EPPP key terms

A rapid electrical signal that travels along a neuron's axon when depolarization reaches threshold, triggering release of neurotransmitters at the terminal buttons.

A medial temporal lobe structure essential for forming new declarative memories; damage produces anterograde amnesia while leaving older, well-established memories largely intact.

The anterior region of the frontal lobes that supports planning, impulse control, working memory, and social judgment, and is among the last brain areas to fully myelinate.

The brain's capacity to reorganize its structure and connections in response to experience, learning, or injury, supporting recovery and the acquisition of new skills.

The division of the peripheral nervous system that regulates involuntary functions through its sympathetic branch, which arouses, and its parasympathetic branch, which restores and conserves energy.

A learning procedure in which a neutral stimulus repeatedly paired with an unconditioned stimulus comes to elicit a conditioned response when presented alone.

A form of learning in which the frequency of a behavior changes because of its consequences, increasing with reinforcement and decreasing with punishment or extinction.

A limited-capacity cognitive system that briefly holds and actively manipulates information during tasks such as reasoning, comprehension, and problem solving.

An organized mental framework built from prior experience that guides how new information is interpreted, stored, and later recalled.

The psychological discomfort produced by holding two inconsistent beliefs or by behaving in ways that contradict one's attitudes, often resolved by changing the attitude.

A mental shortcut that speeds judgment and decision making but can generate predictable errors, such as estimating likelihood by how easily examples come to mind.

Changing one's behavior or stated beliefs to match those of a group, an effect that is strongest when the group is unanimous and the person feels uncertain.

A deterioration in decision quality within cohesive groups whose members suppress dissent, pressure dissenters, and fail to consider alternative courses of action.

The tendency to overestimate dispositional causes and underestimate situational influences when explaining other people's behavior, while attributing one's own behavior more to circumstances.

The apprehension that one's performance may confirm a negative stereotype about one's group, which can create anxiety and impair performance on the task at hand.

The process of cultural and psychological change that occurs when individuals or groups from different cultures come into sustained contact, resulting in strategies such as integration, assimilation, separation, or marginalization.

A clinician's capacity to understand and respond effectively to clients whose cultural background, values, and experiences differ from their own.

The understanding that objects continue to exist even when they are out of sight, typically developing during Piaget's sensorimotor stage.

Relatively stable patterns of expecting and seeking closeness in relationships, classified as secure, anxious-ambivalent, and avoidant based on early caregiver responsiveness.

The ability to attribute mental states such as beliefs, desires, and intentions to others, and to recognize that those states can differ from one's own.

Vygotsky's term for the distance between what a learner can accomplish alone and what they can accomplish with guidance from a more capable person.

Inborn, relatively stable differences in emotional reactivity, activity level, and self-regulation that appear early in life and shape later personality development.

The consistency or reproducibility of test scores across occasions, forms, items, or raters; it is necessary but not sufficient for a test to be valid.

The extent to which a test measures the construct it is intended to measure and supports the specific inferences and decisions made from its scores.

An index of the average amount of error in an individual's observed score, used to construct confidence intervals around that score.

The prevalence of a condition in a given population; low base rates sharply reduce the probability that a positive test result is correct.

The systematic process of distinguishing among conditions with overlapping symptoms in order to identify the best-fitting explanation for a client's presentation.

A cognitive-behavioral technique in which clients identify, evaluate, and replace distorted automatic thoughts with more accurate and balanced interpretations of events.

A behavioral treatment that pairs relaxation training with a graduated hierarchy of feared situations so that anxiety responses gradually weaken.

The collaborative emotional bond and shared agreement on goals and tasks between therapist and client, consistently associated with treatment outcome.

The integration of the best available research evidence, clinical expertise, and client characteristics, values, and preferences in making treatment decisions.

The statistical assumption that no relationship or difference exists in the population; a study tests whether sample data justify rejecting it.

The probability that a study will correctly reject a false null hypothesis, increased by larger samples, larger effects, and less measurement error.

A standardized index of the strength of a relationship or the magnitude of a difference, independent of the sample size used to estimate it.

The degree to which a study's design supports causal conclusions by controlling confounding variables and alternative explanations for the results.

The extent to which a study's findings can be generalized to other populations, settings, times, and measurement procedures beyond those actually studied.

The ethical and legal requirement to disclose the nature, risks, benefits, and alternatives of treatment so that a client can decide voluntarily whether to participate.

A legal obligation, rooted in the Tarasoff decision, to take reasonable steps to protect identifiable third parties when a client presents a serious threat of violence.

The ethical obligation not to reveal information disclosed within a professional relationship without authorization, subject to defined legal and safety exceptions.

A situation in which a psychologist holds a professional role with a person and also another role with that person or someone closely associated, risking impaired objectivity or exploitation.