Currently taking practice exams and reviewing over materials.</p>
Anything I should focus on? Material or whatever wise?</p>
First self-studying and FUH-REAKING out. (No one has done this at our school either.)</p>
Did some hard core studying today at Books-a-Million and finished a book on AP Psych. Here are some of my notes:</p>
<em>= important
*</em>= very important</p>
**behavioral perspective - the most frequently asked perspective on the test. About 10 questions should be on it.</p>
job/industrial psychology- talks about jobs and counselling, about 1-2 questions, so be familiar. </p>
*Scientific/ experimental method- 50% of the time, an FRQ is about this.</p>
A positive skew looks like a P on its side, and negative skew is the inverse of P on its side.</p>
*Neuron structures such as axon, dendrite, etc. are always on the test.</p>
*Neurotransmitters- know what the abundance or lack of each causes (disorder-wise)</p>
Major parts of the brain you need to know : corpus collasum, thalamus, hypothalamus, limbic system, and the lobes. Everything else should be brief knowledge.</p>
Be able to define transduction, absolute threshold, just noticeable difference, and habituation.</p>
semicircular canals- often overlooked and forgotten, know what it is.</p>
binocular cues- retinal disparity and convergence</p>
Sleep spindles are in Stage 2, and REM is associated with dreaming and is “paradoxical” because it is where you lose muscle control but you eye muscles move rapidly.</p>
*Hilgard- his experiments with hypnosis</p>
alcohol- most abused drug</p>
*Garcia- aversion, and know that he challenges classical conditioning ( know the two ways that he does)</p>
**negative reinforcement- understand its difference from punishment, gets confused often on tests.</p>
Premack Principle- qualifies reinforcement by situation.</p>
Types of conditioning- know who did what: Thorndike, Skinner, Watson, and Pavlov.</p>
*reinforcement schedules- fixed/varible ratio/interval</p>
Kohler- learning, look up the research he did with the chimp, Sultan.</p>
Tolman- latent learning, look up research he did with mice.</p>
Bandura- observational learning- look up Bobo doll.</p>
*Memory- Sensory,short term, long term, procedural, declarative, episodic, semantic, and flashbulb.</p>
Research these people: Ebbinghaus, Loftus, Chomsky, and Whorf. </p>
Retroactive/ proactive interference- think PRoactive interference has PRevious information conflict with new. Retroactive is vise-versa.</p>
Phonemes/ Morphemes- parts of speech/words, think of PM, Phonemes are smaller than Morphemes, thus P precedes M. </p>
**Schema- define, be familiar.</p>
**Hierachy of needs- think PE BES. Physiological needs, Safety, Belonging, Esteem, and Self Actualization.</p>
approach-approach- win-win situation
avoidance-avoidance- lose-lose situation
approach-avoidance- iffy, example: get into a good college, but costs A LOT of money.</p>
Selye- kinda makes steps to fight-or-flight</p>
*Ainsworth- review the Strange Situation.</p>
**Stage Theories- know them. All. Well.</p>
Criticisms of Kohlberg from Gilligan is the female exclusion (refers to the Heinz situation)</p>
** Defense Mechanisms- questions usually give a situation and then asks which one it is.</p>
Locus control- internal- works hard to succeed, external- hopes to get lucky to succeed.</p>
Remember what these people did: Spearman, Sternburg, Gardener, Binet, Weschler.</p>
**Schizophrenia- know the disorder well, different types, and symptoms.</p>
*Wolpe- systematic desensitization (through classical conditioning)</p>
know definition of fundamental attribution, cognitive dissonance and self-serving bias.</p>
**Milgram’s shocking experiment. It’s affects on authority and obedience.</p>
attraction/aggression- very often it is skipped over since it is at the end of most books- however AP writers make a question or two about it.</p>
Superordinate goals- stops discrimination and bad stuff alike.</p>
TROUBLE SPOTS (most mistakes):</p>
-independent/dependent variables
-parts of the brain
-cones/rods
-REM sleep and stages
-negative reinforcement
-functional fixedness- limiting things to its normal use, not thinking, during a storm, that a plastic bad can be used as a makeshift coat.
-availability and representative heuristic
- James-Lange vs. Schather-Singer
-Piaget Stage Theory
-Defense Mechanisms
-reliability vs validity
-Schizophrenia
-Different schools of thoughts approach to therapy and what they treat the best.
-self-serving bias and fundamental attribution error- nobody knows what it means. </p>
Annddd… thats it, most the stuff you need to study.
Goodluck</p>