AP Psych Review

• Psychology


  Derived from physiology (biology) and philosophy
• Early Approaches


  • Structuralism
  • Functionalism
• Structuralism


  Used INTROSPECTION (act of looking inward to examine mental experience) to determine the underlying STRUCTURES of the mind
• Functionalism


  Need to analyze the PURPOSE of behavior
• Approaches Key Words


  • Psychoanalytic/dynamic
  • Behavioral
  • Humanistic
  • Cognitive
  • Evolutionary
  • Biological
  • Sociocultural
  • Biopsychosocial
• Mary Calkins: First Fem. Pres. of APA
• Charles Darwin: Natural selection & evolution
• Dorothea Dix: Reformed mental institutions in U.S.
• Stanley Hall: 1st pres. of APA1st journal
• William James: Father of American Psychology – functionalist
• Wilhem Wundt: Father of Modern Psychology – structuralist
• Margaret Floy Washburn–1st fem. PhD
• Christine Ladd Franklin –Color Vision
• Basic research


  Purpose is to increase knowledge (rats)
• Applied research


  Purpose is to help people
• Psychologist


  Research or counseling – MS or PhD
• Psychiatrist


  Prescribe medications and diagnose – M.D.
• Research Design


  • Experiment
  • Correlation
  • Naturalistic Observation
  • Case Study
• Experiment


  • Researcher controls variables to establish cause and effect
  • Difficult to generalize
• Independent Variable


  Purposefully altered by researcher to look for effect
• Experimental Group


  • Received the treatment (part of the IV)
  • Can have multiple exp, groups
• Control Group


  • Placebo, baseline (part of the IV)
  • Can only have 1
• Placebo Effect


  Show behaviors associated with the exp. group when having received placebo
• Dependent Variable


  Measured variable (is DEPENDENT on the independent variable)
• Double-Blind


  Experiment where neither the participant or the experimenter are aware of which condition people are assigned to (drug studies)
• Single-Blind


  Only participant blind – used if experimenter can't be blind (gender, age, etc)
• Operational Definition


  Clear, precise, typically quantifiable definition of your variables – allows replication
• Confound


  Error/ flaw in study
• Random Assignment


  Assigns participants to either control or experimental group at random – minimizes bias, increase chance of equal representation among groups
• Random Sample


  Method for choosing participants for your study – minimizes bias, everyone has a chance to take part
• Representative Sample


  Sample mimics the general pop. (ethnic, gender, age)
• Correlation


  • Identify relationship between two variables
  • No cause and effect (CORRELATION DOES NOT EQUAL CAUSATION)
• Positive Correlation


  Variables increase & decrease together
• Negative Correlation


  As one variable increases the other decreases
• 3rd variable problem (lurking variable)

  Different variable is responsible for relationship (breast implants & suicide)
• Illusory correlation


  Belief of correlation that doesn't exist (old man predicts rain from arthritis)
• Naturalistic Observation


  • Real world validity (observe people in their own setting)
  • No cause and effect
• Case Study


  • Studies ONE person (usually) in great detail – lots of info
  • No cause and effect
• Measures of Central Tendency


  • Mean
  • Median
  • Mode
• Mean


  Average (use in normal distribution)