Language is arbitrary, that is, words, rarely
sound like ideas that they convey
 Language has a structure that is additive in
a certain sense

› i.e.; words are added together to form
sentences, sentences to form paragraphs
Language has multiplicity of structure,
meaning that it can be analyzed in a
number of different ways
 Language is dynamic, meaning that it is
constantly changing and evolving


Phonemes – smallest unit of speech
sound in a given language that are still
distinct in sound from each other
› An example of a phoneme is the /t/ sound in
the words tip, stand, water, and cat

Morphemes – smallest meaningful units
of speech, such as simple words,
prefixes, and suffixes.

Most morphemes are a combo of
phonemes
› i.e.; Farm is made up of 3 phonemes
(sounds) and 1 morpheme (meaning)
Grammar – set of that determine how
sounds and words can be combined
and used to communicate meaning
 Syntax – word order
 Semantics – word meaning or word
choice

Babbling – product of phonemes, not
limited to the phonemes which the baby is
exposed (4 months)
 Holophrase – one word to convey meaning
(1st B-day)
 Overextension – Error in speech as a result
of not knowing enough words
 Telegraphic speech – verb and noun

› i.e.; “eat cookie”
› 2 – 3 years of age, language expands
› 3 years old follow rules of grammar

Overgeneralization (overregularization) –
children apply grammatical rules without
making appropriate exceptions
› i.e.; “I goed to the store.”

Nativists – biological predisposition for
language (Noam Chomsky)
› Prewired for language
› Language acquisition device – grammar
switches are turned on as children are exposed
to their language
› Critical period - (Feral Children)

Behaviorist – we develop language by
imitating sounds we hear to create words
(B.F. Skinner)
› Learn language by association (reinforcement/
imitation)

Noam Chomsky
› Transformational grammar – generative
grammar, especially of a natural langauge
› Surface structure of language – superficial
way in which words are arranged in a text or
in speech
› Deep structure of language – underlying
meaning of words
Thinking affects our language, which in
turn affects our thoughts.
 Linguistic relativity hypothesis – speakers
of different languages develop different
cognitive systems as a result of their
differences in language.

› i.e.; Garo people of Burma – many words for
rice, English only a few words to describe it.
Why? Because rice has more meaning to the
Garo people


Cognition – thinking
Reasoning – drawing conclusion from
evidence (deductive/inductive reasoning)
› Deductive reasoning – draw a logical conclusion
from general statement
 i.e.; All politicians are trustworthy, Janet is a
politician, Therefore, Janet is trustworthy
› Inductive reasoning – drawing general
inferences from specific observations
 i.e.; You may notice that everyone who plays
football is a good student. Not necessarily true,
you are drawing inference based on common
occurrence

Divergent Thinking – does a problem
have one or more solutions
› i.e.; brainstorming

Convergent Thinking – Problem solved by
one answer
› i.e.; narrowing many choices available

Heuristics – intuitive rules of thumb that may
or may not be useful in given situation
› Availability Heuristic – judge by what events
come readily to mind
 i.e.; many people feel air travel is more dangerous
than car, because crashes reported are so vivid
› Representativenss Heuristic – judge objects and
events in terms of how closely they match the
prototype of that event or object
 i.e.; people view H.S. athletes as less intelligent

Algorithms – systematic, mechanical
approaches that guarantee an eventual
answer to a problem

Insight – sudden understanding of a
problem or a potential strategy for
solving a problem
› i.e.; Kohler’s chimps reached the Banana’s
outside the cage by combining to sticks to
reach out further than they would
individually

Mental set – fixed frame of mind
› Trouble solving problems this way

Functional Fixedness – tendency to
assume that a given item is only useful for
the task which it was designed for.


Confirmation bias – search for info that
supports a particular point of view, which
hinders problem solving
Hindsight bias – tendency after the fact to think
you knew what the outcome would be
› i.e.; Monday morning QB’s


Belief perseverance – Individual only sees the
evidence that supports a particular position,
despite evidence presented to the contrary
Framing – way a question is phrased, can alter
the objective outcome of problem
solving/decision making
› Loftus Palmer – car accident study

Creativity – process of producing
something novel yet worthwhile.

Psychometricians – measurement of
mental traits, abilities, and processes
› Measurement of some constructs (behavior
that distinguishes among people)
 i.e.; we can not measure happiness in feet
Standardization – group of people who
represent the entire population
 Norms – standards of performance
against which anyone who takes a given
test can be compared


Flynn Effect – supports the need to
standardize because data indicate that
the population has gotten smarter over
the past 50 years
› i.e.; IQ of 100 may mean something different
in different years

Reliability – measure consistent a test is in
the measurement it provides
› i.e.; An individual would get a similar score if they
took the test on separate occasions
Test-retest – two sets of scores are
compared and a correlation coefficient is
computed between them
 Split-half – one group takes half the test
(odd questions) another group takes the
other half (even), and equivalent form
(different but similar tests covering same
concepts)


Validity – refers to the extent that a test measures
what it intends to measure
› i.e.; Develop a new IQ test you want to know if it was valid,
you might compare your results to those that the same
participants had achieved on other IQ measures

Predictive Validity – correlation between the test and
future performance
› i.e.; ACT

Content Validity – measures the degree to which the
test measures what it is supposed to measure
› i.e.; AP Psychology Exam – College Board

Construct Validity – (True Validity) – the degree which
the test indeed measures what it is supposed to test

Projective – ambiguous stimuli, open to
interpretation
› Rorschach Inkblot Test
› Thematic Apperception Test (TAT)

Inventory-type – participants answer a
standard series of questions
› Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory-2
(MMPI-2)
› No free response typically

Power Tests – gauge abilities in certain
areas
› Extremely difficult, really hard to get all right
Speed tests – Very easy to answer, but
timed makes it difficult to answer
 Achievement Tests – assess knowledge
gained

› i.e.; AP Test

Aptitude Test – evaluate person’s abilities
› Road test before driver’s license

Intelligence – goal-directed adaptive
thinking
› Difficult to measure all aspects of
intelligence

Alfred Binet – French Psychologist who
first began to measure intelligence
› Stanford-Binet Scale
 Originally measure child development –
overtime became 1st intelligence test

Intelligence Quotient (IQ) –
›
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Mental age/chronological (physical) age X 100
Under 20 (Profound)
20-34 (Severe)
35-49 (moderate)
50 - 70 (mild) Mental Retardation
130 Gifted
145 sometimes considered geniuse
Most common children intelligence test
› Stanford-Binet Intelligence Scale
› Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children (WISC-R)

Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale (WAIS)

Charles Spearman
› General intelligence (g factor)
› Specialized abilities (s)
› Factor analysis – statistical procedure that id
common factors among groups of items by
determining which variables have a high
degree of correlation (used to id, g)


Louis Thurstone – researcher in the field of
intelligence, posited that we need to think of
intelligence more broadly, because
intelligence can come in many different forms
Howard Gardner – multiple intelligences
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Verbal & Mathematical
Musical
Spatial
Kinesthetic
Environmental
Interpersonal (people perceptive)
Intrapersonal (insightful, self-awareness)
Naturalistic

Robert Sternberg – stats intelligence
could be more broadly defined as
having 3 major components:
› Analytical - facts
› Practical – “street smarts”
› Creative intelligence – seeing multiple
solutions

3 separate and testable intelligences

John Horn and Raymond Cattell –
identified two intelligence factors
› Fluid intelligence – those cognitive abilities
requiring speed or rapid learning that tends
to diminish with adult aging
› Crystallized intelligence – learned
knowledge and skills, such as vocabulary,
which tends to increase with age

Emotional intelligence – ability to
perceive, express, understand, and
regulate emotions which is similar to
Gardner’s interpersonal and
intrapersonal intelligences
› Peter Salovey and John Mayer

Motivation – psychological process that
directs and maintains behavior toward a
goal
› Motives – needs/desires that energize behavior
› Social motives – learned motives acquired as
part of growing up in a particular culture

Emotion – psychological feeling that
involves
› Physiological arousal
› Conscious experience
› Overt behavior

Darwin – Natural Selection
› Survival & reproduce
Instincts – inherited behavior, done
automatically
 Ethologist (Animal behaviorist)

› Konrad Lorenz – worked with baby geese
› Imprinting – forming of attachment to first
moving object they see/hear after birth

Sociobiology – relate social behaviors to
evolutionary biology
› Look at mating behaviors in males as opposed
to females

Drive reduction theory – behavior is
motivated reducing drives such as sex,
hunger, thirst.
› Need = motivated stated caused by lack of
› Drive = psychological tension induced by
need

Homeostasis – body’s tendency to
maintain an internal steady state of
metabolism (sum total of all chemical
processes that occur in our bodies)
Push – primary motives to satisfy basic
biological needs
 Pull – environmental factors (little to do
with biology)
 Incentive – either positive/negative
environmental stimulus that motivates
behavior pulling us to a goal.

› Secondary motives are motives learned by
society pull
Arousal – level of alertness, wakefulness,
activation caused by nervous system
 Yerkes-Dodson – law states that we
usually perform most activities best when
moderately aroused, and efficiency of
performance is usually lower when
arousal is to high/low.

Hypothalamus = hunger
 Lateral hypothalamus – brings on hunger

› Stimulate = even a well fed animal will eat
› Lesion = starving animal will have no interest
in food

Ventromedial hypothalamus - depresses
hunger
› Stimulate = animal will stop eating
› Lesion = animal will continue to want to eat
Leptin – hypothalamus sense rise in leptin
and will curb eating and increase
activity
 Set Point – Hypothalamus acts as a
thermostat

› Were meant to be a certain weight
Anorexia Nervosa – don’t eat
 Bulimia – Eating but purging

Achievement motive – desire to meet some
internalized standard of excellence
 Intrinsic – desire to perform an activity for its
own sake
 Extrinsic – desire to perform an activity to
obtain a reward such as money, applause,
and attention
 Overjustification effect – promising a reward
for doing something they already like to do
results in them seeing the reward as the
motivation for performing


Approach-approach conflicts
› 2 positive options, only one you can choose
› i.e.; accepted to both Harvard and Yale

Avoidance-avoidance conflicts
› 2 negative options, must choose one
› i.e.; Rock and a hard place

Approach-avoidance conflicts
› Whether or not to choose an option that has
both a positive/negative consequence
› i.e.; Order a rich dessert ruins your diet but
satisfies your chocolate craving

Multiple approach-avoidance conflict
› Most complex form of conflict
› Several courses of action that have both positive
and negative aspects.
› i.e.; if you take the bus to the movies, you’ll get
there in time to get a good seat and see the
coming attractions, but you won’t have enough
money to buy popcorn.
› i.e.; If your parents drive you, you’ll have to help
make dinner and wash the dishes
› i.e.; if you walk there you may be late, but you
can afford popcorn, and you wont have to do
the dishes

Emotion – conscious feeling of
pleasantness or unpleasantness
accompanied by biological activation
and expressive behavior.
› Emotion has both cognitive, physiological,
and behavioral components

When we see a vicious looking dog growl at
us, our sympathetic nervous system kicks in,
we begin to run immediately, and then we
become aware that we are afraid
› What’s this mean? We can change our feelings
by changing our behavior

Consistent with facial-feedback hypothesis,
our facial expressions affect our emotional
experiences
› i.e.; smiling induces positive moods

Theorized that the thalamus
simultaneously sends info to both the
limbic system (emotional center), and
the frontal lobes (cognitive center)
about an event
› i.e.; we see a vicious growling dog, our
bodily arousal and our recognition of the
fear we feel occur at the same time

Thalamus relays sensory info to
amygdala and hypothalamus

When we experience an emotion, an
opposing emotion, will counter the first
emotion, lessening the experience of that
emotion. When we experience the first
emotion on repeated occasions, the
opposing emotion becomes stronger and
the first emotion becomes weaker, leading
to an even weaker experience of the first
emotion
› i.e.; About to jump out of an airplane for the first
time, we tend to feel extreme fear along with
low levels of elation. On next jump we
experience less fear and more elation

Our emotional experiences depend on
our interpretation of situations. Their
studies suggest we infer emotion from
arousal, then label it according to our
cognitive explanation for the arousal.
› i.e.; if we feel aroused and someone is
yelling at us, we must be angry

Lazarus’ theory
› Our emotional experiences depends on our
interpretation of of the situation we are in.
 Primary appraisal, we assess potential
consequences of the situation
 Secondary appraisal, we decide what to do
› The theory suggest that we can change our
emotions if we learn to interpret the situation
differently

Selye’s General Adaptation Syndrome
(GAS)
› A = alarm – sympathetic nervous system
› R = resistance › E = exhaustion

Stressors – stimuli we see as a threat to
well being
Catastrophes – unpredictable, largescale disasters which threaten us
 Daily hassles – everyday annoyances

Type A personality – high achievers,
competitive, impatient, multi-taskers,
who walk, talk and eat quickly
 Type B personality – relaxed calm
approach in life


Defense mechanisms