Exam 2 Study GuideIncludes objectives for Nature and Nurture, Sensation and Perception, Learning, and Memory, from class notes, lectures, and the textbook. Also includes answers to the extra credit.Nature and Nurture1. What is natural selection? What is an adaptation? What are two components for natural selection to occur? Be able to give an example.a. Natural selection : those traits that lead to more successful survival and reproduction will be passed on to following generationb. Adaptations : physical and psychological traits passed down because they helped our ancestors to survive and reproducec. Two components: 1. environmental challenge2. adaptation2. Be able to define genes. Be able to differentiate between genotype and phenotype.a. Genes : units of heredity, segment of DNA capable of synthesizing proteinsb. Genotype: the set of genes an organism receives from its parentsc. Phenotype : observable traitsd. Basically, genotype is our genetic makeup, whereas phenotype is our observable traits.3. What is heritability? What can it tell us? What can’t it tell us?a. Heritability - the extent to which differences among individuals can be attributed to differing genesb. If heritability of IQ is 50%, what does that mean? That means that half of the difference between them is due to genetic difference.so we can tell how muchof the difference can be attributed to genetic difference.c. As differences in environmental decreases, heritability increases. And vice versa.4. What are twin studies? Adoption studies? What can they tell us?a. Twin studiesa. analysis of how traits differ in identical vs fraternal twinsb. Fraternal twins share 50% of their genes, and identical share 100%. Identical twins are more similar than fraternal in personality.b. Adoption studiesa. Environment is from unrelated people, with genes of biological parents.Usually it’s hard to know if a trait comes from a shared trait or a sharedenvironment the person has with their parent, and this allows us to separate these two.b. Adoptees are more similar in personality to biological parents than adoptive.5. What roles do parents and peers play in who we are? What can an enriching/impoverished environment do for us?a. Influence of parents and peersa. Parents: education, discipline, responsibility, etc.b. Peers: social interaction, romantic relationships, etc.b. Influence of experiences. More enriched environment= more synaptic connections6. What general roles do heredity and environment play in who we are? a. Heritability plays an important role in personality. It determines reaction rangesb. Environment plays an important role in attitudes (e.g. values, manners, religion, politics) and determines where we fall in the range.Sensation and Perception1. Be able to define and differentiate between sensation and perception.a. Sensation : detection of physical energy by our sense organsb. Perception : brains interpretation of sensory inputc. Sensation and perception are not the same. Essentially, sensation first allows us to pick up the signals in our environments, and perception then allows us to assemble these signals into something meaningful.2. What is transduction? What are sensory receptors? How do they work together?a. Transduction: the process by which external stimuli is converted into electricalsignals within neuronsb. Changing one form of energy into another form of energy. What all of our sense organs do.c. Sense receptors: specific receptors for each of our five senses transduces specific stimulid. Transduction is changing a form of energy into another form, and we need that to sense because our sense receptors have to transduce what they sense into electrical figures. Sensory receptors do the transductione.3. What is psychophysics? What is absolute threshold? Be able to give an example. What is just noticeable differences? Be able to give an example. What is Weber’s law?a. Psychophysics : study of how we perceive sensory stimuli based on their physical characteristicsb. Absolute threshold : the lowest level of sensory stimulus we can detect on 50% of trials (when no other stimulus is present)i. Ex. at what amplitude (loudness) does one hear a sound 50% for a given frequency?c. Just noticeable difference (JND): smallest change in intensity of sensory stimulus we can detect.i. Ex. How much light would we have to use to a room, for someone to know there is more light in the roomd. Weber’s law : constant proportional relationship between JND and original intensity. Essentially, the stronger the stimulus, the bigger the change neededfor a change in stimulus intensity to be noticeable. For example, you would have to add a lot more light into an already well-lit room for it to be noticeable than the light needed to be added to a dimly lit room.4. What are the three things our brain integrates to “perceive?” What do we often sacrifice to perceive?a. Our brain integrates sensory data into meaningful conceptsb. Brain “perceives” by integrating:i. what’s currently in our sensory fieldii. what was there a moment agoiii. what we remember from our past (usually we need old information to process new informationc. often we sacrifice small details for the bigger picture (i.e. the meaningful concept)5. What is parallel processing? What is cross-modality? What is the McGurk effect and how does it demonstrate cross-modality? What is synesthesia?a. Parallel processing : can attend to multiple sense modalities at the same timeb. Cross-modality: processing info from multiple senses that produces a differentperception than that of any one sense. Basically, the whole is more than the sum of its partsc. The McGurk effect is when you see and hear something and the vision overrides the hearing. Like the video in class, where the guy kept saying “ba”and they played it with video clips of him saying “fa”. During this, we hear “fa”even though the audio is still “ba.” This demonstrates cross-modality because seeing him talk influence what we think he’s saying.d. Synesthesia : extreme version of cross-modality. Tasting sounds, hearing colors.6. Be able to define and differentiate between top-down processes and bottom-up processes. What are each of these processes driven by?a. Bottom-up processes : Sensory detection and encoding; construction of whole from partsi. Lines, angles, shapes, colors, etc. ii. The example is the picture with the woman or the
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