1. Explain the basic interests and applications of selected branches of psychology.

Developmental psychology – It studies the physical, cognitive and psychological changes

across the life span. It attempts to examine the major developmental milestones that occur at
different stages of development.
Personality Psychology – it focuses on the relatively enduring traits and characteristics of
individuals. Personality psychologists study topics such as self-concept, aggression, moral
development, etc.
Social Psychology –deals with people‘s social interactions, relationships, social perception,
and attitudes.
Cross-cultural Psychology - examines the role of culture in understanding behavior, thought,
and emotion. It compares the nature of psychological processes in different cultures, with a
special interest in whether or not psychological phenomena are universal or culture-specific.
Industrial psychology – applies psychological principles in industries and organizations to
increase the productivity of that organization.
Forensic psychology - applies psychological principles to improve the legal system (police,
testimony, etc..).
Educational Psychology - concerned with the application of psychological principles and
theories in improving the educational process including curriculum, teaching, and
administration of academic programs.
Health Psychology - applies psychological principles to the prevention and treatment of
physical illness and diseases.
Clinical Psychology:-is a field that applies psychological principles to the prevention,
diagnosis, and treatment of psychological disorders.
Counseling Psychology: - is a field having the same concern as clinical psychology but helps
individuals with less severe problems than those treated by clinical psychologists

Overall, these branches of psychology have diverse interests and applications that contribute to our
understanding of human behavior and mental processes in various contexts.

2. Describe how monocular and binocular cues are used in the perception of depth
Monocular cues are visual cues that can be perceived with only one eye. These cues include:

Retinal disparity: Is the degree of difference between the image of an object that are focused on the two retinas.
The closer the object, the greater is the retinal disparity. To demonstrate retinal disparity for yourself, point a
forefinger vertically between your eyes. Look at the finger with one eye closed. Then look at it with the other
closed. You will notice that the background shifts as you view the scene with different views of the same
stimulus.

Convergence: He degree to which the eyes turn inward to focus on an object. As you can confirm for yourself,
the closer the objects are the greater the convergence of the eyes. Hold a forefinger vertically in front of your
face and move it toward your nose. You should notice an increase in ocular muscle tension as your finger
approaches your nose.
Binocular cues, on the other hand, require both eyes to perceive depth. These cues include:

Monocular cues: require only one. This means that even people who have lost sight in one eye may still have
good depth perception. One monocular is accommodation, which is the change in the shape of the lens that lets
you focus the image of an object on the retina.

Motion parallax: the tendency to perceive ourselves as passing objects faster when they are closer to us than
when they are farther away. You will notice this when you drive on a rural road. You perceive yourself passing
nearby telephone poles faster than you are passing a farmhouse.

Pictorial cues: because artists use them to create depth in their drawings and paintings. He noted that an object
that overlaps another object will appear closer, a cue called interposition. Because your psychology professor
overlaps the blackboard, you know that she or he is closer to you than the blackboard is. Comparing the
relative size of objects also provides a cue to their distance. If two people are about the same height and one
casts a smaller image on your retina. You will perceive that person as farther away.

Linear perspective: during world War II, naval aviation cadets flying at night sometimes crashed into airplanes
ahead of them, apparently because of failure to judge the distance of those plans. Taking advantage of linear
perspective solved this problem. Two taillights set a standard distance apart replaced the traditional single
taillight. As a result, when pilots noticed that the taillights of an airplane appeared to move farther apart, they
realized that they were getting closer to it

Elevation: provides another cue to its distance. Objects that are higher in your visual field seem to be farther
away.

Aerial perspective: depends on the clarity of objects. Closer objects seem clearer than more distant ones. A
distant mountain will look hazier than a near one.

Texture gradient: affects depth perception because the nearer an object, the more details we can make out and
the farther an object, the more details we can make out, and the farther an object, the fewer details we can make
out.

3. Recognize and define three basic forms of learning—classical conditioning, operant

conditioning, and observational learning

4. Identify and describe the three stages of memory storage.

There are three memory stages: sensory, short-term, and long-term. Information processing begins in sensory
memory, moves to short-term memory, and eventually moves into long-term memory.

Sensory memory Sensory memory is the first stage of memory. Its purpose is to give your brain time to process
the incoming information.

Sensory memory is not consciously controlled. You subconsciously and continuously gather information from
the environment through your five senses. Sensory memory holds impressions of that sensory information that
was received by your five senses after the original stimulus has stopped. However, it only holds it for a very
brief period, generally for no longer than a second. In order for that information to be retained for longer, it has
to continue onto short-term memory.

Most of the information that gets into sensory memory is forgotten. It never makes its way into the second stage
of memory because it was never attended to. To get information into short-term memory, you need to attend to
it – meaning consciously paying attention to it.

Sensory memory can be observed if you look at an object then close your eyes. As your eyes close, you can
notice how the visual image is maintained for a fraction of a second before fading. It is your sensory memory
that is holding that image

Short-term memory

Short-term Memory Short-term memory (STM) is also known as working or active memory. It holds the
information you are currently thinking about. This information will quickly be forgotten unless you make a
conscious effort to retain it.

Like sensory memory, short-term memory holds information temporarily, pending further processing.
However, unlike sensory memory which holds the complete image received by your senses, short-term memory
only stores your interpretation of the image.

Long-term memory

Long-term memory Long-term memory (LTM) refers to the storage of information over an extended period. It
is all the memories you hold for periods longer than a few seconds. The information can last in your long-term
memory for hours, days, months, or even years. Although you may forget some information after you learn it,
other things will stay with you forever.

Some information retained in STM is processed or encoded into long-term memory. This information is filed
away in your mind and must be retrieved before it can be used. Some of the information in your LTM is easy to
recall, while other memories are much more difficult to retrieve.

Unlike short-term memory, long-term memory has seemingly unlimited capacity. You may remember
numerous facts and figures, as well as episodes in your life from years ago.
5. Understand and explain all been proposed as theories of motivation.
THEORIES OF MOTIVATION

Motivation is often referred to as a reason which leads an individual to act in a particular manner.
Motivation is an important force which would lead to an individual to act and initiate, guide and
maintain behaviors.

The researchers and psychologists have come up with a number of theories to explain the idea of
motivation. The collective comprehension of all the ideas related to different theories of motivation,
the entire understanding of motivation would get better. There are different theories of motivation such
as the biological, emotional, social, or cognitive theories

Instinct Theory of Motivation

The instinct theory of motivation suggests that the important aspect for our motivation is mostly the
biological programming of our body. The comprehensive idea about this theory is that same
motivations occur to two human beings because of their similar biological programming that is shared
across human beings

Human beings act or behave based on their motivations and these motivations are emerged as a result
of a core motivation that is common to all human beings. A famous example for the seasonal migration
of the birds is majorly due to the winter in south.

Incentive Theory of Motivation

This theory of motivation suggests that the behavior of an individual is motivated because of the
reinforcement or incentives because of which this is called as the incentive theory of motivation. this
theory suggests that our actions are largely influenced by the incentives that are outside and human
beings are generally attracted to those incentive that are outside them rather than having the desire to
reduce the stimulus.

Drive Reduction Theory

This theory suggests that human beings keep doing what they do in order to decrease the internal
tension which is caused by our unfulfilled needs. For instance, human beings drink water when they
feel the internal tension that is present inside our body which is caused by thirst. This theory was
proposed in 1943 by Clark Hull and this theory was quite popular theory of motivation until the late
1950s. This theory is not widely used these days because of some problems such as why do human
beings eat even when they are not hungry.

Arousal Theory of Motivation

This theory suggests that there are few individuals who take certain decisions and actions in order to
increase or decrease their levels of arousal with respect to a goal in order to maintain an optimal level
of arousal. The arousal theory of motivation suggests that the individuals have a different arousal level
that is apt for them. This theory suggest that human beings seek stimulation in order to maintain an
optimal level of arousal.
Humanistic Theory of Motivation

The humanistic theory explains that the cognitive processes are some of the important aspects that
affect our actions. One of the famous humanistic theory of motivation was the Abraham Maslow's
hierarchy of needs which explains the motivation at a totally different level.

According to this theory the first need of human beings are the biological needs such as food and
shelter. Once the lower level or basic needs are fulfilled then they move up the pyramid to fulfil other
needs such as safety, love, esteem and ultimately, they meet the needs such as self- actualization which
refers it the need or desire to fulfil an individual's full potential.

Expectancy Theory of Motivation

The expectancy theory of motivation suggests that our actions are based on our perception and
outcome is largely for their actions. This theory of expectancy was proposed by Vroom in the context
of management and motivation, but this theory is applicable to all sorts of human actions.

The major goal of the expectancy theory is to expect the best possible outcome. The expectancy theory
works largely on the perceptions. This indicates that when two different individuals are working in the
same company then these two individuals have different levels of motivation majorly because one
would have a perception that the process would work for them while the others might assume that the
process might not work for them.

There are three key terms that are present as a part of the theory of motivation such as Expectancy (E),
Valence(V) and Instrumentality(I). The essence of this theory is that an employee is going to give the
best performance only when they believe that they have a certain achievable reward for their
performance. Similarly, an employee would not perform well if assumes that they do not have the
required skill set to perform a goal.

6. Explain the major theories of emotion.

There are several major theories of emotion, including
The James-Lange Theory of Emotion:

The James-Lange theory is one of the best-known examples of a physiological theory of emotion.
Independently proposed by psychologist William James and physiologist Carl Lange, the James-Lange
theory of emotion suggests that emotions occur as a result of physiological reactions to events.

According to the James-Lange theory of emotion, an external stimulus leads to a physiological

reaction. Your emotional reaction depends upon how you interpret those physical reactions.

For example, suppose you are walking in the woods and see a grizzly bear. You begin to tremble, and
your heart begins to race. The James-Lange theory proposes that you will conclude that you are
frightened ("I am trembling. Therefore, I am afraid"). According to this theory of emotion, you are not
trembling because you are frightened. Instead, you feel frightened because you are trembling.

The Cannon-Bard Theory of Emotion

Another well-known physiological theory is the Cannon-Bard theory of emotion. Walter Cannon
disagreed with the James-Lange theory of emotion on several different grounds. First, he suggested,
people can experience physiological reactions linked to emotions without actually feeling those
emotions. For example, your heart might race because you have been exercising, not because you are
afraid.

Cannon also suggested that emotional responses occur much too quickly to be simply products of
physical states. When you encounter a danger in the environment, you will often feel afraid before you
start to experience the physical symptoms associated with fear, such as shaking hands, rapid breathing,
and a racing heart.

According to the Cannon-Bard theory of emotion, we feel emotions and experience

physiological reactions such as sweating, trembling, and muscle tension simultaneously.

More specifically, the theory proposes that emotions result when the thalamus sends a message to the
brain in response to a stimulus, resulting in a physiological reaction. At the same time, the brain also
receives signals triggering the emotional experience. Cannon and Bard’s theory suggests that the
physical and psychological experience of emotion happen at the same time and that one does not cause
the other.

Schachter-Singer Theory
Also known as the two-factor theory of emotion, the Schachter-Singer theory is an example of
a cognitive theory of emotion. This theory suggests that the physiological arousal occurs first, and then
the individual must identify the reason for this arousal to experience and label it as an emotion. A
stimulus leads to a physiological response that is then cognitively interpreted and labeled, resulting in
an emotion.

Schachter and Singer’s theory draws on both the James-Lange theory and the Cannon-Bard theory.
Like the James-Lange theory, the Schachter-Singer theory proposes that people infer emotions based
on physiological responses. The critical factor is the situation and the cognitive interpretation that
people use to label that emotion.
 The Schachter-Singer theory is a cognitive theory of emotion that suggests our thoughts are
responsible for emotions.
Like the Cannon-Bard theory, the Schachter-Singer theory also suggests that similar physiological
responses can produce varying emotions. For example, if you experience a racing heart and sweating
palms during an important exam, you will probably identify the emotion as anxiety. If you experience
the same physical responses on a date, you might interpret those responses as love, affection, or
arousal

7. Describe the assumptions of the psychodynamic perspective on personality

development
The psychodynamic perspective on personality development assumes that:

1. Personality is shaped by unconscious forces: The psychodynamic perspective assumes that a

significant portion of our personality is shaped by unconscious forces, such as repressed memories,
desires, and fears.

2. Early childhood experiences are crucial: The psychodynamic perspective emphasizes the importance
of early childhood experiences in shaping personality. According to this perspective, the way we are
treated by our parents and caregivers during our early years has a lasting impact on our personality
development.

3. Personality is divided into three parts: The psychodynamic perspective divides personality into three
parts - the id, ego, and superego. The id represents our primitive instincts and desires, the ego
represents our rational self, and the superego represents our moral compass.

4. Defense mechanisms protect us from anxiety: The psychodynamic perspective suggests that we use
defense mechanisms to protect ourselves from anxiety caused by conflicts between the id, ego, and
superego.

5. Unresolved conflicts can lead to psychological disorders: The psychodynamic perspective suggests
that unresolved conflicts from childhood can lead to psychological disorders later in life if they are not
resolved through therapy.

6. Dreams reveal unconscious desires: The psychodynamic perspective believes that dreams reveal
unconscious desires and fears that can be analyzed to gain insight into a person's personality.

7. Transference occurs in therapy: The psychodynamic perspective recognizes transference as a

phenomenon where patients transfer their feelings about important people in their lives onto their
therapist during therapy sessions.

8. Discuss the Big Five factors and describe someone who is high and low on each of
the five traits

The Big Five personality traits are Openness to experience, Conscientiousness, Extraversion,
Agreeableness and Neuroticism. The five trait dimensions can be remembered by using the acronym
OCEAN, in which each of the letters is the first letter of one of the five dimensions of personality and
each trait represents a range between two extremes and each person has five traits, each scored on a
continuum from high to low. Here’s a brief description of someone who is high and low on each of the
five traits:

Openness to experience: High scorers tend to be creative, curious and imaginative. They enjoy trying
new things and are open to new ideas. Low scorers tend to be more conventional and prefer familiar
routines.

Conscientiousness: High scorers tend to be organized, reliable and responsible. They are goal-oriented
and work hard to achieve their goals. Low scorers tend to be more laid-back and spontaneous.

Extraversion: High scorers tend to be outgoing, sociable and assertive. They enjoy being around
people and are energized by social interactions. Low scorers tend to be more reserved and prefer
solitary activities.

Agreeableness: High scorers tend to be cooperative, empathetic and compassionate. They are
considerate of others’ feelings and try to avoid conflict. Low scorers tend to be more competitive and
less concerned with others’ feelings.

Neuroticism: High scorers tend to be anxious, moody and emotionally unstable. They are more likely
to experience negative emotions such as anxiety, depression and anger. Low scorers tend to be more
emotionally stable and resilient.