Trivia On General Psychology Exam! Quiz

Memory and perception are typical concerns of cognitive psychologists. Cognition is "thinking" or "human information processing" and involves all sorts of mental activities which can be studied directly or simulated on computers, such as memory, problem solving, perception, and language comprehension

Maslow was pointing out that motivations come in many varieties, from the "basic" motivations of obtaining food and water to the "security" needs such as obtaining shelter and physical safety, on up to the "higher" motives involved with self-actualization. People are more likely to pay attention to the higher needs when they have taken care of the lower needs. For example, a person who has fame and fortune, but is still unhappy, might start thinking seriously about the meaning of life and how to obtain fulfillment of spiritual needs.

Obesity is a condition characterized by excessive body weight, typically caused by an accumulation of fat. When a person is about 35% over their ideal body weight, it is considered a significant increase and falls within the range of obesity. This excess weight can lead to various health issues such as heart diseases, diabetes, and joint problems. Therefore, the given answer "Obesity" accurately describes the condition of being 35% over the ideal body weight.

Referred pain, such as the pain that people sometimes feel in their left arms and shoulders when they are having a heart attach, is due to the way in which nerves come together in the spinal cord. The brain sometimes loses track of where the pain is coming from.

William James was a psychologist and philosopher who believed that understanding the evolved functions of our thoughts and feelings was important. He questioned why our nose smells and our brain thinks, and he was influenced by Darwin's ideas. James believed that thinking was an adaptive factor that contributed to our survival.

"Congruity" means about the same thing as "consistency." Think of the word "incongruous" which means "strange, odd, out of place." A thing which is "congruous" or which "has congruity" is a thing which fits, which makes sense, whch is consistent with other things that are happening.

Personal space differs in size depending on the situation. Below are the four main personal space zones and their distances.
Intimate zone- 0-0.5m - used for a close relationship.
Personal zone- 0.5m-1.5m - maintained by close friends and enables conversation to take place.
Social zone- 1.5-4m - this is for formal situations such as to do with business.
Public- over 4m - General distance between strangers.

In 1949, Paul McLean completed and corrected Papez’s ideas, and called the larger complex the limbic system, which is what we call it today. It included the hypothalamus, the hippocampus, and the amygdala, and is tightly connected with the cingulate gyrus, the ventral tegmental area of the brain stem, the septum, and the prefrontal gyrus

for many psychologists, hypersuggestibility is a synonym for "hypnosis." About the only thing everybody agrees about hypnosis is that people are very open to suggestion during this state.

Information from the senses travel from the sensory store, to the working, or short-term store, and finally to the long-term store.

Gate theory It seems that some non-pain stimulation can sometimes interfere with the experience of pain. This is the explanation behind such phenomena as the benefits of rubbing a painful area, the use of hot or cold compresses, acupuncture, and acupressure.
There are people who have had damage to some part of these tracts, often after a stroke, who feel tingling or a burning pain that is aggravated by touch. Other people have damage higher in the brain that lets them feel pain like everyone else, but eliminates the connections to the emotional centers. They feel pain, but they don’t suffer emotionally.

Behavior is activity. As an outside observer you measure consciousness only indirectly, by measuring some sort of activity (speech, brain activity, reaction time...) performed by another person. So (the argument runs) you cannot measure consciousness directly, and if you can measure something, it is behavior. You can study brain activity, or verbal self-reports of consciousness, or reaction times, but all those things are behaviors.

In 1937, James Papez noted that the physiological side of emotion is not just a matter of the hypothalamus, but is a complex network of neural pathways -- the Papez circuit.

Proactive interference is when an older memory interferes with remembering a newer memory. If you take a French lesson after taking a Spanish lesson, some of your Spanish may creep into your French. It is harder to remember that the word for man is now homme, not hombre!

This allows other researchers to specify a particular facial expression, by using Ekman's system. Ekman identified all the muscles which can make up a facial expression. By identifying which muscles are activated, one can describe an expression very precisely...for example, one can distinguish between several different types of smiles

Contemporary Psychology refers to the current field of study that focuses on understanding behavior and mental processes. This field incorporates various approaches and theories, such as cognitive neuroscience and behaviorism, to explore the complexities of human behavior and cognition. It emphasizes the importance of studying both external behaviors and internal mental processes to gain a comprehensive understanding of the human mind and behavior.

This explanation is based on the given information that the ability to divide, detach, and manipulate our own actions is the fundamental operation in all higher mental processes. Thinking involves the process of dividing and manipulating our thoughts and actions. It requires the ability to detach ourselves from the present moment and analyze different possibilities and outcomes. Therefore, thinking aligns with the given description and is the correct answer.

Flashbulb memories refer to exceptionally clear and vivid memories of highly emotional events. These memories are often described as having a near-photographic quality, as if the individual can recall every detail of the event with great accuracy. Flashbulb memories are typically formed in response to unexpected and emotionally charged events, such as national disasters or personal tragedies. These memories are believed to be special because they are associated with strong emotional arousal, which enhances the encoding and storage of the event in the brain.

There are four kinds of nociceptors:
Thermal nociceptors are sensitive to high or low temperatures.
Mechanical nociceptors respond to strong pressure to the skin that comes with cuts and blows. These receptors respond quickly, and often trigger protective reflexes!
Chemical nociceptors respond to a variety of chemicals released with tissue damage, as well as to external chemicals such as capsaicin (the chemical that makes hot peppers "hot") and spider venom.
Polymodal nociceptors can be excited by strong pressure, by heat or cold, and by chemical stimulation as well.
Silent (or sleeping) nociceptors stay quiet - hence the name - but become more sensitive to stimulation when they are surrounded by inflammation.

A difference threshold is the smallest difference in stimulation needed for someone to notice a difference between two stimuli fifty percent of the time. A lower difference threshold means that it takes less of a change from one to the other for him to catch the difference.

The brainstem region known as the pons is critical for initiating REM sleep. During REM sleep, the pons sends signals to the visual nuclei of the thalamus and to the cerebral cortex (this region is responsible for most of our thought processes). The pons also sends signals to the spinal cord, causing the temporary paralysis that is characteristic of REM sleep.

a "lexicon" is a dictionary, and "lexical processing" refers to our ability to retrieve the meaning of a word, when we read the word.

The James-Lange Theory of emotion suggests that emotions are a result of physiological responses and interpretations of those responses, rather than being the cause of them. In the given example, the event of seeing a bear triggers a physiological response, such as tense muscles and a racing heart. These bodily changes are then interpreted as fear, leading to the experience of the emotion of fear. This theory emphasizes the importance of bodily sensations and their role in the experience of emotions.

Sleep is a cyclical process. During sleep, people experience repeated cycles of NREM and REM sleep, beginning with an NREM phase. This cycle lasts approximately 90 to 110 minutes and is repeated four to six times per night. The term ultradian rhythm (that is, rhythm occurring within a period of less than 24 hours) is used to describe this cycling through sleep stages.

Drugs, trauma, and fatigue can also cause altered states of consciousness. A high level of consciousness is requires for focusing tasks; a low level of consciousness is used for daydreaming. When you are asleep, you are in a subconscious level of awareness.

In order to do any form of meditation, one has to stop talking to oneself. This can be very difficult! Common techniques for quieting or diverting the "inner voice" include repetitive chanting or concentration upon breathing.

The first part is called the sensory register (or "very short-term memory"). It is an experience that lasts for a very short time because it takes a second or two for the sensory neurons and the neurons that come right after them to recover from stimulation. If you look at a window, then shut your eyes tight, you will still see the window for a moment, and then see a reversed image of the window (where white becomes black, red becomes green, blue becomes yellow, and so on). Then it all fades back to black.

Source degradation is a tactic used to counter a persuasive message by attacking the credibility of the source. It is commonly used in court, for example, when a lawyer tries to undermine the credibility of an opposing witness.

Vacillation means "going back and forth." For example, if a woman was dating two men who she liked, and was forced to choose between them, she would be in an "approach/approach" conflict and might well vacillate about which one she preferred...sometimes one, sometimes the other.

Symptoms are worse during inactivity and often interfere with sleep. RLS sufferers report experiencing creeping, crawling, pulling, or tingling sensations in the legs (or sometimes the arms) that are relieved by moving or rubbing them