs
2nd: Safety needs
3rd: Belongingness
4th: Esteem
5th: Self-Actualization
What are the 4 factors that affect conformity?
group size, lack of group unanimity/presence of ally, difficulty of task, answer in private
Who was Ernest Dichter and what what was his major contribution?
Ernest Dichter realized that people often don’t know what they want
• He invented focus groups - observe consumers using and interacting with products, letting them talk freely about them
Memorable achievement:
• Instant cake didn’t sell well à found out that it was because housewives
felt guilty for not having to do work
• Solution: get them to add their own eggs, which changed perception of
ease and sales soared
List 5 psychological disorders
1. Neurodevelopmental: intellectual disability, global development delay, communication disorder, autism spectrum disorder
2. Bipolar and Related Disorders: bipolar, mania, depressive episodes
3. Anxiety Disorders: generalized anxiety disorder, agoraphobia, social anxiety disorder, panic disorder, separation anxiety disorder
4. Trauma and Stressor-related Disorders: acute stress disorder, adjustment disorder, post-traumatic stress disorder, reactive attachment disorder
According to psychodynamic theory, what is personality made up of?
1. Id (instincts)
• Primitive and instinctive component
• All inherited (i.e. biological) components
2. Ego (reality)
• Mediate between internal id and real external world
• Decision-making component
3. Super-ego:
• Values and morals of society, taught by parents and others
What is the Stroop Effect?
• First described by John Ridley Stroop in 1930s
• Refers to a delay in reaction times between congruent and incongruent stimuli
What are the two memorable works of Edward Bernays in the past century?
Memorable work #1:
• Got American women to smoke by associating with gender equality
• Also paid women in mass gatherings to smoke, setting an example
Memorable work #2:
• Deceitful act of Bernays was to make Guatemala look like a communist threat to the US and overthrew the government
What is the importance of studying psychology?
1. Describe: observe behaviour and describe in detail what is observed
2. Explain: why did the test subject do what they did?
3. Predict: if we know what happens and why it does, we can predict what will happen in the future
4. Control: once we know what happens, why it does, and what can likely happen in the future, we can expect to control it
5. Improve: control behaviour in a positive manner and improve a person's life
1. Efficient perception of reality
2. Comfortable acceptance of self, others, and nature
3. Reliant on own experiences and judgement
4. Spontaneous and natural
5. Task centering
6. Autonomy
7. Continued freshness of appreciation
8. Profound interpersonal relationships
9. Comfort with solitude
10. Non-hostile sense of humor
11. Peak experiences
What are the different types of memories studied in cognitive psychology?
1. False memories:
• how people can develop false memories or implant false memories
2. Retroactive interference/Misinformation effect
• When a person’s recall of episodic memories becomes less accurate because of post-event info.
3. Eyewitness memory
• Episodic memory of a crime, an accident, or other legally significant event
4. Unconscious transference
• Inability to distinguish between the perpetrator and another person who was encountered in a different context
Give 4 reasons why the stroop effect occurs.
1. Speed of processing theory: words processed faster than colours
2. Selective attention theory: recognizing colors requires more attention, thus more time
3. Automaticity: recognizing colors is not an automatic process
4. Parallel distributed processing: some neural pathways (such as reading words) are stronger than others (such as naming colors)
Who is the main contributor for 4 of the theories discussed in class?
1. Structuralism: William Wundt
2. Behaviourism: B. F. Skinner
3. Humanism: Abraham Maslow and Carl Rogers
4. Psychodynamic: Sigmund Freud