● Blind spot: Part of retina where you cannot see; Occurs because the opening for the optic

ic nerve passes through

the retina that has no rods/cones/receptor cells in the area
● Correlations: two sets of variables are examined to determine if they are associated; relationship is shown by its
magnitude and direction; positive (one variable increases, other increases) v negative (one decreases, other
decreases); interpreting a correlation: correlation does not imply causation; correlation coefficients: rep of
relationship is shown by its magnitude and direction, ranging from +1.0 to -1.0; Limitations not random; cannot
establish cause-and-effect relationship
● Experiments: alt to correlational research; establishes causation; establishes relationship between 2+ variables by
deliberately changing in a controlled situation & observing the effects; Hypothesis: proposition made on the basis
of reasoning as a starting point for further investigation; Independent (condition that is manipulated by
experimenter) & dependent variables (variable measured in study expected to change); control group: receives no
special treatment; Random assignment: assignment of participants to experimental group based on chance
● Face blindness: inability to recognize faces
● Gestalt principles of organization: organization method for info to be made whole constitutes basic process of
perception; “The whole is different from the sum of its parts”; Similarity: elements that look alike, grouped together;
Proximity: closer together, grouped together; Closure: elements perceived to form complete figs. rather than open
ones; Simplicity: perceive elements in the most basic way.
● SSRI (selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors): permit neurotransmitters to remain active for longer periods at
certain synapses in the brain reducing depression; block reuptake, allowing more serotonin to pass further
messages between nearby nerve cells
● Limbic system: series of donut shaped structures including the amygdala (reacts to negative/threatening stimuli)
and hippocampus (memory consumption); borders the top of the central core and has connections with cerebral
cortex; helps with emotion processing, self preservation, memory storage, & pleasure; similar to other mammals
“animal brain”
● Lobes of the brain: lobes in cerebral cortex/new brain divided by sulcus; frontal lobe at front center of cortex,
motor area and Broca’s area; parietal lobe behind, controls somatosensory and somatosensory association areas;
temporal lobe in lower-center portion, primary auditory area, Wernicke’s area & auditory association area; occipital
lobe lying behind temporal, visual & visual association areas
● Major brain structures & functions: Hindbrain: regulates breathing, heart rate, arousal & basic survival functions;
includes medulla (regulates breathing, heart rate), cerebellum (Body movement, balance, coordination and fine
motor skills) & pons (sleep and arousal; midbrain: processes what you see and hear and initiates voluntary
movement; connects higher and lower portions of brain and relays info between eyes and ears; forebrain: controls
cognitive, sensory and motor function, regulates emotion, body temp, sleeping and reproductive function; includes
thalamus (relays info), basal ganglia (clusters of neuron that control voluntary movements), hypothalamus
(regulates major drivers and motives), limbic system (amygdala and hippocampus), & cerebral cortex (left and right
hemisphere of brain connected by corpus callosum)
● Major divisions of the nervous system: Peripheral nervous system: branches out from spinal cord & brain &
reaches extremities of body; made up of neurons w long axons & dendrites; two divisions Somatic
(sensory/voluntary, brings info in & motor neurons, controls voluntary movement) + autonomic (involuntary
responses, ex. Fight or flight, sympathetic division, ex. Tenses you & parasympathetic, ex. Relaxes you); Central
nervous system: brain and spinal cord, encased in bone & floating in fluid, interneurons (comes between other
neurons)
● Major perspectives on psychology: Psychodynamic: deals with problems from unconscious to conscious; work
through past conflicts & unacceptable impulses; Cognitive: focuses on study of higher mental processes;
Behavioral: biological basis of behavior & how inheritances plays a role; Neuroscience: study of the nervous
system; Humanistic: all individuals naturally strive to grow, develop, & be in control of our lives & behavior
● Major structures of the ear & functions: Outer ear (help sound localization, amplify particular frequencies to
different degrees); Auditory canal (tube passage that leads to eardrum); Middle ear: (consist of hammer, anvil and
stirrup (transmit vibrations to oval window); Inner ear (changes sound vibrations so they can be transmitted to
brain): sound enters through oval window, to cochlea (tube that is filled with fluid that vibrates in response to
sound), which contains a basilar membrane, covered in hair cells that send a neural message to the brain)
● Naturalistic observation: investigator observes naturally occurring behavior & does not change situation; seeing
people in their natural habitat, however unable to control factors of interest, researchers must wait for appropriate
conditions to occur & if ppl know they are being observed they may alter their behavior and produce reactions not
representative.
● Negative afterimages: occurs when rods & cones are overstimulated and become desensitized; can be explained
by opponent-process theory, where receptor cells for yellow component in yellow-blue pairing become fatigued &
receptor cells for blue are tired, making white surface appear blue, producing opponent colors for a while.
● Neuron function: action potential (neuron polarized, ion exchange across cellular membrane, neuron depolarizes
where depolarization reaches critical level, electrical signal travels quickly down axon, neurotransmitters release);
all-or-none law (neurons are either on/off); importance of the synapse (rudimentary information processing at
cellular level); Reuptake (reabsorption of neurotransmitters by terminal button); inhibitory (make postsynaptic
neuron less likely to fire); excitatory (make postsynaptic more likely to fire)
● Neurons: major structures (held in place by glial cells that nourish neurons; cell body is the start that contains
nucleus; dendrites at end that carry signals from other cells toward cell body; axon is the sending end that carries
signals from cell body to other neurons with atonal branching and terminal buttons; myelin sheath increases speed
 of transmission; terminal buttons at end of axon fiber that sends info to other neurons in form of chemical; synapse
is the sending neuron and junction between axon and dendrite); Presynaptic (sends info) v. postsynaptic (receives
info); mirror neurons (specialized neurons that fire not only when a person enacts a particular behavior but also
when a person simply observes another individual carrying out same behavior)
● Neuroplasticity: brains ability to change throughout lifespan through addition of new neurons, new interconnections
between neurons & reorganization of info-processing area.
● Neurotransmitters: Acetylcholine (brain, spinal cord, peripheral nervous system; excitatory in brain & autonomic
nervous system, inhibitory elsewhere; muscle movement, cognitive function); Glutamate (brain, spinal cord;
excitatory; memory); Gamma-amino butyric acid (brain, spinal cord; main inhibitory neurotransmitter; eating,
aggresion, sleeping); Dopamine (brain; excitatory/inhibitory; movement control, pleasure & reward, attention);
Serotonin (brain, spinal cord; inhibitory; sleeping, eating, mood, pain, depression); Endorphins (brain, spinal cord;
primarily inhibitory except hippocampus; pleasurable feelings, appetites, placebos)
● Psychological specializations: behavioral genetics (studies inheritance of traits), behavioral neuroscience
(examines biological basis of behavior), clinical (study, diagnosis, & treatment of psych disorders), clinical
neuropsych (unites biopsych and clinical psych, focusing on relationship between bio factors + psych disorders),
cognitive (study of higher mental processes), counseling (focus on educational, social & career adjustment
problem), cross-cultural (similarities & diffs in psych functioning in & across cultures), developmental (examines
how ppl grow & change from conception to death), educational (focus on teaching & learning processes,
relationship btwn motivation & school performance), environmental (relationship btwn ppl & physical environment,
including climate change), evolutionary (how behavior is influenced by genetic inheritance), experimental (studies
process of sensing, perceiving, learning & thinking abt world), forensic (legal issues; accuracy of witness
memories), health (relation btwn psych factors & physical ailments), industrial/organizational (concerned w psych
of workplace), personality (consistency in ones behavior over time & diff traits of diff ppl), program evaluation
(focus on assessing large-scale programs to determine effectiveness), psych of women (focus on discrimination &
cause of violence against women), school (counseling children in school w academic/emotional problems), social
(study of how ppl’s thoughts, feelings, actions r affected by others), sport (applies psych to athletic activity)
● Rods (light-sensitive receptions in the retina that enable vision in black, white and grey in dim light; vision is not
sharp and exists in periphery) and cones (receptor cells in the retina that enable vision in color and fine detail in
adequate light but do not function well in dim light; mostly in the fovea)
● Scientific method: approach used to systematically acquire knowledge & understanding abt behavior & other
phenomena of interest; steps consist of identifying questions of interest, Formulating an explanation, carrying out
research designed to support/refute, communicate findings
● Split-brain research: unable to name objects when touched with left side, but were able with right side.; left
specializes in verbal tasks (logical reasoning, speaking, reading) & right specializes in nonverbal tasks (spatial
perception, perception recognition, emotional expression); both regarded as two separate brains
● Top-down processing: Making meaning of sensory information by fitting it to what you already know (experiences,
motivation, expectation, context); works in tandem with bottom up
● Bottom-up processing: processing sensory info provided from individual components of stimuli and perceiving as
whole
● Visual processing: Fovea (Small area at the center of retina; Point of central focus; Densely packed with cones, but
no rods, provides clearest vision); Retina (The layer of tissue at the back of the eye that contains sensory
receptors for vision (light sensitive cells) and onto which the incoming image is projected by the lens; Crossover
between retina and brain; Contains rods and cones); bipolar cell (nerve cell in retina; receive info from rods and
cones and communicate info to ganglion); ganglion cells (nerve cell in retina; receive info from bipolar cell and
collects and summarizes visual info, moving it back to eyeball and sending to brain through optic nerve); optic
nerve (bundle of ganglion axons that carry visual info to brain); optic chiasm (point between two eyes where each
optic nerve split); theories of color vision: trichromatic color theory (suggests there are three cones in retina
sensitive to specific range of wavelengths (maximally to red, green or blue; varying levels of activity produce colors
you see) + opponent-process theory (Suggests there are three types of cells, but each pair of receptors work in
opposition; Each type of receptor par is sensitive to a given pair of colors: red/green, yellow/blue; When one
member of the pair is activated, the other member is inhibited. No simultaneous transmissions); primary visual
cortex (region of occipital lobe whose primary input is from visual system; responds same way to electrical
stimulation)