🧠 AP Psychology
Key terms and concepts for AP Psychology curriculum.
📏Absolute Threshold
The minimum stimulus needed to detect a stimulus 50% of the time.
🧪Acetylcholine
A neurotransmitter involved in muscle movement and memory.
🏆Achievement Motivation
A desire for significant accomplishment.
📚Achievement Test
A test designed to assess what a person has learned.
🔊Acoustic Encoding
The encoding of sound.
📚Acquisition
The initial stage of learning.
⚡Action Potential
A brief electrical charge that travels down an axon.
🔗Addiction
Compulsive drug craving and use.
⚡Adrenal Glands
Glands that secrete hormones like adrenaline and cortisol.
🏃Aerobic Exercise
Sustained exercise that increases heart and lung fitness.
👥Affiliation Need
The need to build relationships and to feel part of a group.
➕Agonist
A chemical that mimics or enhances a neurotransmitter.
📐Algorithm
A methodical, logical rule or procedure that guarantees solving a particular problem.
🧠Amnesia
The loss of memory.
😨Amygdala
Linked to emotion, especially fear and aggression.
🚫Anorexia Nervosa
An eating disorder in which a person diets and becomes significantly underweight, yet still feels fat.
➖Antagonist
A chemical that blocks or inhibits a neurotransmitter.
🔮Aptitude Test
A test designed to predict a person's future performance.
🧠Association Areas
Areas of the cortex involved in higher mental functions.
👂Audition
The sense of hearing.
🤖Automatic Processing
Unconscious encoding of incidental information.
💓Autonomic Nervous System
The part of the nervous system controlling involuntary actions.
📰Availability Heuristic
Estimating the likelihood of events based on their availability in memory.
⚡Axon
The long extension of a neuron that transmits signals.
👶Babbling Stage
The stage of speech development in which the infant spontaneously utters various sounds.
🔥Basal Metabolic Rate
The body's resting rate of energy expenditure.
🔒Belief Perseverance
Clinging to one's initial conceptions after the basis on which they were formed has been discredited.
🍕Binge-Eating Disorder
Significant binge-eating episodes followed by distress, disgust, or guilt.
👀Binocular Cues
Depth cues that depend on the use of two eyes.
🕳️Blind Spot
The point where the optic nerve leaves the eye.