Term
| What is one of the most predominant theories in the sociocultural approach to psychology? |
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Definition
| The Social Learning Theory |
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Term
| Who proposed the Social Learning Theory? |
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Definition
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Term
| What is one of the fundamental assumptions of the Social Learning Theory? |
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Definition
| Observational learning, or people learn behavior by watching models and imitating their behavior, is one of the fundamental assumptions of the Social Learning Theory. |
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Term
| What are the four factors involved in social learning? |
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Definition
1. Attention
2. Retention
3. Motor Reproduction
4. Motivation |
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Term
| Describe attention in terms of factors involved in social learning. |
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Definition
| The person must first pay attention to the model. |
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Term
| Describe retention in terms of factors involved in social learning. |
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Definition
| The observer must be able to remember the behavior that has been observed. |
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Term
| Describe motor reproduction in terms of factors involved in social learning. |
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Definition
| The observer has to be able to replicate the action. |
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Term
| Describe motivation in terms of factors involved in social learning. |
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Definition
| Learners must want to demonstrate what they have learned. |
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Term
| What are the four factors that influence an observer's likelihood to imitate and learn? |
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Definition
1. Consistency
2. Identification with the Model
3. Rewards/Punishment
4. Liking the Model |
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Term
| Describe consistency in terms of factors that influence an observer's likelihood to imitate and learn. |
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Definition
| If the model behaves in a way that is consistent across situations, then the observer will be more likely to imitate than if the model behaves in different ways depending on the situation. |
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Term
| Describe identification with the model in terms of factors that influence an observer's likelihood to imitate and learn. |
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Definition
| There is a tendency to imitate models who are like ourselves - for example, in terms of age or gender. |
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Term
| Describe rewards / punishment in terms of factors that influence an observer's likelihood to imitate and learn. |
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Definition
| Bandura argues that people can learn from observing what happens to others; they don't have to experience the consequences themselves. This is called vicarious reinforcement in Bandura's theory and happens when we watch people around us - whether in reality or movies. |
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Term
| Describe liking the model in terms of factors that influence an observer's likelihood to imitate and learn. |
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Definition
| Warm and friendly models are more likely to imitated than cold, uncaring models. |
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Term
| What is a study associated with liking the model in terms of factors that influence an observer's likelihood to imitate and learn? |
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Definition
| In a study by Yarrow et al. in 1970, research showed that children learn altruistic behavior better from people with whom they have already developed a friendly relationship than from people they do not know. |
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Term
| What is one study supporting the Social Learning Theory? |
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Definition
| Albert Bandura's Bobo Doll Experiment in 1961. |
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Term
| Describe the Bobo Doll Experiment. |
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Definition
| Thirty-six children of both sexes from ages three to six years old were divided into groups based on their reported aggression, which was determined by evaluation by teachers and parents. One group was exposed to adult models who showed aggression by bashing an inflatable "Bobo" doll; a second group observed a non-aggressive adult who assembled toys for ten minutes; and a third group served as a control and did not see any model. In the first and seconds groups, some children watched same-sex models and some watched-opposite sex models. After watching the models, the children were placed in a room with toys. Soon thereafter, they were taken out of the room, being told that those toys were for other children, and then they were put into the room with Bobo doll. |
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Term
| What were the results of the Bobo Doll Experiment? |
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Definition
| Bandura's group found that the children who had observed the aggressive models were significantly more aggressive - both physically and verbally. Bandura also observed that girls were more likely to imitate verbal aggression, whereas boys were more likely to imitate physical aggression. Children were also more likely to imitate the same-sex adult. |
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Term
| What are some criticisms of the Bobo Doll Experiment? |
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Definition
1. There is a lack of ecological validity. Not only was the experiment carried out in a lavoratory, but there are also other factors which make the situation less than natural. There is only a very brief encounter with the model, and there children are intentionally frustrated after they being to play with a toy. This situation does little to predict what happens if a child is repeatedly exposed to aggresive parents or violence on television.
2. Does the aggression against a Bobo doll indicate learned aggression in general, or is it highly specific to this situation?
3. The aggression modelled by the adult was not completely standardized, meaning that the children may have observed slight differences in the aggression displayed.
4. In spite of the attempt to match the participants with regard to aggression, it was based on observations from teachers and parents, and thus may not have been completely accurate.
5. The children may have acted aggressively because they thought it would please the researcher.
6. Is it ethical to use young children in an experiment of this nature? |
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Term
| What are some criticisms of the Social Learning Theory? |
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Definition
| Though a behavior may be acquired, it is not always demonstrated. Something may be learned from a model, but may not be exhibited for some time. Because this gap exists between when one observed the model and when one may demonstrate the behavior, it is difficult to establish that the behavior is the result of observing the model. Additionally, the Social Learning Theory fails to describe why some people never learn a behavior, in spite of the criteria being met. |
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Term
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Definition
| Conformity occurs when the situation does not exert direct pressure to follow the majority, but the pressure is often perceived by individuals as influencing their behavior. It is the tendency to adjust one's thoughts, feelings, or behavior in ways that are in agreement with those of a particular individual or group, or with accepted standards about how a person should behave in specific situations. |
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Term
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Definition
| Compliance is the result of direct pressure to respond to a request. |
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Term
| What are compliance techniques? |
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Definition
| Compliance techniques are ways in which individuals are influenced to comply with the demands or desires of others. |
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Term
| Who developed the compliance techniques? |
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Definition
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Term
| What are the six compliance techniques? |
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Definition
1. Authority
2. Commitment
3. Liking
4. Reciprocity
5. Scarcity
6. Social Proof |
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Term
| Describe authority in terms of compliance techniques. |
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Definition
| People comply more with those in positions of some authority. |
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Term
| Describe commitment in terms of compliance techniques. |
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Definition
| Once people have agreed to something, either by their behavior or by a statement of belief, they are likely to comply with similar requests. |
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Term
| Describe liking in terms of compliance techniques. |
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Definition
| People comply with requests from people they like. |
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Term
| Describe reciprocity in terms of compliance techniques. |
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Definition
| People often feel they need to "return a favor". |
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Term
| Describe scarcity in terms of compliance techniques. |
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Definition
| Opportunities seem more valuable to people when they are less readily available. |
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Term
| Describe social proof in terms of compliance techniques. |
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Definition
| People view a behavior as correct if they see others performing it. |
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Term
| What is one study of conformity? |
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Definition
| The Soloman Asch Line Test in 1951 |
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Term
| Describe the Soloman Asch Line Test Study. |
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Definition
| Participants entered a room where there were six people and the researcher. The men in the room were dressed like businessmen, in suits and ties. These men were part of the study and they were playing confederates who helped the researcher to deceive the participants. After the participants took a seat, the group was told that they were going to take part in "a psychological experiment on visual judgement". They were then shown cards with lines on them. The participants were asked to select the line from the second card that matched the length of the line on the first cared. There were eighteen trials in total. In some of the trials, the difference in the lines was hardly noticeable, while in others it was very clear. The confederates had been instructed to answer correctly fro some of the trials, but to answer incorrectly for the majority of the trials. |
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Term
| What were the results of the Soloman Asch Line Test Study? |
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Definition
| About seventy-five percent of the participants agreed with confederates' incorrect responses at least once during the trials. Asch found that a mean of thirty-two percent of the participants agreed with incorrect responses in half of more of the trials. However, twenty-four percent of the participants did not conform to any of the incorrect responses given by the confederates. |
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Term
| What are the four factors that contribute to an individual's likelihood to conform to a group based on the Soloman Asch Line Test study? |
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Definition
1. Group Size
2. Unanimity
3. Confidence
4. Self-Esteem |
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Term
| How does group size affect conformity based on the Asch paradigm? |
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Definition
| In a 1955 study, Soloman Asch found that with only one confederate, just three percent of the participants conformed; with two confederates, the rate rose to fourteen percent; and with three confederates, it rose to thirty-two percent. Large groups did not increase the rate of conformity. In some cases, very large groups decreased the level of conformity |
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Term
| How does unanimity affect conformity based on the Asch paradigm? |
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Definition
| In a 1956 study by Soloman Asch, conformity was found to be most likely when all of the confederates agreed. If one of the confederates disagreed, even if this answer was also incorrect, the participant was significantly less likely to conform. |
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Term
| How does confidence affect conformity based on the Asch paradigm? |
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Definition
| When individuals feel that they are more competent to make decisions with regard to a field of expertise, they are less likely to conform. Perrin and Spencer found in 1988 that when they replicated Asch's study with engineers and medical students, conformity rates decreased significantly. |
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Term
| How does self-esteem affect conformity based on the Asch paradigm? |
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Definition
| Stang found in 1973 that participants with high self-esteem were less likely to conform to incorrect responses. |
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Term
| Discuss the ecological validity of Soloman Asch's Line Test study. |
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Definition
1. In the original experiment, bot the task and the use of strangers made the situations somewhat atypical. Asch, however, argued that experiments are social situations in which participants feel like an outsider if they dissent.
2. There is the consideration of demand characteristics - participants may act in a way that they feel is required by the features of the experiment.
3. Culture could have limited the validity of the original study. Since only one culture was studied, and the group was not multicultural, it is possible that the Asch paradigm is no longer valid today, even if it were to be studied in the same cultural groups as the original study. |
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Term
| Discuss the ethical considerations of Soloman Asch's Line Test study. |
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Definition
| The participants were deceived, and they were made to feel anxiety about their performance. |
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Term
| Discuss one theory of conformity. |
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Definition
| Deutsch and Gerard (1955) argue that conformity is a result of informational social influence and normative social influence. |
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Term
| What is informational social influence? |
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Definition
| Informational social influence is based on the way people cognitively process information about a situation. Festinger (1954) said that people evaluation their own opinions and ideas through social comparison - that is, by looking at what others do. When one notices that others are not behaving in the same way, or that they think differently, it causes anxiety. Festinger called this cognitive dissonance. |
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Term
| What is normative social influence? |
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Definition
| Normative social influence is based on our nature as social animals. People have a need to be accepted by others and to belong. They may conform to avoid rejection and gain social approval. |
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Term
| Describe Kuschel's (2004) definition of culture. |
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Definition
| Kuschel argues that culture cannot be seen, rather, the manifestations of culture can be seen. Culture should not be used as an explanation of behavior. Instead, descriptions of cultural factors can be used to understand how people have survived in their environment, how they have organized life in social grou-ps, and what beliefs, attitudes, and norms influence behavior in the social and cultural groups. THese cultural factors may lead to specific kinds of behavior. |
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Term
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Definition
| Surface culture is visible culture of a group of people - food, eating habits, clothing, rituals, communication patterns, religion, status behavior, and etc. |
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Term
| Describe Lonner's (1995) definition of culture. |
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Definition
| Lonner defines culture as the common rules that regulate interactions and behavior in a group as well as a number of shared values and attitudes in the group. |
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Term
| Describe Hofstede's (2002) definition of culture. |
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Definition
| Hofstede described culture as "mental software", that is, cultural schemas that have been internalized so that they influence thinking, emotions, and behavior. The mental software is shared by members of a sociocultural group and is learned though daily interactions and by the the feedback from other members of the group. |
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Term
| Define the etic approach to psychology. |
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Definition
| The etic approach to psychology attempts to find universal behaviors - that is, "rules" of human behavior that can be applied to all cultures around the world. Etic approaches are typically taken within cross-cultural psychology where behavior is compared across specific cultures. Etic study involves drawing on the notion of universal properties of cultures, which share common perceptual, cognitive, and emotional structures. |
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Term
| Define the emic approach to psychology. |
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Definition
| The emic approach looks at behaviors that are culturally specific. Emics have challenged psychologists to reexamine their ideas of "truth" with regard to culture. In most cases, truth may be relative, based on the culture in which one is raised. In that case, it is important for psychologists to realize these cultural variations in order to best understand members of other cultural groups. |
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Term
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Definition
| Cultural norms are behavior patterns that are typical of specific groups. They are often passed down from generation to generation by observational learning from parents, teachers, religious leaders, and peers. |
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Term
| What are some examples of cultural norms? |
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Definition
| Cultural norms include such things as how marriage partners are chosen, attitudes towards alcohol consumption, and acceptance or rejection of spanking children. |
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Term
| What are cultural dimensions? |
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Definition
| Cultural dimensions are the perspective of a culture based on values and cultural norms. |
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Term
| Describe the cultural dimensions of individualism versus collectivism. |
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Definition
| In individualist societies, the ties between individuals are loose: everyone is expected to look after himself or herself and his or her immediate family. In collectivist societies, from birth onward people are integrated into strong, cohesive in-groups, often extended families (with uncles, aunts, and grandparents), which provides them with support and protection. However, if an individual does not live up to the norms of the family or the larger social group, the result can sometimes be severe. |
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Term
| Describe the cultural dimensions of uncertainty and avoidance. |
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Definition
| Uncertainty and avoidance deal with a society's tolerance for uncertainty and ambiguity. It indicates to what extent a culture programs its members to feel either uncomfortable or comfortable in unstructured situations. Unstructured situations are novel, unknown, surprising. Uncertainty-avoiding cultures try to minimize the possibility of such situations by strict laws and rules, safety and security measures, and, on the philosophical and religious level, by a belief in absolute truth. |
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Term
| Describe the cultural dimensions of monochronism and polychronism. |
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Definition
| Monochronic cultures focus on one thing at a time. There is a high degree of scheduling, and punctuality and meeting deadlines are highly valued. In polychronic cultures, many things happen at once. The focus is more on relationships and interactions. Interruptions are experienced as part of life, and there is little frustration experienced when things are postponed or late. |
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Term
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Definition
| Streotyping is a cognitive process whereby people catagorize others for example, in terms of belonging to a social group or simply just on th basis of their looks. |
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Term
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Definition
| Prejudice is an attitutde, hich is a combination of cognition and emotion. Not only does an individual judge another based on a set of characteristics that is attributed to him or her because of the group to which he or she belongs, but contact elicits an emotional response. |
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Term
| How is prejudice related to stereotyping? |
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Definition
| Prejudice may or may not be be based on stereotyping. |
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Term
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Definition
| Discrimination is a behavior and occurs when an individual treats another differently based on his or her memeberhsip to a group rather than individual merit. |
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Term
| What is one biological study relating to prejudice? |
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Definition
| In a 2007 study by Fiske, participants were placed into a MRI scanner and then shown a series of photos. These photos included people with disabilities, rich businessmen, older people, US Olympic athletes, and homeless people. Fiske found that the brain initiated reactions associated with disgust when photos of homeless people were shown. The insula, an area of the brain associated with non-human objects such as garbage and waste, was activated, while the dorsomdial preforntal cortex, which responds to humans, showed no signs of activity. |
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Term
| Discuss some limitations of biological research on prejudice. |
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Definition
| Prejudice has a strong emotional component, it mans that cognitive gfactors play a strong role in determining whether one actually acts in accordance ith these immediate brain responses. A study by Bettelheim and Janoitz in 1964 showed that one's stereotypes does not predict one's felings of prejudice or acts of discrimination. It is also unknown if individuals are more pejudiced because of an increased activity in the brain or if prejudices effected the increased activity. Research has also been carried out on adults, who would have been highly influenced by the values and attitudes of the culture in which they grew up, one cannot easily determine the level to which their response is innate or learned. |
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Term
| What is the availability heuristic? |
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Definition
| Tversky and Kahnemann argued in 1982 that people make many judgements based on the availability heuristic - that is, they base decisions on the information that is most readily available. |
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Term
| On what cognitive and social concepts is the availability heuristic based? |
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Definition
| The availability huristic is based on schema processing, which people use to to process social information. This is part of social cognition. Social schemas are used give the individual the opportunity to process the enormous amount of information in the social world in an economic way. |
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Term
| What is the social identity thory? |
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Definition
| The social identity thory, developed by Henri Tajifel, assumes that individuals strive to improve their self-image by trying to enhance self-esteem, based on thir personal identity or various social identitiy. |
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Term
| Describe an experiment relating to the social identity theory. |
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Definition
The Robbers' Cave experiment, conducted by Sheif in 1961, tested the effects of the creation of groups alone on the eruption of conflict.
Groups were created to make the participants as homogenous as possible - they were all healthy, slightly above-average intelligence, European-American, Protestant, and socially well adjusted. None of the participants knew one another prior to the experiment.
The boys were unaware that they were part of an experiment. They were sent off to a sumer camp, where the researchers wer posing as the camp staff in order to achieve ecological validity.
After a few days at the camp, the boys were divided into two teams. The rsearchers took care to make sure that any of the boys who had already become good friends were separated.The groups then engaged in a series of activites in ordr for them to "bond".
Shrif hypothesized that when the groups had conflicting aims, their memebers will become hostile to one another. In order to test this hypothesis, he had the boys' teams compte against ach othr in a series of games. As the games continued, the boys began to freely insult members of the other group, and there were acts of agression against the other team.
Shrif wondered how to diminsh the hostility between the groups that was the result of their newly formed group identities. Superordinate goals were established; an urgent situation which affected both groups and required all of them to participate in order for the problem to be solved was created. By having to work together, the individual group identities broke down and a new, more inclusive group identity was created. |
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Term
| Describe one theory of prjudice reduction. |
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Definition
| The contact hypothesis, pioneered by Allport in 1956 and developed further by Amir in 2000, states that prejudice is strengthened or increased if contact between two groups produces compettion or is unpleasant. It is also a problem if the state of one group is lowered as a result of contact, or when one group is left frustrated. Prejudice can be reduced, however, when the contact is cooperative and the groups are seen as equals. There should be superordinate goals and the contact between the groups should be pleasant and rewarding. |
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Term
| What are the fundamental assumptions and principles of the sociocultural perspective? |
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Definition
1. Humans are social animals and we have a basic need to "belong".
2. Culture influences behavior.
3. Because humans are social animals, they have a social self. People do not only have an individual identity, but also a collective or social one.
4. People's views of the world are resistant to change. |
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Term
| Research methods in the sociocultural level of analysis. |
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Definition
1. Naturalistic observation
2. Participant observation - Researchers immense themselves in a social setting for an extended period of time and observe behavior.
- Overt obsrvation is when the participants in the group know that they are being observed.
- Covert observation is when the participants do not know they are being observed.
3. Interviews or Surveys |
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Term
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Definition
| Attribution is defined as how people interpret and explain casual relationships in the social world. |
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Term
| Describe the fundamental attribution error. |
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Definition
| The fundamental attribution error is the tendency for humans to overestimate dispositional factors and underestimate situational factors in the behavior of individuals. |
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Term
| Describe the self-serving bias. |
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Definition
| The self-seving bias is when an individual attributes their successes to dispositional factors and their failures to situational factors. |
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Term
| Describe one instance of the self-serving bias. |
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Definition
| Lau and Russel found in 1980 that American football coachse and players tended to credit their wins to internal factors - being in good shape, hard work, natural talent - and their failures to extenral factors - injuries, weather, fouls, etc. |
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Term
| Describe one thory relating to the self-serving bias. |
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Definition
| Greenberg et al. argued in 1982 that the self-serving bias serves as a means of self-protection: when we attribute our successes to dispositional factors, it boosts our self-esteem. When we attribute our failures to situational factors, it protects our self-esteem. |
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Term
| Describe the role of cognitive factors in the self-serving bias. |
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Definition
| Miller and Ross argued in 1975 that human beings natural expect to succeed at a task. If we expect to succeed and we do succeed, we attribute it to our skill and ability. If we expect to succeed and do not succeed, then we feel that it is bad luck or external factors that brought about this unexpected outcome. |
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Term
| Describe the self-serving bias in other cultures. |
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Definition
| In a study by Kashima and Triandis in 1986, it was found that American students were more likely to attribute their success to ability whereas the Japanese students were more likely to attribute their failure in terms of thir lack of ability. From this study, Jasima and Triandis concluded that because of the more collective nature of Asian socities, people derive their sense of self-esteem not from individual achievement but from group identitiy, thus ar more likely to employ the self-serving bias. |
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Term
| What are some flaws of the social identity theory? |
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Definition
| The social identity theory does not accurately predict human behavior. Why is it that in some cases our personal identity is strongr than th group identity? Second, using the theory in isolation is reductionist - it fails to address the environement that interacts with the self. Cultureal expectations, rewards as motivators, and societal sonctrains such as poverty may play more of a role in behavior that one's own sense of in-group identity. |
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Term
| What are the underlying assumptions or principles that define the biological perspective? |
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Definition
1. Behavior can be innate because it is genetically based.
2. Animal research can provide insight into human behavior.
3. There are biological correlates of behavior. |
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Term
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Definition
| Neurons, or nerve cells, are one of the building blocks of behavior. The neurons send electrochemical messages to the brain so that people can respond to stimuli - either from the environment or from internal changes in the body. |
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Term
| What are neurotransmitters? |
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Definition
| Neurotransmitters are the body's neutral chemical messengers which transmit information from one neuron to another. |
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Term
| Describe neurotransmission. |
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Definition
| When an electrical impulse travels down the body (axon) of the neuron, it releases neurotransmitters which then cross the gap (synapse) between two neurons. After crossing the synapse, the neurotransmitters fir into receptor sites on the post-synaptic membrane. Once the message is passed on, the neurotransmitters are either broken down or reabsorbed by the terminal buttons. |
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Term
| Describe one neurotransmitter, referencing a study. |
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Definition
| Serotonin is known to influence sleep, arousal levels, and emotion. Researchers Kasamatsu and Hirai of Tokyo University studied Buddhist monks who went on a 72-hour pilgrimage to a holy mountain in Japan in 1999. During the monks' stay on the mountain, they did not consume food or water, they did not speak, and they were exposed to the cold, late autumn weather. After about 48 hours, they began to have hallucinations, often seeing ancient ancestors or feeling a presence by their sides. The researchers took blood samples to compare with ones taken before the pilgrimage as soon as the monks reported having hallucinations. The researchers found that serotonin levels had increased in the monks' brains. These higher levels of serotonin activated the hypothalamus and the frontal cortex, resulting in the hallucinations. From this study, researchers concluded that sensory deprivation triggered the release of serotonin, which altered the way the monks experienced the world. |
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Term
| What is a longitudinal study? |
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Definition
| A longitudinal study is a study that occurs over a long period of time. |
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Term
| What is localization of function in the brain? |
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Definition
| When a behavior is localized in the brain, it is possible to trace the origin of the behavior to a specific part of the brain. |
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Term
| Describe one study relating to localization of function in the brain. |
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Definition
| Paul Broca found that people suffering from damage in the left frontal love of the brain - an area that eventually came to be known as Broca's area - were unable to understand and make grammatically complex sentences in 1861. Broca's patients had problems producing speech, but were able to understand it. Broca's most famous patient was a young man named Tan, who earned his name because it was the only word he could say. After his death, an autopsy revealed the source of his brain damage and led to the idea that the disability was the result of a specific brain trauma. |
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Term
| What are some methods of study in the biological perspective? |
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Definition
1. lesioning
2. fMRI
3. twin studies |
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Term
| Describe lesioning, as well as its advantages and disadvantages. |
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Definition
| Lesioning is the scarring of brain tissue in order to observe its effects on behavior. Lesioning has the potential to cure ailments, but is reasonably invasive, permanent, and has the potential to do more harm than good. |
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Term
| Describe fMRIs, as well as their advantages and disadvantages. |
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Definition
| An fMRI provides three-dimensional pictures of the brain structures, using magnetic fields and radio waves. The fMRI shows actual brain activity and indicates which area of the brain are active when engaged in a behavior. These scans have a higher resolution than PET scans, and they are easier to carry out. fMRIs are reasonably noninvasive and can provide a good image of the brain. However, they are expensive and does not show the problem in all cases. |
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Term
| Describe twin studies, as well as their advantages and disadvantages. |
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Definition
| Twin studies are often utilized in genetic study. They are noninvasive methods of study, but are reasonably rare and often must occur longitudinally. |
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Term
| Describe one way in which the brain interacts with an individual's environment, referencing a study. |
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Definition
| In 2004, Richard Davidson studied eight Buddhist monks who were highly trained in meditation and ten volunteers who had been trained for a week. All the participants were told to meditate on love and compassion. Using a PET scan, Davidson observed that two of the controls and all of the monks experienced an increase in the number of gamma waves in their brain during meditation. As soon as they stopped meditationg, the volunteers' gamma-wave production returned to normal, while the monks did not experience a decrease in gamma wave production after they stopped meditating. The synchronized gamma-wave production area of the monks' brain during meditation on love and compassion was found to be larger than the corresponding activation of the volunteers' brains. This led Davidson to argue that meditation could have significant long-term effects on the brain and the way it processes emotions. These findings indicate that the brain adapts to stimulation - whether from the environement or as a result of our own thinking. |
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Term
| What is brain plasticity? |
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Definition
| Brain plasticity refers to the brain's ability to rearrange the connections between its neurons - that is, the changes that occur in the structure of teh brain as a result of learning or experience. |
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Term
| Describe one study relating to how the environment affects an indiviudal's brain. |
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Definition
| Rosenzweig and Bennett studied brain plasticity in 1972. The reserachers placed rats into one of two environments to measure the effect of either enrichment or deprivation on the development of neurons in the cerebral cortex. The enriched, stimulating environment was characterized by interesting toys with which to play. The deprive environment was characterized by no toys. The rats spent 30 or 60 days in their respective environmen and then they were sacrificed. Post-mortem studies of their brains showed that those that had been in the stimulating environment had an increased thickness in the corex. The frontal lobe (associated with thinking, planning, and decision making) was heaving in the rats that had been in the stimulating environment. |
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Term
| What are some limitations of the study of brain plasticity on rats? |
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Definition
| The findings can be applied to humans only to an extent. Psychologists cannot carry out controlled experiments to test this with humans, and human brains differ in terms of gentic make-up and the environmental inputs that they receive. Because of these differences, it may also be difficult to decide what is considered an enriched environment for a specific person. This reaises the question of the importance of education in the growth of new synapses. If learning always results in an increase of dendritic branchings, then the findings from animal studies which show brain plasticity in response to environmental stimulation are important to the human cortex as well. |
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Term
| Describe the hormone oxytocin, referencing one study. |
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Definition
| Oxytocin functions as mother-child attachment. It plays a role in induing labor contractions and lactation. Oxytocin is released with touches and hugs, and is associated with bonding between a mtoher and her child as well as between lovers. Oxytocin appears to change the brain signals related to social recognition via facial expression, perhaps by changing the firing of the neurons in the amygdala (proceesor of emotional stimuli). Oxytocin has been called "the love hormone" because it seems to be such an effective mediator of huiman social behavior. If ocxytocin is given to health individuals it seems that fear regulation is affected and there is an increased trust and geneoristy. |
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Term
| Describe the hormone melatonin, referncing one study. |
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Definition
| Melatonin, known to function as a regulatory hormone for sleep, is stimulated by darkness and inhbited by light. Melatonin levels in the bloodstream peak in the middle of the night, and gradually decrease towards morning. Melatonin release correlates with the circadian rhythm - the biological clock that is based on the day/night cycle. Rosenthal found in 1987 that higher levels of melatonin contribute to seasonal affective disorder (SAD) - a subcategory of depression that is characterized by sleepiness and lethargy - as well as craving for carbohydrates. Reduced levels of sunlight in autumn and winter are believed to disrupt the circadian rhythm in certain people, leading ot this form of depression. |
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Term
| Describe one study regarding biology and intelligence. |
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Definition
| In 1990, Bouchard et al. published some findings from the Minnesota Twin Study, which compared the IQs of MZAs and MZTs (identical twins raised apart and together, respectively). Each twin completed approximately 50 hours of testing and interviews. It was found that correlation was highest amongst identical twins reared together and lowest amongst biological siblings reared together. From this study, Bouchard et al. determined that the heritability estimate of intelligence is approximately 70%. |
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Term
| What are some criticisms of the Minnesota Twin Study? |
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Definition
1. Bouchard relied on media coverage to recruit participants.
2. There are some ethical concerns about the way he reunited the twins.
3. There was no adequate control to establish the frequency of contact between the twins prior to study.
4. It cannot be assumed that twins who are raised together experience the same environment - this is called "equal environment bias". |
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Term
| Describe a study regarding biology and intelligence that contrasts to the Minnesota Twin Study. |
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Definition
| A study by Scarr and Weinberg in 1977 focused on parents who raised both natural and adopted children. The assumption is that all the children had the same upbringing, in the same environment, with the same parents. Any significant differences between parent-child IQ correlations for adopted and natural children should be attributable to genes. The researchers found no significant differences in IQ correlations, even though the adoptive parents were wealthy, white, and middle class while the adoptive children came from poor, lower-class backgrounds with lower IQ parents. |
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Term
| Examine one evolutionary explanation of behavior. |
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Definition
| Dan Fessler argues that the emotion of disgust allowed our ancestors to survive long enough to produce offspring, who in turn passed the same sensitivities on to us. in 2006, he investigated the nausea experienced by women in their first trimester of pregnancy. During this period, an infusion of hormones lowers the expectant mother's immune system so as not to fight the new foreign genetical material in her womb. Fessler hypothesized that the nausea response helps to compensate for the suppressed immune system. Fessler gathered nearly five hundred pregnant women between the ages of 18 and 50 and posed a series of questions to determine if they were experiencing morning sickness. He then asked them to consider 32 potentially stomach-turning scenarios - walking barefoot and stepping on an earthworm, someone accidentally sticking a fish hook through their finger, and maggots on a piece of meat in an outdoor waste bin - before ranking how disgusting they found these scenarios. Women in the first trimester scored much higher across the board in disgust sensitivity than their counterparts in the second and third trimester. But when Fessler controlled the study for morning sickness, the response only held for disgusting scenarios involving food, such as the maggot example. |
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Term
| What are some considerations of examining an evolutionary argument? |
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Definition
1. Since it may be difficult to rest some evolution-based theories empirically, researchers may be susceptible to the confirmation bias.
2. Little is known about the behavior of early humans, so statements about how humans "used to be" are hypothetical.
3. Evolutionary arguments often underestimate the role of cultural influences in shaping behavior. |
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Term
| What are some ethical considerations of researching genetic influences on behavior? |
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Definition
Participants should always know how their privacy and confidentiality will be protected, and what will happen to any genetic material or information obtained as part of the study. The aims and procedures of the study must be explained plainly and participants must sign informed consent to show that they have a clear understanding of the study they are participating in, and the implications, including any potential harm.
- Coding information and anonymizing samples can protect confidentiality, but anonymizing samples may limit the scientific value of the study by preventing follow up and further investigation.
Genetic research can also reveal unexpected information that may harm research participants, including misattributed paternity, unrevealed adoptions, and carried genes for particular disorders. |
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Term
| What are some of the fundamental assumptions or principles of the cognitive perspective? |
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Definition
1. Human beigs are information procssors and mental processes guide behavior.
2. The mind can be studied scientifically by developing theories and using a number of sciwentific research methods.
3. Cognitive processes are influenced by social and cultural factors. |
|
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Term
| What are some methods of research used at the cognitive level of analysis? |
|
Definition
1. Controlled laboratory experiments
2. Case studies
3. Modern neuro-imagining technologies |
|
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Term
| Discuss the use of the methods used at the cognitive level of analysis. |
|
Definition
1. Traditionally, laboratory experiments were favored because all variables could be ontrolled; however, the experiment may sufferfrom artificiality.
2. Case studies - for example, people with extraordinary memory or who have lost the ability to process langauge due to brain trauma - show normal processing is affected by studying the unordinary.
3. Modern neuro-imaging technologies offer possibilities to look into brain processes because cognitive processes are localized in the brain. The brain areas that are active whn people make decisions can be studied, as well as how cognitive processes canbe disrupted by brain damage. |
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Term
| What are cognitive schemas? |
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Definition
| Cognitive schemas are networks of knowledge, beliefs, and expectations about particular aspects of the world. they organize information about theworld with fixed and variable slots; if a slot is left out of unsepcified, it is filled by a "default value" - that is, a best guess. Schemas canbe related to form systems and are ative recognition devices. They help to predict future events based on past events, and represent general knowledge rather than definitions. |
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Term
| What is the schema theory? |
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Definition
| The schema thory is a cognitive theory about information processing. |
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Term
| Describe the Atkinson and Shiffrin or multi-store model of memory. |
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Definition
| In 1968, Atkinson and Shiffrin published the multi-store model of memory. Information from the world enters sensory memory, which is modality specific (rlated to different senses). Information stays here forafew seconds, and only a very small part of the information attended to will continue into the short-term memory (STM) store. The capacity of the STM is limited to around seven items and its duration is normally about six to twelve seconds. Material in STM is quickly lost if not guiven attention. Rehersal plays a key role in determining what is stored in long-term memory. The long-term memory (LTM) store is believed to be of indefinite duration and potentially unlimited capacity. The material is not an exact replia of events or facts, but is stored in some outline form. Memories may be distortd when they are retrieved, because we fill in the gaps to create a meaningful memory as predicted by schema theory. |
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Term
| Describe the Baddeley and Hitch or working memory model. |
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Definition
| The working memory model, published by Braddeley and Hitch in 1974, isbased upon the multi-store model. However, it challenges the view that the STM is a single store. Working memory is a model of the STM and includes several components, whereas the multi-store model only includes one. |
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Term
| What is the central executive in the working memory model? |
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Definition
| The centra executive is controlling system that monitors and coordinates the opeartions of the other components (slave systems). The central executive has limited capacity and it is modality free (it can process any sensory information). |
|
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Term
| What is the most important job of the central executive? |
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Definition
The most important job is attentional control, which happens in two ways:
1. The automatic level is based on havit and controlled more or less automatically by stimuli from the environment.
2. The supervisory attentional level deals with emergencies or creates new strategies when the old ones are no longer sufficient. |
|
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Term
| Describe the episodic buffer in the working memory model. |
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Definition
| The role of th episodic buffer is to act as a temporary and passive display store until the information is neded. The processing of information takes place in other parts of the system. |
|
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Term
| Describe the phonological loop in the working memory model. |
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Definition
| The phonological loop is divded into two components. The first component is the articulatory control system (inner voice), which can hold information in a verbal form. The second component is the phonological store (inner ear), which holds speech based material in a phonological form. The phonological store can receive information dirctly from sensory memory in the form of auditory material, from LTM in the form of verbal information, and from the articulory control system. |
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Term
| Describe the visuospatial sketchpad. |
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Definition
| The visuospatial sktchpad (inner eye) deals with spatial information from either sensory memory or LTM. |
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Term
| Describe one experiment relating to the working memory model. |
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Definition
| Baddeley and Hitch performed an experiment in 1974, in which they asked participants to read prose and understand it, while at the same time remmbering sequences of numbers. They found that in dual-task experiments there was a clear and systematic increase in reasoning time if people had to undertake a memory-dependent task at the same time. They also found that the task was significantly impaired if the participants had to learn sequences of six numbers, but that they could manage to learn sequences of three numbers. The findings indicate that even though there was impairment in the concurrent task, it was not catastrophic. Thus, this supplies evidence that STM has more than one unitary store and the total breakdown of working memory demands much more pressure than the concurrent task in this experiment. |
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Term
| Evaluate the working memory model. |
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Definition
| Working memory provides a much more satisfactory explanation of storage and processing than the STM component of the multi-store model of memory. It includes active storage and processing, which makes it very useful for understanding cognitive tasks. The multi-store model assumes that mental processes are passive, while the working model can explain why people are able to perform different cognitive tasks at the same time without disruption. |
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Term
| Describe the case study of Clive Wearing. |
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Definition
| In March 1985, Clive Wearing was struck by a brain infection - a herpes encephalitis - affecting especially the parts of the brain concerned with memory. He was left with a memory span of only seconds; new events and experiences were effaced almost immediately. MRI scans of Clive Wearing's brain shows damage to the hippocampus and some of the frontal regions. |
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Term
| Describe the biological foundation of different memory systems in reference to the case study of Clive Wearing. |
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Definition
| Wearing's episodic memory and some of his semantic memory are lost. He cannot transfer new information to long-term memory either. Wearing can still play the piano and conduct the music that he knew before his illness. These skills are part of implicit memory. The fact that he can do this is evidence of a distributed memory system, since implicit memory is linked to a brain structure other than the hippocampus. His emotional memory is also intact, which is clearly demonstrated in the affection he constantly shows for his wife. |
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Term
| Describe the background of Cole and Scribner's 1974 cultural memory study. |
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Definition
| In 1974 Cole and Scribner wanted to investigate memory strategies in different cultures. They compared recall of a series of words in the US and among the Kpelle people of rural Liberia. The same list was not used in both situations; individual lists were developed based on the everyday cognitive activities in Liberia with the help of college-educated people who spoke the language using common words. |
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Term
| Describe the procedures of Cole and Scribner's 1974 cultural memory study. |
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Definition
| The researchers asked Liberian children from different age groups to recall as many items as possible from four categories: utensils, clothes, tools, and vegetables. It was expected that the older children would recall more items after practice, but researchers found that this was not the case unless the children had attended school for several years. The non-schooled children did not improve their performance on free-reall tasks after the age of ten. After fifteen practice trials they remembered only two more items. Children who had attended school learned the lists just as rapidly as children in the US, and they used the same strategy to recall based on categorical similarity of objects. |
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Term
| Describe the results of Cole and Scribner's 1974 cultural memory study. |
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Definition
| Illiterate children did not use strategies like chunking (grouping bits of information into larger units) to help them remember. The Kpelle people did not appear to apply rehearsal, as the position of a word in the list did not have an effect on the rate of recall. In a later trial, objects were presented meaningfully as part of a story. The illiterate children recalled the objects easily and chunked them according to the roles they played in the story. |
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Term
| Discuss memory in reference to Cole and Scribner's 1974 cultural memory study. |
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Definition
| Though the ability to remember is universal, strategies for remembering are not. It is therefore a problem that many traditional memory studies are associated with formal schooling. Schooling presents children with a number of specialized information-processing tasks and learning to use logic and abstract symbols in problem solving. It is questionable whether such ways of remembering have parallels in traditional societies like the Kpelle studied by Cole and Scribner. In conclusion, people learn to remember in ways that are relevant for their everyday lives, and these do not always mirror the activities that are used to investigate mental processes. |
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Term
| Discuss the reliability of memory, referencing one study. |
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Definition
| In 1974, Loftus and Palmer investigated the role of leading questions in recall. The experiment used 45 students, who first saw films of traffic accidents and then had to estimate the speed of the car in the film. The critical question in the experiment was: About how fast were the cars going when they hit each other? "Hit" was replaced by "smashed", "collided", and "contacted" in separate trials. It was found that the mean speed estimate was in fact affected by the words, so that "smashed" and "collided" increased the estimated speed. The interpretation of the results was that the use of different verbs activates different schemas in memory, so that the participant hearing the word "smashed" may actually imagine the accident as more severe than a participant hearing the word "collided". |
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Term
| What are some criticisms of Loftus' and Palmer's study? |
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Definition
| The experiment was controlled in a laboratory, so there may be problems with ecological validity. There may also be a problem in using closed questions (one must answer yes or no). All the research participants were US students, which means that the sample is culturally biased. Additionally, the study begs the question of how well people are able to estimate speed. |
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Term
| What is one contrasting study to Loftus' and Palmer's study? |
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Definition
| In 1986, Yuille and Cutshall interviewed people who witnessed a real robbery and found that misleading questions did not seem to distort people's memory. Instead, they found that the memory for details in this real-life situation was quite accurate. This was seen particularly in witnesses who had been close to the event. In fact, it seemed that te wording of the question had no effect on recall, and those who were most distressed by the situation had the most accurate memories. |
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Term
| Describe how brain imaging techniques have been used in cognitive study, referencing a study. |
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Definition
| In 2003, Kilts conducted a series of experiments using MRI scanners to investigate the role of the brain in product preferences. Using a self-selected sample of volunteers, Kilts asked participants to rate a number of consumer goods in terms of preference, giving them points according to the level of attractiveness. Then each of the participants was put into a MRI scanner, where they were shown pictures of the times again and asked to rate them while the scanner registered brain activity. It was found that every time a person rated a product as particularly attractive, there was activity in a small area in the medial prefrontal cortex, which is known to be related to our sense of self and personality. Kilts explained that if we are attracted to a product, we somehow identify with it, and that is why this area shows activity. |
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Term
| Describe the flashbulb theory. |
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Definition
| The flashbulb theory was suggested by Brown and Kulik in 1977. Flashbulb memory is a special kind of emotional memory, which refers to vivid and detailed memories of highly emotional events that appear to be recorded in the brain as though with the help of a camera's flash. |
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Term
| Describe one study relating to the flashbulb theory. |
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Definition
| Brown and Kulik found in 1977 that people said that they had very clear memories of where they were, what they did, and what they flet when they first learned about important public occurrences such as the assassination of John F. Kennedy. The participants recalled the assassination of John F. Kennedy most vividly. People in the study were also asked if they had flashbulb memories of personal events. Of 80 participants, 73 said that they had flashbulb memories associated with a personal shock such as the sudden death of a close relative. |
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Term
| Describe one study contradicting the flashbulb theory. |
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Definition
| In 1982, Neisser questioned the idea of flashbulb memories. People do not always know that an event is important until later. He suggests that the memories are so vivid because the event itself is rehearsed and reconsidered after the event. According to Neisser, what is called a flashbulb memory may simple b a narrative convention. The flashbulb memories are governed by a storytelling schema following a specific structure, such as place, activity, informant, and affect. |
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Term
| What are some of the limitations of the multi-store model? |
|
Definition
1. There are some case studies in which patients with STM impairment are able to access LTM.
2. There are some single incidents that result in LTM without rehearsal.
3. This model does not account for reconstruction.
4. Some research has indicated that different types of memories are stored differently. |
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Term
| Describe the criterion by which abnormality can be defined. |
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Definition
In 1984, Rosenhan and Seligman suggested that seven criteria that could be used to decided whether a person or a behavior is normal or not.
1. Suffering
2. Maladaptiveness
3. Irrationality
4. Unpredictability
5. Vividness and unconventionality (Does the person experience things that are different from other people?)
6. Observer discomfort
7. Violation of moral or ideal standards |
|
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Term
| Describe some limitations of the criterion for abnormality. |
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Definition
| Criterion are influenced by social norms, and people often fail to consider the diversity in how people live. Psychiatric diagnosis of minorities has been misapplied because doctors do not understand the cultural norms of groups of people. |
|
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Term
| Describe the criterion by which mental health can be defined. |
|
Definition
In 1958, Jahoda attempted to establish abnomality by identifying the characteristics of the normal.
1. Efficident self-perception
2. Realistic self-esteem and acceptance
3. Voluntary control of behavior
4. True perception of the world
5. Sustaining realtionships and giving affection
6. Self-direction and productivity |
|
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Term
| Evaluate the criterion by which mental health can be defined. |
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Definition
| It is difficult to define these criterion precisely, so the question is what they mean. Additionally, most people would seem abnormal in some way based on these criterion. What is considered psychologically normal also depends on the society and culture in which a person lives. |
|
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Term
| Discuss the reliability and validity of a classification system. |
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Definition
| For a classification system to be reliable, it should be possbile for different clinicians, using the same system, to arrive at the same diagnosis for the same individual. It should be able to classify a real pattern of symptoms which can lead to an effective treatment. However, the classification system is discriptive and does not identify any specific causes for disorders. Thus, it is difficult to make a valid diagnosis for psychiatric disorders because there are no objective physical signs of such disorders. |
|
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Term
| Discuss the reliability and validity of disagnostic criteria. |
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Definition
| Appropriate identification of diagnostic criteria is, to a large extent, influenced by psychiatrists. In some cases, psychiatrists have suggested alternate systems for diagnosis because they found that the existing ones were not reliable. |
|
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Term
| Describe one study relating to the relability and validity of psychiatric diagnosis. |
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Definition
| In 1973, Rosenhan conducted a field experiment where eaight healthy people - five men and three women, all researchers - tried to gain admission to twelve different psychiatric hospitals. They complaind that they had been hearing voices. The voices were unclear, unfamiliar, of the same sex and said single words like "empty" or "thud". These were the only symptoms they reported. Seven of them were diagnosed as suffering from schizophrenia. After the individuals had been admitted to psychiatric wards, they all said they felt find, and that they were no longer experiencing the symptoms. It took an average of 19 days before they were discharged. For seven of them, the psychiatric classification of the time of discharge was "schizophernia in remission" implying that the schizophrenia might come back. Another experiment was then conducted, in which the staff at the psychiatric hospital was told that pseudo-patients would try to gain admittance. No pseudo-patients actually appeared, but 41 real patients were judged with great confidence to be pseudo-patients by at least one member of the staff. Of these genuine patients, 19 were suspected of being frauds by one psychiatrist and another member of the staff. |
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Term
| Discuss the conclusion of Rosenhan's 1973 study. |
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Definition
| Rosenhan concluded that it was not possible to distinguish between sane and insane in psychiatric hospitals. His study demonstrates thel ack of scientific evidence on which medical diagnoses can be made. It also raises the issue of treatments - that is, if they are always properly justified. |
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Term
| What are some of the ethical considerations in abnormal diagnosis? |
|
Definition
| A psychiatric diagnosis may be a label for life. Even if a patient no longer shows any symptoms, the label "disorder in remission" still remains. |
|
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Term
| What are some studies relating to the ethical considerations of abnormal diagnosis? |
|
Definition
| In 1966, Scheff argued one of the effects of abnormal labels is the self-fufilling prophecy. |
|
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Term
| Describe the concept of abnormailty across cultures. |
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Definition
| Conceptions of abnormality differ between cultures, and this can influence the validity of siagnosis of mental disorders. Culture-bound syndromes are culturally specific. For example, shenjing shuairuo (neurasthenia) accounts for more than half of psychiatric outpatients in China. Many of the symptoms are similar to the symptoms that would ee the criteria of a mood disorder and an anxiety disorder in the United States, however. |
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Term
| Describe the reporting bias in reference to diagnosis of abnormality. |
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Definition
| Depression, which is common in western culture, appears to be absent in Asian cultures. It has been observed that Asians tend to live within an extended family, which means that they have ready access to social support. Asian doctors report that depression is equally common among Asians, but that Asians only consult their doctor for physical problems, and rarely report emotional distress. They do not see this as the responcibility of the doctor, and instead tend to sort it out within the family. Hence, the reporting bias may actually make cross-cultural comparison difficult. One of the major difficulties with studies using diagnostic data is that figures are based on hospital admissions, which may not reflect the true prevalence rates for particular groups or particular disorders.Low admission rates found in many minority ethnic groups may reflect cultural beliefs about health or a minority group's lack of access to mental health care. |
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|
Term
| Describe culture blindness in terms of abnormal diagnosis. |
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Definition
| There is a problem of identifying symptoms of a psychological disorder if they are not the norm of the clinican's own culture. |
|
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Term
| Describe the symptoms of major depressive disorder. |
|
Definition
| Feelings of guilt and sadness, lack of enjoyment or pleasyure in familiar activities or company, passivity, lack of initative, frequent negative thoughts, fault attribution of blame, low self-esteem, suicidial thoughts, irrational hopelessness, difficulties in concentration, inability to make decisions, loss of energy, imsomnia or hypersomnia, weight loss or gain, diminished libido |
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Term
| Describe the prevalence of major depressive disorder. |
|
Definition
| Major depressive disorder is realtively common, according to Charney and Weismann in 1988, affecting around fifteen percent of people at some time in their life. Depression is two to three times more comon in women than men, and occurs frequently among members of lower socio-economic groups though most frequently among young adults. Depression tends to be a recurrent disorder, with about 80 percent experiencing a subsequent episode, with an episode typically lasting for three to four months. The average number of episodes is four. In approximately 12 percent of cases, depression becomes a chronic disorder with a duration of about two years. |
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Term
| Describe one biological experiment in terms of etiology of major depressive disorder. |
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Definition
| Janowsky et al. demonstrated in 1972 that decreased levels of noradrenaline due to malfunctioning of serotonin receptors could produce depression-like symptoms. Participants in the experiment were given a drug called physostigmine. Within minutes, they became profoundly depressed and experienced feelings of self-hate along with suicidal wishes.The fact that a depressed mood can be artificially induced by certain drugs suggests that some cases of depression might stem from a disturbance in neurotransmission. Furthermore, drugs that increase the available noradrenaline tend to be effective in reducing the symptoms of depression. However, Lacasse and Leo argued in 2005 that contemporary neuroscience research has failed to provide evidence that depression is caused by a simple neurotransmitter deficiency because it is not possible to measure brain serotonin levels in a living human. |
|
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Term
| Describe one cognitive experiment in terms of etiology of major depressive disorder. |
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Definition
| A longitudinal prospective study (participants are chosen on a basis of a variable and then followed to see what happens long term) by Alloy et. all in 1999 followed a sample of young Americans in their twenties for six years. Their thinking style was tested and they were placed in either the "positive thinking group" or "negative thinking group". After six years, the researchers found that only one percent of those in the positive thinking group had developed depression compared to seventeen percent in the negative thinking group. The results indicate that there may be a link between cognitive style and development of depression. Overall, it is not clear if depression is caused by depressive thinking patterns or if these patterns are merely the consequence of having a depression. |
|
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Term
| Describe one sociocultural experiment in terms of etiology of major depressive disorder. |
|
Definition
| In 1978, Brown and Harris carried out a study concerning the social origins of depression in women. The researchers found that 29 out of 32 women who became depressed had experienced a severe life events, but 78 percent of those who did experience a sever life event did not become depressed. Life events which resemble previous experiences were more likely to lead to depression. Cross-cultural research has demonstrated that there is a virtually identical core of symptoms present in depression in many different cultures. However, in addition to this core set of symptoms, there are manifestations which are culturally specific because depression is not exactly the same the world over. |
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Term
| Describe the prevalence of bulimia nervosa. |
|
Definition
| According to the National Institute of Mental Health, between 2 and 3 percent of women and 0.02 and 0.03 percent of men in the United States have been diagnosed with bulimia nervosa. Bulimia nervosa occurs most frequently in late adolescence or young adulthood. |
|
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Term
| Describe the symptoms of bulimia nervosa. |
|
Definition
| Feelings of inadequacy, guilt, or shame; recurrent episodes of binge eating; use of vomiting, laxatives, exercise, or dieting to control weight; negative self-image; poor body image; tendency to perceive events as more stressful than most people would; perfectionism; swollen salivary glands; erosion of tooth enamel; stomach or intestinal problems, and, in extreme cases, heart problems. |
|
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Term
| Describe one biological experiment in terms of etiology of bulimia nervosa. |
|
Definition
| Carrso found lower levels in serotonin in bulimic patients in 2000 and in 1999, Smith et al. found that when serotonin levels were reduced in recovered bulimic patients, they engaged in cognitive patterns related to eating disorders, such as feeling fat. |
|
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Term
| Describe one cognitive experiment in terms of etiology of bulimia nervosa. |
|
Definition
| Brush proposed the body-image distortion hypothesis in 1962, which stated that many eating disorder patients suffer from the delusion that they are fat. |
|
|
Term
| Describe one sociocultural experiment in terms of etiology of bulimia nervosa. |
|
Definition
| Following the introduction of television in one of the remote islands in Fiji in 1995, Becker et al. studied the introduction of television on the Fijian people. 63 secondary-school girls with an average age of 17 were interviewed in 1995, then 65 girls with the same characteristics were interviewed again in 1998. The girls reported that the use of vomiting to control weight had increased from three percent to fifteen percent and twenty-nine percent scored highly on an eating-disorder test as opposed to thirteen percent in previous years. Women also reported feeling overweight and the reported number of eating disorders increased. |
|
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Term
| Describe cultural variations in bulimia nervosa, citing research. |
|
Definition
| In 2002, Jaeger et al. investigated body satisfaction in order to determine if eating disorders were culture-bound syndromes.1751 medical and nursing students were sampled across 12 nations, including western and non-western countries. A self-report method was used to obtain data on body dissatisfaction, self-esteem, and dieting behavior. A series of 10 body silhouettes, designed to be as culture-free as possible, were shown to the participants in order to assess body dissatisfaction. BMI was also measured. Significant differences between cultures were obtained. The most extreme body dissatisfaction was found in Mediterranean countries, followed by northern European countries. Countries in the process of westernization showed an intermediate amount of body dissatisfaction, while non-western countries showed the lowest levels. Body dissatisfaction was the most important influence on dieting behavior and it was found to be independent of self-esteem and BMI. The significant differences between cultures support the explanation that bulimia nervosa is due to the "idealized" body images portrayed in the media, which encourage distorted views, and, consequently, body dissatisfaction and dieting behavior. Western countries are more exposed to these images, and they show higher body dissatisfaction than non-western cultures. There were some limitations of the study: firstly, it ignores the role of genetic factors in causing bulimia; secondly, it is a natural experiment and because the independent variable was not under the control of the experimenter, causation cannot be inferred; and thirdly, the participants in the study were all medical or nursing students and thus did not form representative samples. |
|
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Term
| Describe gender variations in bulimia nervosa, citing research. |
|
Definition
| In 1993, a MORI survey of adult males in the United Kingdom showed that one-third of men had been on a diet, and that nearly two-thirds believed a change in shape would make them more sexually attractive. |
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