Page 654 - Understanding Psychology

Glossary
psychoanalysis a form of therapy aimed at making
patients aware of their unconscious motives so that they can gain control over their behavior and free themselves of self-defeating patterns (p. 494)
psychoanalyst a psychologist who studies how unconscious motives and conflicts determine human behavior (p. 19)
psychobiologist a psychologist who studies how physical and chemical changes in our bodies influence our behav- iors (p. 21)
psychological the emotional and behavioral characteris- tics of an individual or group (p. 616)
psychological dependence a strong, repetitive desire for use of a drug to such an extent that a person feels ner- vous and anxious without it (p. 476)
psychological needs urges to belong and to give and receive love and urges to acquire esteem through com- petence and achievement (p. 326)
psychologist a scientist who studies the mind and behav- ior of humans and animals (p. 25)
psychology the scientific, systematic study of behaviors and mental processes (p. 9)
psychophysics the study of the relationships between sen- sory experiences and the physical stimuli that cause them (p. 208)
psychosocial development life periods in which an indi- vidual’s goal is to satisfy desires associated with social needs (p. 83)
psychosocial hunger factors external cues that affect eating (p. 321)
psychosurgery a medical operation that destroys part of the brain to make the patient calmer and freer of symptoms (p. 510)
psychotherapy a general term for the application of psy- chological principles and techniques for any treatment used by therapists to help troubled individuals overcome their problems and disorders (p. 486)
puberty theperiodofsexualmaturation;theendofchildhood and the point when reproduction is first possible (p. 95) pupil the opening in the iris that regulates the amount of
light entering the eye (p. 215)
R
psychoanalysis–retinal disparity
reaction formation a defense mechanism by which the ego unconsciously replaces an unacceptable feeling or urge with its opposite (p. 382)
recall the type of memory retrieval in which a person reconstructs previously learned material without the aid of or with very few external cues (p. 283)
recognition the type of memory retrieval in which a person is required to identify an object, idea, or situa- tion as one he or she has or has not experienced before (p. 283)
recombination rearranging the elements of a problem in order to arrive at an original solution (p. 301)
reconceptualization one of three principles in cognitive therapy where clients work toward an alternative belief system to explain their experiences or current observa- tions (p. 500)
reconstructive processes the alteration of a recalled memory that may be simplified, enriched, or distorted, depending on an individual’s experiences, attitudes, or inferences (p. 284)
regression a defense mechanism in which an individual retreats to an earlier stage of development or pattern of behavior in order to deal with a threatening or stressful situation (p. 383)
reinforcement a stimulus or event that follows a response and increases the likelihood that the response will be repeated (p. 251)
reliability the ability of a test to give the same results under similar conditions (p. 344)
REM sleep a stage of sleep characterized by rapid eye movements, a high level of brain activity, a deep relax- ation of the muscles, and dreaming behind closed eye- lids (p. 186)
replicate to repeat a research study to confirm the results of the original study (p. 40)
representational thought the intellectual ability of a child to picture something in his or her mind (p. 72)
repression the exclusion from conscious awareness of a painful, unpleasant, or undesirable memory (pp. 286, 381)
resistance in psychoanalysis, the reluctance of a patient either to reveal painful feelings or to examine long- standing behavior patterns (p. 494)
response chain the learned reactions that follow one another in sequence, each reaction producing the signal for the next (p. 256)
resynthesis the process of combining old ideas with new ones and reorganizing feelings in order to renew one’s identity (p. 439)
retina the light-sensitive innermost coating of the back of the eye that contains the rods, cones, and neurons that process visual stimuli (p. 215)
retinal disparity a binocular cue for perceiving depth based on the differences between the images stimulating each eye (p. 216)
random sample a sample group of a larger population selected in such a way that each subject within the pop- ulation has an equal chance of being selected (p. 37)
range the lowest score in a distribution subtracted from the highest score (p. 52)
rational-emotive therapy (RET) a confrontational cog- nitive form of therapy aimed at changing unrealistic assumptions about oneself and other people (p. 500)
rationalization a process whereby an individual seeks to explain an often unpleasant emotion or behavior in a way that will preserve his or her self-esteem (pp. 102, 381)
640 Glossary