Perspectives In Psychology Key Terms & Concepts

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Psychology

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scientific study of behavior and mental processes

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Behavior

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any action that other people can observe and measure

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Cognitive activities

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mental processes, dreams, perceptions, thoughts, memories

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Introspection

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careful examination of our thoughts and feelings

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Unconscious

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collection of unacceptable thoughts, wishes, feelings and memories that one is not aware of but that does impact behavior

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neurosis

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relatively mild personality disorder with a great deal of anxiety or indecision and social or interpersonal maladjustment.

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id

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unconscious energy that wants to fulfill basic/primal sexual and aggressive drives (psychoanalytical theory)

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ego

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personality part of individual that is conscious/aware and controls behavior (psycholanalytical theory)

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superego

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the part of the personality that represents individual's internalized ideals - gives values and morals upon which to judge (psychoanalytical theory)

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fixation

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"a partial stop of emotional and instinctual development at an early point in life, due to a severe traumatic experience or overwhelming gratification, a preoccupation with one subject, issue; obsession:

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psychotherapy

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goal is to help an individual deal with and get out of psychological disorders and problems in living - variety of psychological techniques used

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free association

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uncensored thoughts that come to mind in therapy (psychoanalysis)

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resistance

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blocking from consciousness anything that might cause anxiety

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regression

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defense mechanism where a person goes back to an earlier stage of development when faced with anxiety

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transference

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the shift of emotions, esp. those from childhood, from person or object to another, esp. the transfer of feelings about a parent to analyst

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stimulus-response

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reaction to a stimulus

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reinforcement

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event or stimulus that follows a response and increases the likelihood of that response occuring again

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conditioning

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a type of learning that involves stimulus-response connections, where the response relies on the stimulus to occur

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desensitization

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thru repeated exposure to a stimulus, the undesirable response to a panic or phobic situation is decreased until it disappears

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behavior modification

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basic learning techniques that modify unacceptable behavior patterns by substituting new responses for undesirable ones

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hypothetical constructs

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a variable that can be explained but not observed

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genetics

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science of heredity, dealing with resemblances and differences of related organisms because of their genes

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physiology

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functions and activities of living organisms and their parts, including all physical and chemical processes

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nature - v- nuture

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process of debate on whether most growth takes place as a result of biology that is programmed or because our social and physical environment provides stimulation

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reductionist

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"theory that every complex phenomenon can be explained by analyzing the simplest, most basic mechanisms that are in operation during the phenomenon.

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mechanistic

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automatic response due to biological causes

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deterministic

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every human event, act, and decision is the inevitable consequence of what happened before - preprogrammed

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subjective interpretation

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interpretation of an event that takes place in a person's mind rather than the external world

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self-actualization

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the self-motivated striving to reach one's potential

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incongruence

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not connected by similarities