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Introduction to Psychology (Ciccarelli) Chapter 1-6
Psychology (Pamantasan ng Lungsod ng Maynila)
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Aquino, Jezreel M.
CHAPTER 1
Chapter 1.1 What is Psychology?
Psychology- scientific study of behavior and mental processes
Behavior- includes all of our outward or overt actions and reactions, such as talking, facial
expressions, and movement
Mental Processes- refers to all the internal, covert (hidden) activity of our minds, such as
thinking, feeling, and remembering
Psychology’s Goals
1. DESCRIPTION: WHAT IS HAPPENING?
Description
- involves observing a behavior and noting everything about it: what is happening, where it
happens, to whom it happens, and under what circumstances it seems to happen
- the goal of description provides the observations
2. EXPLANATION: WHY IS IT HAPPENING?
Explanation
- finding explanations for behavior is a very important step in the process of forming theories of
behavior
- the goal of explanation helps to build the theory
Theory- a general explanation of a set of observations or facts
3. PREDICTION: WHEN WILL IT HAPPEN AGAIN?
Prediction
- determining what will happen in the future
4. CONTROL: HOW CAN IT BE CHANGED?
Control
- the focus of control, or the modification of some behavior, is to change a behavior from an undesirable
one to a desirable one
Chapter 1.2 Psychology Then: The History of Psychology
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1. WUNDT, INTROSPECTION AND THE LABORATORY
- laboratory in Leipzig, Germany, in 1879
- Wilhelm Wundt (1832–1920), a physiologist, attempted to apply scientific principles to the
study of the human mind
- Wundt is known as the father of psychology
- Wundt believed that consciousness, the state of being aware of external events, could be
broken down into thoughts, experiences, emotions, and other basic elements
- Objective Introspection is the process of objectively examining and measuring one’s own
thoughts and mental activities
2. TITCHENER AND STRUCTURALISM IN AMERICA
- One of Wundt’s students was Edward Titchener (1867–1927), an Englishman who eventually
took Wundt’s ideas to Cornell University in Ithaca, New York
- Structuralism’s focus of study was the structure of the mind
- He believed that every experience could be broken down into its individual emotions
and sensations
3. WILLIAM JAMES AND FUNCTIONALISM
- Harvard University was the first school in America to offer classes in psychology in the late
1870s, these classes were taught by one of Harvard’s most illustrious instructors, William James
(1842–1910)
- James began teaching anatomy and physiology, but as his interest in psychology developed, he
began teaching it almost exclusively
- James focused on how the mind allows people to function in the real world
- Functionalism is how people work, play, and adapt to their surroundings
- heavily influenced by Charles Darwin’s ideas about natural selection, in which physical
traits that help an animal adapt to its environment and survive are passed on to its
offspring
Chapter 1.3 Gestalt Psychology: The Whole is Greater Than the Sum of Its Parts
- Max Wertheimer believed that psychological events such as perceiving and sensing could not
be broken down into any smaller elements and still be properly understood
- Wertheimer and others devoted their efforts to studying sensation and perception in this new
perspective, Gestalt psychology
- Gestalt (Gesh-TALT) is a German word meaning “an organized whole” or “configuration,” which
fit well with the focus on studying whole patterns rather than small pieces of them
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SIGMUND FREUD’S THEORY OF PSYCHOANALYSIS
- Freud was a neurologist, a medical doctor who specializes in disorders of the nervous system
- he proposed that there is an unconscious (unaware) mind into which we push, or repress, all
of our threatening urges and desires
- he believed that these repressed urges, in trying to surface, created the nervous
disorders in his patients
- Freud stressed the importance of early childhood experiences, believing that personality was
formed in the first 6 years of life
- Freudian psychoanalysis, the theory and therapy based on Freud’s ideas, has been the basis of
much modern psychotherapy (a process in which a trained psychological professional helps a
person gain insight into and change his or her behavior)
PAVLOV, WATSON, AND THE DAWN OF BEHAVIORISM
Ivan Pavlov
- Ivan Pavlov was a Russian physiologist who showed that a reflex (an involuntary reaction)
could be caused to occur in response to a formerly unrelated stimulus
- Conditioning is a theory that the reaction ("response") to an object or event ("stimulus") by a
person or animal can be modified by 'learning', or conditioning
John B. Watson
- “science of behavior,” or behaviorism
- Watson wanted to bring psychology back to a focus on scientific inquiry, and he felt that the
only way to do that was to ignore the whole consciousness issue and focus only on observable
behavior—something that could
be directly seen and measured
- Watson believed that all
behavior is learned
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Chapter 1.4 Psychology Now: Modern Perspectives
1. PSYCHODYNAMIC PERSPECTIVE
- the focus may still include the unconscious mind and its influence over conscious behavior and
on early childhood experiences, but with less of an emphasis on sex and sexual motivations and
more emphasis on the development of a sense of self, social and interpersonal relationships,
and the discovery of other motivations behind a person’s behavior
2. BEHAVIORAL PERSPECTIVE
- Skinner not only continued research in classical conditioning, but he also developed a theory
called operant conditioning, to explain how voluntary behavior is learned
- In this theory, behavioral responses that are followed by pleasurable consequences are
strengthened, or reinforced
3. HUMANISTIC PERSPECTIVE
- Often called the “third force” in psychology, humanism was really a reaction to both
psychoanalytic theory and behaviorism
- Humanists held the view that people have free will, the freedom to choose their own destiny,
and strive for self-actualization, the achievement of one’s full potential
- Today, humanism exists as a form of psychotherapy aimed at self-understanding and selfimprovement
4. COGNITIVE PERSPECTIVE
- Cognitive psychology, which focuses on how people think, remember, store, and use
information, became a major force in the field in the 1960s
- The cognitive perspective with its focus on memory, intelligence, perception, thought
processes, problem solving, language, and learning has become a major force in psychology
- cognitive neuroscience includes the study of the physical workings of the brain and nervous
system when engaged in memory, thinking, and other cognitive processes
5. SOCIOCULTURAL PERSPECTIVE
- the sociocultural perspective, which actually combines two areas of study: social psychology,
which is the study of groups, social roles, and rules of social actions and relationships; and
cultural psychology, which is the study of cultural norms, values, and expectations
- The sociocultural perspective is important because it reminds people that the way they and
others behave (or even think) is influenced not only by whether they are alone, with friends, in
a crowd, or part of a group but also by the social norms, fads, class differences, and ethnic
identity concerns of the particular culture in which they live
6. BIOPSYCHOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVE
- In the biopsychological perspective, human and animal behavior is seen as a direct result of
events in the body
- Hormones, heredity, brain chemicals, tumors, and diseases are some of the biological causes
of behavior and mental events
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7. EVOLUTIONARY PERSPECTIVE
- focuses on the biological bases for universal mental characteristics that all humans share
- it seeks to explain general mental strategies and traits, such as why we lie, how attractiveness
influences mate selection, why fear of snakes is so common, or why people universally like
music and dancing
- in this perspective, the mind is seen as a set of information-processing machines, designed by
the same process of natural selection that Darwin (1859) first theorized, allowing human beings
to solve the problems faced in the early days of human evolution— the problems of the early
hunters and gatherers
Chapter 1.5 Psychological Professionals and Areas of Specialization
Psychologists
- has no medical training but has a doctorate degree
Psychiatrist
- has a medical degree and is a physician who specializes in the diagnosis and treatment
(including the prescription of medications) of psychological disorders
Psychiatric Social Worker
- is trained in the area of social work and usually possesses a master’s degree in that discipline
- focus more on the environmental conditions that can have an impact on mental disorders,
such as poverty, overcrowding, stress, and drug abuse.
Basic Research
- is research for the sake of gaining scientific knowledge
Applied Research
- which is research aimed at answering real-world, practical problems
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Chapter 1.6 Psychology: The Scientific Methodology
The Five Steps of the Scientific Method
1. Perceiving the Question
2. Forming a Hypothesis
3. Testing the Hypothesis
4. Drawing Conclusions
5. Report Your Results
Chapter 1.7-8 Descriptive Method
Chapter 1.9 Correlations: finding Relationships
Correlation
- a statistical technique, a particular way of organizing numerical information so that it is easier
to look for patterns in the information
- is a measure of the relationship between two or more variables
Chapter 1.10 The Experiment
Experiment
- the only method that will allow researchers to determine the cause of a behavior
- In an experiment, researchers deliberately manipulate the variable they think is causing some
behavior while holding all the other variables that might interfere with the experiment’s results
constant and unchanging
Independent Variable
- the variable that is manipulated in any experiment
Dependent Variable
- the response of the participants to the manipulation of the independent variable is a
dependent relationship, so the response of the participants that is measured
Experimental Group
- group that is exposed to the independent variable
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Control Group
- group that gets either no treatment or some kind of treatment that should have no effect
- used to control for the possibility that other factors might be causing the effect that is being
examined
Chapter 1.11 Experimental Hazards: The Placebo Effect and the Experimenter Effect
Placebo Effect
- the improvement may have had more to do with participants’ belief in the drug than the drug
itself
- the expectations and biases of the participants in a study can influence their behavior
Experimenter Effect
- another way that expectations about the outcome of the experiment can influence the results,
even when the participants are animals rather than people
- it has to do with the expectations of the experimenter, not the participants
Chapter 1.13 Ethics of Psychological Research
THE GUIDELINES FOR DOING RESEARCH WITH PEOPLE
1. Rights and well-being of participants must be weighed against the study’s value to science
2. Participants must be allowed to make an informed decision about participation
3. Deception must be justified
4. Participants may withdraw from the study at any time
5. Participants must be protected from risks or told explicitly of risks
6. Investigators must debrief participants, telling the true nature of the study and expectations
of results
7. Data must remain confidential
8. If for any reason a study results in undesirable consequences for the participant, the
researcher is responsible for detecting and removing, or correcting, these consequences
Chapter 1.14 Applying Psychology to Everyday Life: Thinking Critically About Critical Thinking
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CHAPTER 2
Chapter 2.1 Neurons and Nerves: Building the Network
Nervous System
- a network of cells that carries information to and from all parts of the body
Neuroscience
- a branch of the life sciences that deals with the structure and functioning of the brain and the
neurons, nerves, and nervous tissue that form the nervous system
Biological psychology, or behavioral neuroscience
- is the branch of neuroscience that focuses on the biological bases of psychological processes,
behavior, and learning, and it is the primary area associated with the biological perspective in
psychology
STRUCTURE OF THE NEURON: THE NERVOUS SYSTEM’S BUILDING BLOCK
Neuron
- specialized cell in the nervous system that receives and sends messages within that system
- one of the messengers of the body, and that means that they have a very special structure
Dendrites
- parts of the neuron that receive messages from other cells
- dendrite means “tree-like,” or “branch”
Soma
- dendrites are attached to the cell body, or soma
- part of the cell that contains the nucleus and keeps the entire cell alive and functioning
- soma means “body”
Axon
- a fiber attached to the soma, and its job is to carry messages out to other cells.
Axon Terminals
- end of the axon branches out into several shorter fibers that have swellings or little knobs on
the ends called axon terminals
- responsible for communicating with other nerve cells
Glial Cells
- some glia serve as a sort of structure on which the neurons develop and work and that hold
the neurons in place
- other glia are involved in getting nutrients to the neurons, cleaning up the remains of neurons
that have died, communicating with neurons and other glial cells, and providing insulation for
neurons
- Glial cells affect both the functioning and structure of neurons and specific types also have
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properties similar to stem cells, which allow them to develop into new neurons, both during
prenatal development and in adult mammals
TWO SPECIAL TYPES OF GLIAL CELLS
1. Oligodendrocytes
- produce myelin for the neurons in the brain and spinal cord (the central nervous system)
2. Schwann Cells
- produce myelin for the neurons of the body (the peripheral nervous system)
- Myelin from Schwann cells have a unique feature that can serve as a tunnel through which
damaged nerve fibers can reconnect and repair themselves
Myelin
- wraps around the shaft of the axons, forming an insulating and protective sheath
Tracts
- bundles of myelin-coated axons travel together as “cables” in the central nervous system
Nerves
- peripheral nervous system bundles of axons
Myelin Sheath
- speeds up the neural message traveling down the axon
- insulates and protects the neuron
Nodes
- the places where the myelin seems to bump are small spaces on the axon
- not covered in myelin
GENERATING THE MESSAGE WITHIN THE NEURON: THE NEURAL IMPULSE
Diffusion
- the process of ions moving from areas of high concentration to areas of low concentration,
and electrostatic pressure, the relative electrical charges when the ions are at rest
Resting Potential
- When the cell is resting (the electrical potential is in a state called the resting potential,
because the cell is at rest)
Action Potential
- the electrical potential is now in action rather than at rest
When the cell is stimulated, the first ion channel opens and the electrical charge at that
ion channel is reversed. Then the next channel opens and that charge is reversed, but in the
meantime the first ion channel has been closed and the charge is returning to what it was when
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it was at rest. The action potential is the sequence of ion channels opening all down the length
of the cell’s axon.
All-or-None
- neurons are either firing at full strength or not firing at all
Chapter 2.2 Sending the Message to Other Cells: The Synapse
Synaptic Vesicles
- little sac-like structures
- vesicle is Latin and means a “little blister” or “fluid-filled sac”
Neurotransmitters
- inside the synaptic vesicles are chemicals suspended in fluid, which are molecules of
substances
Synapse or Synaptic Gap
- fluid-filled space
- a junction between two nerve cells, consisting of a minute gap across which impulses pass by
diffusion of a neurotransmitter
Receptor Sites
- proteins that allow only particular molecules of a certain shape to fit into it, just as only a
particular key will fit into a keyhole
The neurotransmitters found at various synapses around the nervous system can either
turn cells on (called an excitatory effect) or turn cells off (called an inhibitory effect), depending
on exactly what synapse is being affected.
NEUROTRANSMITTERS: MESSENGERS OF THE NETWORK
Antagonist
- a chemical substance that
blocks or reduces the
effects of a
neurotransmitter
Agonist
- a chemical substance that
mimics or enhances the
effects of a
neurotransmitter
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CLEANING UP THE SYNAPSE: REUPTAKE AND ENZYMES
Reuptake
- The neurotransmitters have to get out of the receptor sites before the next stimulation can
occur. Some just drift away through the process of diffusion, but most will end up back in the
synaptic vesicles in a process called reuptake. (Think of a little suction tube, sucking the
chemicals back into the vesicles.) That way, the synapse is cleared for the next release of
neurotransmitters
Enzymatic Degradation
- an enzyme specifically designed to break apart ACh clears the synaptic gap very quickly
- enzymes that break down other neurotransmitters as well
OVERVIEW OF THE NERVOUS SYSTEM
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Chapter 2.3-5
Chapter 2.6-8
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Chapter 2.9-11
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CHAPTER 3
Chapter 3.1 The ABCs of Sensation
Sensation
- occurs when special receptors in the sense organs—the eyes, ears, nose, skin, and taste buds
—are activated, allowing various forms of outside stimuli to become neural signals in the brain
Transduction
- process of converting outside stimuli, such as light, into neural activity
Sensory Receptors
- specialized forms of neurons, the cells that make up the nervous system
- instead of receiving neurotransmitters from other cells, these receptor cells are stimulated by
different kinds of energy—for example, the receptors in the eyes are stimulated by light,
whereas the receptors in the ears are activated by vibrations
SENSORY THRESHOLDS
Ernst Weber (1795–1878)
- did studies trying to determine the smallest difference between two weights that could be
detected
- his research led to the formulation known as Weber’s law of just noticeable differences (jnd, or
the difference threshold)
- JND is the smallest difference between two stimuli that is detectable 50 percent of the time,
and Weber’s law simply means that whatever the difference between stimuli might be, it is
always a constant
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Gustav Fechner (1801–1887)
- expanded on Weber’s work by studying something he called the absolute threshold
- an absolute threshold is the lowest level of stimulation that a person can consciously detect 50
percent of the time the stimulation is present
- stimuli that are below the level of conscious awareness are called subliminal stimuli
- these stimuli are just strong enough to activate the sensory receptors but not strong enough
for people to be consciously aware of them. Many people believe that these stimuli act upon
the unconscious mind, influencing behavior in a process called subliminal perception.
HABITUATION AND SENSORY ADAPTATION
Habituation
- although they actually are hearing it, they aren’t paying attention to it
- it is the way the brain deals with unchanging information from the environment
- in habituation, the sensory receptors are still responding to stimulation, but the lower centers
of the brain are not sending the signals from those receptors to the cortex
Sensory Adaptation
- is another process by which constant, unchanging information from the sensory receptors is
effectively ignored
- the receptor cells themselves become less responsive to an unchanging stimulus—garbage
odors included—and the receptors no longer send signals to the brain
Chapter 3.2 The Science of Seeing
THE STRUCTURE OF THE EYE
Brightness
- is determined by the amplitude of
the wave—how high or how low the
wave actually is
Color
- or hue, is largely determined by the
length of the wave
Saturation
- refers to the purity of the color
people perceive
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Visual Accommodation
- the lens changes its shape from thick to thin, enabling it to focus on objects that are close or
far away
Myopia
- nearsightedness
- shape of the eye causes the focal point to fall short of the retina
Hyperopia
- farsightedness
- the focus point is behind the retina
RETINA, RODS, AND CONES
Retina
- final stop for light within the eye
- light sensitive area at the back of the eye containing three layers: ganglion cells, bipolar cells,
and the rods and cones, special receptor cells (photoreceptors) that respond to the various
wavelengths of light
Rods
- about 100 million of them in each eye
- are found all over the retina except the fovea, but are concentrated in the periphery
- sensitive to changes in brightness but not to a variety of wavelengths, so they see only in black
and white and shades of gray
Cones
- there are 6 million cones in each eye; of these, 50,000 have a private line to the optic nerve
(one bipolar cell for each cone)
- the receptors for visual acuity, or ability, to see fine detail
- located all over the retina but are more concentrated at its very center where there are no
rods (the area called the fovea)
- cones work best in bright light, which is also when people see things most clearly
- sensitive to different wavelengths of light, so they are responsible for color vision
The Blind Spot
- There are no rods or cones here
- eyes don’t adapt to constant stimuli under normal circumstances because of saccadic
movements
- if people stare with one eye at one spot long enough, objects that slowly cross their visual field
may at one point disappear briefly because there is a “hole” in the retina—the place where all
the axons of those ganglion cells leave the retina to become the optic nerve, the optic disk
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HOW THE EYE WORKS
Dark Adaptation
- occurs as the eye recovers its ability to see when going from a brightly lit state to a dark state
- the brighter the light was, the longer it takes the rods to adapt to the new lower levels of light
Light Adaptation
- the cones have to adapt to the increased level of light, and they accomplish this light
adaptation much more quickly than the rods adapt to darkness—it takes a few seconds at most
PERCEPTION OF COLOR
Trichromatic Theory
- (“three colors”)
- proposed three types of cones: red cones, blue cones, and green cones, one for each of the
three primary colors of light
- processing by cones
Opponent-Process Theory
- processing beyond cones (bipolar or ganglion cells to LGN of thalamus)
- afterimages occur when a visual sensation persists for a brief time even after the original
stimulus is removed
- there are four primary colors: red, green, blue, and yellow, the colors are arranged in pairs,
with each member of the pair as opponents: Red is paired with its opponent green, and blue is
paired with its opponent yellow
Color Blindness
- caused by defective cones in the retina of the eye and, as a more general term, color-deficient
vision is more accurate, as most people with “color blindness” have two types of cones working
and can see many colors
- monochrome color blindness, people either have no cones or have cones that are not working
at all
- dichromatic vision, are caused by the same kind of problem—having one cone that does not
work properly
Chapter 3.4 The Hearing Sense: Can You Hear Me Now?
PERCEPTION OF SOUND: GOOD VIBRATIONS
Wavelengths
- are interpreted by the brain as frequency or pitch (high, medium, or low)
Amplitude
- is interpreted as volume, how soft or loud a sound is
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Timbre
- what would correspond to saturation or purity in light is called timbre in sound, a richness in
the tone of the sound
THE STRUCTURE OF THE EAR: FOLLOW THE VIBES
The Outer Ear
Pinna
- visible, external part of the ear that serves as a kind of concentrator, funneling the sound
waves from the outside into the structure of the ear
Auditory Canal
- (or ear canal) the short tunnel that runs down to the tympanic membrane, or eardrum
The Middle Ear
- the three tiny bones in the middle ear are known as the hammer (malleus), anvil (incus), and
stirrup (stapes)
- collectively they are referred to as the ossicles and they are the smallest bones in the human
body
- the stirrup, the last bone in the chain, causes a membrane covering the opening of the inner
ear to vibrate
The Inner Ear
- this membrane is called the
oval window, and its vibrations
set off another chain reaction
within the inner ear
- the inner ear is a snail-shaped
structure called the cochlea,
which is filled with fluid
- fluid that surrounds a
membrane running through
the middle of the cochlea
called the basilar membrane
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PERCEIVING PITCH
Pitch
- refers to how high or low a sound is
3 Primary Theories
1. Place Theory
- Hermann von Helmholtz and elaborated on and modified by Georg von Békésy
- the pitch a person hears depends on where the hair cells that are stimulated are located on
the organ of Corti
- for example, if the person is hearing a high-pitched sound, all of the hair cells near the oval
window will be stimulated, but if the sound is low pitched, all of the hair cells that are
stimulated will be located farther away on the organ of Corti
2. Frequency Theory
- developed by Ernest Rutherford in 1886
- states that pitch is related to how fast the basilar membrane vibrates
- the faster this membrane vibrates, the higher the pitch; the slower it vibrates, the lower the
pitch
3. Volley Principle
- developed by Ernest Wever and Charles Bray
- appears to account for pitches from about 400 Hz up to about 4000
- groups of auditory neurons take turns firing in a process called volleying
TYPES OF HEARING IMPAIRMENT
1. Conduction Hearing Impairment
- or conductive hearing loss, refers to problems with the mechanics of the outer or middle ear
and means that sound vibrations cannot be passed from the eardrum to the cochlea
2. Nerve Hearing Impairment
- or sensorineural hearing loss, the problem lies either in the inner ear or in the auditory
pathways and cortical areas of the brain
- most common type of permanent hearing loss
- Tinnitus is a fancy word for an extremely annoying ringing in one’s ears, and it can also be
caused by infections or loud noises—including loud music in headphones
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Chapter 3.6 Chemical Senses: It Tastes Good and Smells Even Better
GUSTATION: HOW WE TASTE THE WORLD
Taste Buds
- are the common name for the taste receptor cells, special kinds of neurons found in the
mouth that are responsible for the sense of taste, or gustation
THE FIVE BASIC TASTES
- Hans Henning proposed that there are four primary tastes: sweet, sour, salty, and bitter
- Lindemann proposed that this fifth taste be called umami
- The taste information is sent to the gustatory cortex, found in the front part of the insula and
the frontal operculum
THE SENSE OF SCENTS: OLFACTION
Olfaction
- ability to smell odors is called olfaction, or the olfactory sense
Olfactory Receptor Cells
- olfactory receptor cells each have about a half dozen to a dozen little “hairs,” called cilia, that
project into the cavity
- there are receptor sites on these hair cells that send signals to the brain when stimulated by
the molecules of substances that are in the air moving past them
Olfactory Bulb
- are located right on top of the sinus cavity on each side of the brain directly beneath the
frontal lobes
Chapter 3.7 Somesthetic Senses: What the Body Knows
Somesthetic Senses
- soma, means “body,” esthetic, means “feeling,”
- There are three somesthetic sense systems, the skin senses (having to do with touch, pressure,
temperature, and pain), the kinesthetic sense (having to do with the location of body parts in
relation to each other), and the vestibular senses (having to do with movement and body
position)
TYPES OF SENSORY RECEPTORS IN THE SKIN
Pacinian corpuscles
- respond to changes in pressure
- nerve endings are sensitive to both pain and touch
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Free Nerve Endings
- respond to changes in temperature and to pressure and to pain
Visceral Pain
- pain that arises from, in, or around internal organs
Somatic Pain
- occurs when pain receptors in tissues (including the skin, muscles, skeleton, joints, and
connective tissues) are activated
Chapter 3.8 The ABCs of Perception
Perception
- method by which the brain takes all the sensations a person experiences at any given moment
and allows them to be interpreted in some meaningful fashion
- perception has some individuality to it
THE CONSTANCIES: SIZE, SHAPE, AND BRIGHTNESS
Size Constancy
- the tendency to interpret an object as always being the same size, regardless of its distance
from the viewer
Shape Constancy
- the tendency to interpret the shape of an object as constant, even when it changes on the
retina
Brightness Constancy
- the tendency to perceive the apparent brightness of an object as the same even when the light
conditions change
THE GESTALT PRINCIPLES
Figure–Ground Relationships
- refer to the tendency to perceive objects or figures as existing on a background
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Proximity
- “nearness”
- tendency to perceive objects that are close to one another as part of the same grouping
Similarity
- the tendency to perceive things that look similar as being part of the same group
Closure
- tendency to complete figures that are incomplete
Continuity
- tendency to perceive things as simply as possible with a continuous pattern rather than with a
complex, broken-up pattern
Contiguity
- tendency to perceive two things that happen close together in time as being related
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DEPTH PERCEPTION
- The capability to see the world in three dimensions
- Various cues exist for perceiving depth in the world. Some require the use of only one eye
(monocular cues) and some are a result of the slightly different visual patterns that exist when
the visual fields of both eyes are used (binocular cues)
Monocular Cues
- often referred to as pictorial depth cues because artists can use these cues to give the illusion
of depth to paintings and drawings
1. Linear perspective: tendency for lines that are actually parallel to seem to converge on each
other
2. Relative size: when objects that people expect to be of a certain size appear to be small and
are, therefore, assumed to be much farther away
3. Overlap: also known as interposition, if one object seems to be blocking another object,
people assume that the blocked object is behind the first one and, therefore, farther away
4. Aerial (atmospheric) perspective: the farther away an object is, the hazier the object will
appear to be due to tiny particles of dust, dirt, and other pollutants in the air
5. Texture gradient: the pebbles or bricks that are close to you are very distinctly textured, but
as you look farther off into the distance, their texture becomes smaller and finer
6. Motion parallax: the next time you’re in a car, notice how the objects outside the car window
seem to zip by very fast when they are close to the car, and objects in the distance, such as
mountains, seem to move more slowly
7. Accommodation: also called muscular cue, makes use of something that happens inside the
eye
Binocular Cues
- require the use of two eyes
1. Convergence: if the object is close, the convergence is pretty great (almost as great as
crossing the eyes) and if the object is far, the convergence is much less
2. Binocular disparity: scientific way of saying that because the eyes are a few inches apart, they
don’t see exactly the same image
PERCEPTUAL ILLUSIONS
The Hermann Grid
Müller-Lyer Illusion
The Moon Illusion
Illusions of Motion
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OTHER FACTORS THAT INFLUENCE PERCEPTION
Perceptual Set or Perceptual Expectancy
- people’s tendency to perceive things a certain way because their previous experiences or
expectations influence them
Top-Down Processing
- the use of preexisting knowledge to organize individual features into a unified whole
Bottom-Up Processing
- analysis of smaller features and building up to a complete perception
CHAPTER 4
Chapter 4.1 What Is Consciousness?
Consciousness
- is your awareness of everything that is going on around you and inside your own head at any
given moment, which you use to organize your behavior, including your thoughts, sensations,
and feelings
Waking Consciousness
- thoughts, feelings, and sensations are clear and organized, and they feel alert
Altered States of Consciousness
- occurs when there is a shift in the quality or pattern of your mental activity
- sometimes being in an altered state may mean being in a state of increased alertness, as when
under the influence of a stimulant
- for example, daydreaming, being hypnotized, or achieving a meditative state are usually
considered to be altered states
Chapter 4.2 Sleep
THE BIOLOGY OF SLEEP
- Sleep was once referred to as “the gentle tyrant”
- sleep is one of the human body’s biological rhythms, natural cycles of activity that the body
must go through
- sleep–wake cycle is a circadian rhythm
- a circadian rhythm is a cycle that takes “about a day” to complete
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THE ROLE OF THE HYPOTHALAMUS: THE MIGHTY MITE
- melatonin (a hormone normally secreted by the pineal gland)
- the release of melatonin is influenced by a structure deep within the tiny hypothalamus in an
area called the suprachiasmatic nucleus, the internal clock that tells people when to wake up
and when to fall asleep
- melatonin supplements are often used to treat a condition called jet lag, in which the body’s
circadian rhythm has been disrupted by traveling to another time zone
THE IMPORTANCE OF SLEEP AND THE PRICE OF NOT SLEEPING
Microsleeps
- brief sidesteps into sleep lasting only seconds
- people can have microsleeps, too, and if this happens while they are driving a car or a truck,
it’s obviously bad news
Sleep Deprivation
- loss of sleep, is a serious problem, which many people have without realizing it
- symptoms of sleep deprivation include trembling hands, inattention, staring off into space,
droopy eyelids, and general discomfort, as well as emotional symptoms such as irritability and
even depression
THEORIES OF SLEEP
1. The Adaptive Theory of Sleep
- sleep is a product of evolution
- proposes that animals and humans evolved different sleep patterns to avoid being present
during their predators’ normal hunting times, which typically would be at night
2. The Restorative Theory of Sleep
- states that sleep is necessary to the physical health of the body
- during sleep, chemicals that were used up during the day’s activities are replenished and
cellular damage is repaired
Chapter 4.3 The Stages of Sleep
TWO KINDS OF SLEEP
1. REM (rapid eye movement) Sleep
- is a relatively psychologically active type of sleep when most of a person’s dreaming takes
place
- the voluntary muscles are inhibited, meaning that the person in REM sleep moves very little
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2. Non-REM (NREM) Sleep
- spans from lighter stages to a much deeper, more restful kind of sleep
- the person’s body is free to move around (including kicking one’s bed partner!)
Beta Waves
- a person who is wide awake and mentally active will show a brain-wave pattern on the
electroencephalogram (EEG)
- beta waves are very small and very fast
Alpha Waves
- as the person relaxes and gets drowsy, slightly larger and slower alpha waves appear
Theta Waves
- the alpha waves are eventually replaced by even slower and larger theta waves
The new guidelines use R in place of REM, N instead of NREM, and W instead of
wakefulness. The AASM guidelines also combine NREM Stages 3 and 4 into a single stage, now
indicated by N3
N1 (R&K Stage 1): Light Sleep
- as theta wave activity increases and alpha wave activity fades away, people are said to be
entering N1 sleep, or light sleep
- if people are awakened at this point, they will probably not believe that they were actually
asleep
- they may also experience vivid visual events called hypnogogic images or hallucinations
- a much more common occurrence is called the hypnic jerk
N2 (R&K Stage 2): Sleep Spindles
- as people drift further into sleep, the body temperature continues to drop
- heart rate slows, breathing becomes more shallow and irregular, and the EEG will show the
first signs of sleep spindles
- theta waves still predominate in this stage, but if people are awakened during this stage, they
will be aware of having been asleep
N3 (R&K Stages 3 and 4): Delta Waves Roll In
- in the third stage of sleep, the slowest and largest waves make their appearance (delta waves)
- now the person is in the deepest stage of sleep, often referred to as slow wave sleep (SWS) or
simply, deep sleep
- during this stage that growth hormones are released from the pituitary gland and reach their
peak
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- people in deep sleep are very hard to awaken and if something does wake them, they may be
very confused and disoriented at first
R (R&K REM)
- after spending some time in N3, the sleeping person will go back up through N2 and then into
a stage in which body temperature increases to near-waking levels, the eyes move rapidly under
the eyelids, the heart beats much faster, and brain waves resemble beta waves—the kind of
brain activity that usually signals wakefulness
- the person is still asleep but in the stage known as rapid eye movement sleep (REM) and
sometimes referred to as paradoxical sleep
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REM Sleep: Perchance to Dream?
- when a person in REM sleep is awakened, he or she almost always reports being in a dream
state
- associated with dreaming
- people do have dreams in the other non-REM stages, but REM dreams tend to be more vivid,
more detailed, longer, and more bizarre than the dreams of NREM sleep
- the body is unable to act upon these dreams under normal conditions because the voluntary
muscles are paralyzed during REM sleep, a condition known as sleep paralysis
What Is the Purpose of REM Sleep?
- after a very physically demanding day, people tend to spend more time in NREM deep sleep
than is usual but an emotionally stressful day leads to increased time in REM sleep
- if deprived of REM sleep (as would occur with the use of sleeping pills or other depressant
drugs), a person will experience greatly increased amounts of REM sleep the next night, a
phenomenon called REM rebound
Chapter 4.4 Sleep Disorders
Nightmares
- are bad dreams, and some nightmares can be utterly terrifying
- children tend to have more nightmares than adults do because they spend more of their sleep
in the REM state
REM behavior disorder
- some people have a rare disorder in which the brain mechanisms that normally inhibit the
voluntary muscles fail, allowing the person to thrash around and even get up and act out
nightmares
Night Terrors
- are more likely in children and also likely to disappear as the child grows older
- a state of panic experienced while sound asleep
- people do not remember what happened during a night-terror episode, although a few people
can remember vividly the images and terror they experienced
Insomnia
- the inability to get to sleep, stay asleep, or get a good quality of sleep
- some of the psychological causes are worrying, trying too hard to sleep, or having anxiety
Sleep Apnea
- type of snoring that is often associated with a condition called sleep apnea, in which the
person stops breathing for 10 seconds or more
- when breathing stops, there will be a sudden silence, followed shortly by a gasping sound as
the person struggles to get air into the lungs
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Narcolepsy
- a kind of “sleep seizure”
- the person may slip suddenly into REM sleep during the day (especially when the person
experiences strong emotions)
Chapter 4.5 Dreams
FREUD’S INTERPRETATION: DREAMS AS WISH FULFILLMENT
- believed that the problems of his patients stemmed from conflicts and events that had been
buried in their unconscious minds since childhood
- Freud believed dreams to be a kind of wish fulfillment for his patients
Manifest Content
- the manifest content of a dream is the actual dream itself
Latent Content
- he believed that the true meaning of a dream was hidden, or latent, and only expressed in
symbols
THE ACTIVATION-SYNTHESIS HYPOTHESIS
- a dream is merely another kind of thinking that occurs when people sleep
- less realistic because it comes not from the outside world of reality but from within people’s
memories and experiences of the past
Chapter 4.6 The Effects of Hypnosis
Hypnosis
- a state of consciousness in which a person is especially susceptible to suggestion
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THEORIES OF HYPNOSIS
Chapter 4.7 The Influence of Psychoactive Drugs
PSYCHOACTIVE DRUGS
- chemical substances that alter thinking, perception, memory, or some combination of those
abilities
1. Physical Dependence
- drugs that people can become physically dependent on cause the user’s body to crave the
drug
- after using the drug for some period of time, the body becomes unable to function normally
without the drug and the person is said to be dependent or addicted
a. Drug Tolerance- as the person continues to use the drug, larger and larger doses of
the drug
are needed to achieve the same initial effects of the drug
b. Withdrawal- these symptoms can range from headaches, nausea, and irritability to
severe pain, cramping, shaking, and dangerously elevated blood pressure
Negative Reinforcement
- the tendency to continue a behavior that leads to the removal of or escape from unpleasant
circumstances or sensations
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Classical Conditioning
- when the cues are present, it may be even harder to resist using the drug because the body
and mind have become conditioned, or trained, to associate drug use with the cues
Contingency-Management Therapy
- patients earn vouchers for negative drug tests
- vouchers can be exchanged for healthier, more desirable items like food
Cognitive-Behavioral Interventions
- change the way people think about the stresses in their lives and react to those stressors,
working toward more effective coping without resorting to drugs
2. Psychological Dependence
- the belief that the drug is needed to continue a feeling of emotional or psychological wellbeing, which is a very powerful factor in continued drug use
- the body may not need or crave the drug, and people may not experience the symptoms of
physical withdrawal or tolerance, but they will continue to use the drug because they think they
need it
Positive Reinforcement
- the tendency of a behavior to strengthen when followed by pleasurable consequences
Chapter 4.8-9
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CHAPTER 5
Chapter 5.1 Definition of Learning
Learning
- is any relatively permanent change in behavior brought about by experience or practice
Maturation
- not all change is accomplished through learning
- changes like an increase in height or the size of the brain are another kind of change,
controlled by a genetic blueprint
Chapter 5.2 It Makes Your Mouth Water: Classical Conditioning
Reflex
- an unlearned, involuntary response that is not under personal control or choice
PAVLOV AND THE SALIVATING DOGS
- Pavlov soon discovered that his dogs began salivating when they weren’t supposed to be
salivating
- Pavlov spent the rest of his career studying what eventually he termed classical conditioning,
learning to elicit an involuntary, reflex-like, response to a stimulus other than the original,
natural stimulus that normally produces the response
ELEMENTS OF CLASSICAL CONDITIONING
Unconditioned Stimulus (UCS)
- original, naturally occurring stimulus
- unconditioned means “unlearned”
- the stimulus that ordinarily leads to the involuntary response
- in the case of Pavlov’s dogs, the food is the unconditioned stimulus
Unconditioned Response (UCR)
- automatic and involuntary response to the unconditioned stimulus
- unlearned and occurs because of genetic “wiring” in the nervous system
- in Pavlov’s experiment, the salivation to the food is the UCR
Conditioned Stimulus (CS)
- conditioned means “learned,” and, as mentioned earlier, unconditioned means “unlearned.”
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- the dish was a neutral stimulus (NS) because it had no effect on salivation
- conditioned stimulus is the previously neutral stimulus that begins to cause the same kind of
involuntary response when paired repeatedly with the UCS
Conditioned Response (CR)
- response that is given to the CS is not usually quite as strong as the original unconditioned
response (UCR), but it is essentially the same response
- because it comes as a learned response to the conditioned stimulus (CS), it is called the
conditioned response
Chapter 5.3 Conditioned Emotional Responses: Rats!
Chapter 5.4-5
Chapter 5.6 Schedules of Reinforcement: Why the One-Armed Bandit is so Seductive
THE PARTIAL REINFORCEMENT EFFECT
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- a response that is reinforced after some, but not all, correct responses will be more resistant
to extinction than a response that receives continuous reinforcement (a reinforcer for each and
every correct response)
- Although it may be easier to teach a new behavior using continuous reinforcement, partially
reinforced behavior is not only more difficult to suppress but also more like real life
- Partial reinforcement can be accomplished according to different patterns or schedules
- For example, it might be a certain interval of time that’s important, such as an office safe that
can only be opened at a certain time of day. It wouldn’t matter how many times one tried to
open the safe if the effort didn’t come at the right time.
FIXED INTERVAL SCHEDULE OF REINFORCEMENT
- if you receive a paycheck once a week, you are familiar with what is called a fixed interval
schedule of reinforcement, in which a reinforcer is received after a certain, fixed interval of time
has passed
VARIABLE INTERVAL SCHEDULE OF REINFORCEMENT
- pop quizzes are good examples of a variable interval schedule of reinforcement, where the
interval of time after which the individual must respond in order to receive a reinforcer (in this
case, a good grade on the quiz) changes from one time to the next
FIXED RATIO SCHEDULE OF REINFORCEMENT
- in ratio schedules, it is the number of responses that counts
- in a fixed ratio schedule of reinforcement, the number of responses required to receive each
reinforcer will always be the same number
Variable Ratio Schedule of Reinforcement
- one in which the number of responses changes from one trial to the next
Chapter 5.7 The Role of Punishment in Operant Conditioning
Punishment
- opposite of reinforcement
- any event or stimulus that, when following a response, causes that response to be less likely to
happen again
- punishment weakens responses, whereas reinforcement (no matter whether it is positive or
negative) strengthens responses
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TWO KINDS OF PUNISHMENT
1. Punishment by Application
- occurs when something unpleasant (such as a spanking, scolding, or other unpleasant
stimulus) is added to the situation or applied
- the kind of punishment that most people think of when they hear the word punishment
2. Punishment by Removal
- kind of punishment most often confused with negative reinforcement
- behavior is punished by the removal of something pleasurable or desired after the behavior
occurs
- this type of punishment is typically far more acceptable to child development specialists
because it involves no physical aggression and avoids many of the problems caused by more
aggressive punishments
- negative reinforcement occurs when a response is followed by the removal of an unpleasant
stimulus
Chapter 5.8-10
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Chapter 5.11 Cognitive Learning Theory
Cognition
- the mental events that take place inside a person’s mind while behaving, began to dominate
experimental psychology
TOLMAN’S MAZE-RUNNING RATS: LATENT LEARNING
- one of Gestalt psychologist Edward Tolman’s best-known experiments in learning involved
teaching three groups of rats the same maze, one at a time
Latent Learning
- the idea that learning could happen without reinforcement, and then later affect behavior, was
not something traditional operant conditioning could explain
KÖHLER’S SMART CHIMP: INSIGHT LEARNING
Insight
- Köhler called Sultan’s rapid “perception of relationships” insight and determined that insight
could not be gained through trial-and-error learning alone
SELIGMAN’S DEPRESSED DOGS: LEARNED HELPLESSNESS
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Learned Helplessness
- the tendency to fail to act to escape from a situation because of a history of repeated failures in the
past
Chapter 5.12 Observational Learning
- is the learning of new behavior through watching the actions of a model (someone else who is doing
that behavior)
Learning/Performance Distinction
- the fact that learning can take place without actual performance (a kind of latent learning)
THE FOUR ELEMENTS OF OBSERVATIONAL LEARNING
1. Attention
2. Memory
3. Imitation
4. Desire
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CHAPTER 6
Chapter 6.1 What Is Memory?
Memory
- is an active system that receives information from the senses, puts that information into a
usable form, organizes it as it stores it away, and then retrieves the information from storage
THREE PROCESSES OF MEMORY
1. Putting It In: Encoding
- encoding is the set of mental operations that people perform on sensory information to
convert that information into a form that is usable in the brain’s storage systems
2. Keeping It In: Storage
- to hold on to the information for some period of time in a process called storage
3. Getting It Out: Retrieval
- the biggest problem many people have is retrieval, that is, getting the information they know
they have out of storage
MODELS OF MEMORY
1. Information-Processing Model
- focuses on the way information is handled, or processed, through three different systems of
memory
- processes of encoding, storage, and retrieval are seen as part of this model
2. Parallel Distributed Processing (PDP) Model
- while many aspects of memory formation may follow a series of steps or stages, there are
those who see memory as a simultaneous process, with the creation and storage of memories
taking place across a series of mental networks “stretched” across the brain
- this simultaneous processing allows people to retrieve many different aspects of a memory all
at once, facilitating much faster reactions and decisions
- in the AI world, PDP is related to connectionism, the use of artificial neural networks to explain
the mental abilities of humans
3. Levels-Of-Processing Model
- other researchers have proposed that a memory’s duration depends on the depth (i.e., the
effort made to understand the meaning) to which the information is processed or encoded
- if the word BALL is flashed on a screen, for example, and people are asked to report whether
the word was in capital letters or lowercase, the word itself does not have to be processed very
much at all—only its visual characteristics need enter into conscious attention but if those
people were to be asked to use that word in a sentence, they would have to think about what a
ball is and how it can be used
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- they would have to process its meaning, which requires more mental effort than processing
just its “looks”
THE INFORMATION-PROCESSING MODEL: THREE MEMORY SYSTEMS
- information-processing theory, which looks at how memory and other thought processes
work, bases its model for human thought on the way that a computer functions
- it was also information-processing theorists who first proposed that there are three stages or
types of memory systems
Chapter 6.2 Sensory Memory: Why Do People Do Double Takes?
Sensory Memory
- the first stage of memory, the point at which information enters the nervous system through
the sensory systems—eyes, ears, and so on
- information is encoded into sensory memory as neural messages in the nervous system
TWO KINDS OF SENSORY MEMORY
1. Iconic Sensory Memory
- visual sensory memory is often called iconic memory, and only lasts for a fraction of a second
- iconic memory was studied in several classic experiments by George Sperling
a. Capacity of Iconic Memory
- Sperling had found in his early studies that if he presented a grid of letters using a
machine that allowed very fast presentation, his subjects could only remember about
four or five of the letters, no matter how many had been presented
- partial report method
b. Duration of Iconic Memory
- In real life, information that has just entered iconic memory will be pushed out very
quickly by new information, a process called masking
- Although it is rare, some people do have what is properly called eidetic imagery, or the
ability to access a visual sensory memory over a long period of time. Although the
popular term photographic memory is often used to mean this rare ability, some people
claiming to have photographic memory actually mean that they have an extremely good
memory
c. Function of Iconic Memory
- helps the visual system to view surroundings as continuous and stable in spite of these
saccadic movements
- also allows enough time for the brain stem to decide if the information is important
enough to be brought into consciousness
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2. Echoic Sensory Memory
- brief memory of something a person has heard
- you heard it, but your brain didn’t interpret it immediately
- echoic memory’s capacity is limited to what can be heard at any one moment and is smaller
than the capacity of iconic memory, although it lasts longer—about 2 to 4 seconds
- echoic memory is very useful when a person wants to have meaningful conversations with
others
Chapter 6.3 Short-Term Memory
- if an incoming sensory message is important enough to enter consciousness, that message will
move from sensory memory to the next stage of memory, called short-term memory (STM)
- unlike sensory memory, short-term memories are held for up to 30 seconds or more
SELECTIVE ATTENTION: HOW INFORMATION ENTERS
Selective Attention
- the ability to focus on only one stimulus from among all sensory input
- it is through selective attention that information enters our STM system
- when a person is thinking actively about information, that information is said to be conscious
and is also in STM
WORKING MEMORY
- memory theorists use the term working memory as another way of referring to short-term
memory
- is more correctly thought of as an active system that processes the information present in
short-term memory
Chapter 6.4 Long-Term Memory
Long Term Memory (LTM)
- the system into which all the information is placed to be kept permanently
- long-term memories include general facts and knowledge, personal facts, and even skills that
can be performed
- in terms of capacity, LTM seems to be unlimited for all practical purposes (Bahrick, 1984;
Barnyard & Grayson,1996)
- as for duration, the name long term says it all
- “long term” does not mean that all memories are stored forever, we only store long-lasting
memories of events and concepts that are meaningful and important to us
- there is a relatively permanent physical change in the brain itself when a memory is formed
and that means that many of the memories people have stored away for a long time may still be
there
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- the memories may be available but not accessible, meaning that they are still there, but for
various reasons people cannot “get to” them
- information that is rehearsed long enough may actually find its way into long-term memory
(ex. alphabets, numbers, etc)
1. Maintenance Rehearsal
- most people tend to learn poems and the multiplication tables by maintenance rehearsal,
otherwise known as rote learning
- rote is like “rotating” the information in one’s head, saying it over and over again
2. Elaborative Rehearsal
- a way of transferring information from STM into LTM by making that information meaningful in
some way (Postman, 1975)
- the easiest way to do this is to connect new information with something that is already well
known (Craik & Lockhart, 1972; Postman, 1975)
- example: the French word maison means “house.” A person could try to memorize that (using
maintenance rehearsal) by saying over and over, “Maison means house, maison means house.”
But it would be much easier and more efficient if that person simply thought, “Maison sounds
like masons, and masons build houses.”
- elaborative rehearsal is a deeper kind of processing than maintenance rehearsal and so leads
to better long-term storage
Chapter 6.5 Types of Long-Term Information
1. Nondeclarative (implicit) LTM
- memories for things that people know how to do
- these are the kind of memories people “never forget.”
- nondeclarative memories are not only demonstrated in the performance of a task, such as
procedural memory which includes skills and habits, or through priming, the improvement in
identifying or processing concepts, words, or objects after having prior experience with them,
but also in memory associations learned through classical or operant conditioning that may not
be in conscious awareness (Schacter & Wagner, 2013; Squire & Kandel, 2009)
- anterograde amnesia is a damage in hippocampal area of the brain in which new long-term
declarative memories cannot be formed
- nondeclarative memories are not easily retrieved into conscious awareness
2. Declarative (explicit) LTM
- is about all the things that people can know, the facts and information that make up
knowledge
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TWO TYPES OF DECLARATIVE LONG-TERM MEMORIES
a. Semantic Memory
- facts and concepts
- general knowledge that anyone has the ability to know
- most of this information is what is learned in school or by reading
- “semantic” refers to meaning, so this kind of knowledge is the awareness of the meanings of
words, concepts, and terms as well as names of objects, math skills, etc
b. Episodic Memory
- events and experiences
- personal knowledge that each person has of his or her daily life and personal history, a kind of
autobiographical memory (LePort et al., 2012)
- episodic memories tend to be updated and revised more or less constantly
LONG-TERM MEMORY ORGANIZATION
- Semantic Network Model assumes that information is stored in the brain in a connected
fashion with concepts that are related to each other stored physically closer to each other than
concepts that are not highly related (Collins & Quillian, 1969)
Chapter 6.6-7
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Chapter 6.8-9
Chapter 6. 10 Forgetting
Forgetting
- hyperthymesia are people that have the ability to remember nearly everything, but also have
the inability to forget
EBBINGHAUS AND THE FORGETTING CURVE
- Hermann Ebbinghaus (1913) was one of the first researchers to study forgetting
- Because he did not want any verbal associations to aid him in remembering, he created
several lists of “nonsense syllables,” pronounceable but meaningless (such as GEX and WOL). He
memorized a list, waited a specific amount of time, and then tried to retrieve the list, graphing
his results each time. The result has become a familiar graph: the curve of forgetting.
- this graph clearly shows that forgetting happens quickly within the first hour after learning the
lists and then tapers off gradually
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- Ebbinghaus (1885) found that it is also important not to try to “cram” information you want to
remember into your brain
- research has found that spacing out one’s study sessions, or distributed practice, will produce
far better retrieval of information studied in this way than does massed practice, or the attempt
to study a body of material all at once
ENCODING FAILURE
- the failure to process information into memory
- some things never get encoded in the first place
MEMORY TRACE DECAY THEORY
- memory trace is some physical change in the brain, perhaps in a neuron or in the activity
between neurons, which occurs when a memory is formed (Brown, 1958; Peterson & Peterson,
1959)
- over time, if these traces are not used, they may decay, fading into nothing
- information that is not brought to attention in sensory memory or continuously rehearsed in
STM will fade away
- when referring to LTM, decay theory is usually called disuse, and the phrase “use it or lose it”
takes on great meaning (Bjork & Bjork, 1992)
INTERFERENCE THEORY
- a possible explanation of LTM forgetting is that although most long-term memories may be
stored more or less permanently in the brain, those memories may not always be accessible to
attempted retrieval because other information interferes (Anderson & Neely, 1995)
- LTM, interference can come from two different “directions”:
a. Proactive Interference
- the tendency for older or previously learned material to interfere with the learning
of new material
b. Retroactive Interference
- when newer information interferes with the retrieval of older information
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Chapter 6. 11-12
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