Introductory Psychology (CLEP)

Structuralism --Structuralists believed that consciousness was made out of basic elements that were combined in different ways to produce different perceptions. Introspection --Reporting on one's own conscious thoughts and feelings. Functionalism --Functionalists believed that consciousness, and behavior in general, helped people and animals adjust to their environments. To them, understanding the mind meant understanding what the mind accomplished. Biological Approach --Those who adopt a biological approach to studying behavior focus on understanding how psychological and biochemical processes might produce psychological phenomena. From this perspective, explanations for behavior are ultimately reducible to the workings of genes, the nervous system, hormones, neurotransmitters, and so forth. Psychodynamic Approach --According to those who favor a psychodynamic approach, thoughts, feelings, and behaviors stem from the interaction of innate drives and society's restrictions on the expression of those drives. How we resolve those conflicts, primarily during the first few years of life, determines out personality. The reasons for much of your behavior, then, are unconscious, and rooted in childhood. Behaviorist Approach --Those who take a behaviorist approach explain behavior primarily in terms or learned responses to predictable patterns of environmental stimuli. Pavlov's studies of classical conditioning and Skinner's studies of operant conditioning exemplify this approach. Those who are behaviorists often study animals in order to glean general principles of learning that might then be applied to humans. Cognitive Approach --The cognitive approach developed in large part as a reaction against behaviorism. Behaviorists preferred to avoid explanations of behavior that didn't involve observable events (i.e. stimuli), which meant that references to "expectations," "feelings," or "thoughts" were frowned upon. The cognitive approach focuses on explaining behavior in terms of precisely those sorts of things. Thus, cognitivists might study problem solving, attention, expectations, memory, and other thought processes. Humanistic Approach --The central claim of the humanistic approach is that people aren't merely machines whose behaviors are determined for them by a genetic code, a conflicted childhood, brushes with stimuli, or cold mental calculations. Instead, humanists see people as motivated by a desire for optimal growth and development. From their perspective, each one of us come with his or her own unique set of desires, abilities, skills, and needs, and, in order to be happy and well adjusted, must be able to express those desires, abilities, and so forth. Because they see people as basically good, they tend to focus on positive aspects of development (how to feel good about yourself, etc). Experiments --In experiments, researchers assess cause-and-effect relationships between at least two variables. Independent Variable --The independent variable is the "cause" (i.e. if a certain drug was being tested on people, the drug would be in independent variable). Dependent Variable --The dependent variable is the "effect" (i.e. if a certain drug was being tested on people, the people would be the dependent variable). Experimental Group --Subjects in the experimental group are exposed to whatever the presumed "cause" in the experiments is. Control Group --Those in the control group are not exposed to the "cause." Placebo Effect --The placebo effect occurs when subjects in an experimental group behave differently than they normally would only because they know they're being exposed to a special treatment. Placebo --A placebo occurs when subjects in a control group are told that they, too, are receiving a special treatment even when they're not. Blind Study --If subjects don't know whether they're receiving the drug of the placebo, the experiment is called a blind study. Double-Blind Study --A double-blind study is when neither subjects nor the experimenters know which treatments is the placebo and which is the actual drug. Case Study --A case study is an in-depth analysis of only one person. Correlational Studies --Just like experiments, correlational studies also involve assessing the relation between two variables, but neither variable is manipulated. Positive Relationship --A positive relationship means that high scores on one variable tend to be paired with high scores on the other variable (and low with low scores); for example height and weight have a positive correlation - generally speaking, as one increases so does the other. Negative Relationship --A negative relationship means that high scores on one variable tend to be paired with low scores on the other variable. Job satisfaction and absenteeism are negatively correlated; as log satisfaction increases absentee rates decline. Correlation Coefficient --In addition to the direction of a relationship, a correlation coefficient will describe the strength of the relationship. The coefficient ranges from -1.0 to 1.0, with higher absolute values representing stronger relationships. Notice