Question 1

What is motivation?

Accepted Answer

Reasons for acting in a particular way to reach a goal

(fueled by motives)

Question 2

What are motives?

Accepted Answer

Reasons for doing something; needs that energize your behavior

(biological motives (eating, sleeping) and social motives (need for achievement))

Question 3

What are social motives?

Accepted Answer

Learned motives that result from interacting with each other

(need for affiliation, need for achievement, etc.)

Question 4

What is emotion?

Accepted Answer

A state of feeling that results in changes of thought and behavior

(mixture of physiological arousal, conscious experience, and overt behavior)

Question 5

What is personality?

Accepted Answer

Individual and consistent differences in someone's pattern of thinking, feeling, and behaving

Question 6

What is the James-Lange Theory of Emotion?

Accepted Answer

Conscious emotion occurs because our brains notice physiological responses to a certain event

(if you see something that makes you run, your brain notices that you are running so you must be scared)

Question 7

What is the Cannon-Bard Theory of Emotion?

Accepted Answer

When we see some stimulus, our thalamus sends a signal to our lymbic system (emotion center) and frontal lobes (cognitive center)

This results in us having physiological changes (sweating/heartrate) and conscious/emotional changes at the same time

(unlike the James-Lange theory which states emotions come from physiological changes)

Question 8

What is the Schachter-Singer Theory of Emotion?

Accepted Answer

Physiological arousal occurs first, and the individual must identify a reason for this arousal which becomes the emotion they feel

(cognitive theory; if we are aroused and someone is yelling at us, we must be angry)

Question 9

What is Cognitive Appraisal Theory of Emotion?

Accepted Answer

When we encounter a stimulus, we assess the situation with a thought, leading to simultaneously feeling an emotion and a physiological process

(appraisal=assessing something)

Question 10

What is Opponent-Process Theory of Emotion?

Accepted Answer

When we experience an emotion, an opposing emotion will counter the first emotion

When we experience an emotion repeatedly, the opposing emotion becomes stronger leading to a weaker experience

(you get less scared watching something scary the more times you watch it)

Question 11

What is stress?

Accepted Answer

Process of responding to physical/emotional/environmental threats that causes psychological strain

Question 12

What are stressors?

Accepted Answer

Environmental stimuli that we perceive as endangering and challenge our abilities, causing stress

Question 13

What is the General Adaptation Syndrome (GAS)?

Accepted Answer

A model that describes our pattern of reaction to stress

Question 14

What are catastrophes and daily hassles?

Accepted Answer

Catastrophes: large-scale and unpredictable disasters that cause huge stress and threaten our lives (death of a loved one)

Daily hassles: small-scale annoyances that cause minor stress, but can add up and cause larger problems (getting a low grade on a quiz)

Question 15

What are Type A and Type B personalities?

Accepted Answer

Type A: competitive, time urgent, hostile/aggressive (more likely to have cardiac problems)

Type B: relaxed, patient, easy-going (less likely to have cardiac problems)

Question 16

What are coping strategies?

Accepted Answer

Patterns that people use to manage stress and remove stressors

(adaptive: remove stress or help us improve (seeking help); maladaptive: don't remove problem and can often make the issue worse (smoking))

Question 17

What is positive psychology?

Accepted Answer

Scientific study of what makes life worth living, focusing on adaptive, creative, and fulfilling human experience

(founded by Martin Seligman; positive emotions, positive character, and positive groups)

Question 18

What is a defense mechanism?

Accepted Answer

Psychological strategies that are unconsciously used to protect people against unacceptable thoughts/feelings

(repression, denial, projection, ...)

Question 19

What is repression?

Accepted Answer

A defense mechanism where you push away threatening thoughts/feelings/memories into the unconscious mind

(most frequent and powerful)

Question 20

What is regression?

Accepted Answer

Defense mechanism where you retreat to an earlier stage of development, rather than overcoming the issue

(more immature and pleasurable behavior)

Question 21

What is rationalization?

Accepted Answer

Defense mechanism where you offer socially acceptable reasons for inappropriate behavior

(unconscious excuses)

Question 22

What is projection?

Accepted Answer

Defense mechanism where you project your undesirable feelings onto others

Question 23

What is displacement?

Accepted Answer

Defense mechanism where you redirect negative thoughts from a threatening entity to a less threatening entity

(boss yells at an employee, who goes home to yell at their kids, who take it out on their toys)

Question 24

What is reaction formation?

Accepted Answer

Defense mechanism where you act in the opposite manner to your true feelings

(treating someone you hate in a very nice way)

Question 25

What is sublimation?

Accepted Answer

Defense mechanism where unacceptable urges are transformed into productive urges

(someone who is angry for not being selected by a company (unacceptable urge) works hard to create their own company (productive urge))

Question 26

What is the personal unconscious?

Accepted Answer

Jung's idea of the unique information/memories/instincts present within our minds

(similar to Freud's preconscious and unconscious; opposite of collective unconscious)

Question 27

What is the collective unconscious?

Accepted Answer

The structures of the unconscious mind created by evolution, that are shared by all people

(opposite of personal unconscious; coined by Jung)

Question 28

What are archetypes?

Accepted Answer

Universal and archaic symbols and images that we derive from the collective unconscious

("the mother", "the trickster", "the flood")

Question 29

What is individuation?

Accepted Answer

Jung's process of a person becoming a unified individual, with conscious and unconscious processes

Question 30

What is Carl Roger's concept of the "self"?

Accepted Answer

The organized and consistent set of beliefs and perceptions we hold about ourselves

Develops in response to life experiences

Question 31

What is fully functioning?

Accepted Answer

Roger's term for a person who is in touch with their inner desires and feelings

(mostly equivalent to self-actualization)

Question 32

What is self-concept?

Accepted Answer

Our overall view of our abilities, behavior, and personality

Question 33

What is self-esteem?

Accepted Answer

A part of self-concept that deals with how we evaluate ourselves

Question 34

What is Personal Construct Theory?

Accepted Answer

People develop personal constructs about how the world works, which they use to make sense of their observations/experiences

(proposed by George Kelly)

Question 35

What is reciprocal determinism?

Accepted Answer

Bandura's idea that a person's characteristics, their behavior, and their environment all affect each other in a two-way relationship

Question 36

What are self-efficacy and collective efficacy?

Accepted Answer

Self-efficacy is an individual's perception of their ability to perform a task

Collective efficacy is a group's shared belief in their ability to perform a task

Question 37

What is Locus of Control?

Accepted Answer

How much we believe we can personally influence a situation, compared to how much is luck/fate

(internal locus of control: think they are rewarded for hard work; external locus of control: think what happens to them is just fate)

Question 38

What are behavioral signatures?

Accepted Answer

Consistent ways of acting in situations that characterize our personality

(developed by our personal beliefs, goals, feelings, personal competencies, and self-regulatory processes)

Question 39

What is a trait?

Accepted Answer

A permanent characteristic of our personality that can be used to predict our behavior

Question 40

What is the 16 Personality Factor (16PF) Questionnaire?

Accepted Answer

A self-report personality test that measures 16 areas of personality

Some traits are "surface traits" and are visible, while others are "source traits" and are underlying

(created by Raymond Cattell)

Question 41

What are the Big Five Personality traits?

Accepted Answer

A grouping of personality traits, where each individual has five different dimensions of personality

Question 42

What are direct observation tests?

Accepted Answer

Psychological tests where a psychologist looks at an individual's behavior as they do something

(may evaluate the individual on a personality scale; subject to the Hawthorn effect)

Question 43

What are projective personality tests?

Accepted Answer

Tests that present ambiguous stimuli and task the test takers with coming up with an explanation for it

(Thematic Apperception Test and Rorschach inkblot test)

Question 44

What are self-reported tests?

Accepted Answer

Psychological tests where the individual answers a series of questions about themself

(most common; MMPI-2, Myers-Briggs, 16PF, etc.)

Personality, AP Psychology Flashcards