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Mach bands The accentuated edges between two adjacent regions that differ in brightness. This sharpening is maximal at the borders where the distance between the two regions is smallest and the contrast most striking.
magic number According to George Miller, the number (seven plus or minus two) that represents the holding capacity of the working memory system.
magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) See MRI.
magno cells Ganglion cells found largely in the periphery of the retina that, because of their sensitivity to brightness changes, are particularly suited to the perception of motion and depth. See also parvo cells.
maintenance rehearsal Repetition to keep material in working memory for a while. In contrast to elaborative rehearsal, this confers little long-term benefit for longer-term retention. See also elaborative rehearsal.
major depression A mood disorder in which patients are disabled by guilt or sadness (especially in Western cultures), experience a loss of energy, pleasure and motivation, and disturbances of sleep, diet, and other bodily functions.
major histocompatibility complex (MHC) Part of the genome involved in the immune system's ability to target invading cells and leave one's own cells alone.
mania A mood disorder characterized by racing thoughts, pressured speech, irritability or euphoria, and marked impairments in judgment. See also bipolar disorder.
manifest content In psychoanalytic interpretation, the immediately visible, surface content of a dream or behavior. This content is hypothesized to be a means of representing the latent content in disguised form, to protect the person from the anxiety associated with the latent content.
matching hypothesis The hypothesis that persons seek romantic or sexual partners who possess a similar level of physical attractiveness.
mean (M) See measure of central tendency.
means-end analysis An important strategy for problem solving in which one's current position and resources are continually evaluated with respect to one's goal.
measure of central tendency A single number intended to summarize an entire distribution of experimental results. Three commonly used measures of central tendency are: (1) the mode, or the score that occurs most frequently; (2) the median, or the point that divides the distribution into two equal halves; and (3) the mean, or the arithmetic average.
medial forebrain bundle (MFB) A tract of fibers that runs through the base of the forebrain and parts of the hypothalamus. Electric stimulation of this bundle is usually experienced as rewarding.
median See measure of central tendency.
medulla Part of the hindbrain and the rearmost portion of the brain, just adjacent to the spinal cord. It is involved in the control of respiration, circulation, balance, and protective reflexes such as coughing and sneezing.
melatonin A neurohormone secreted by the pineal gland that is involved in regulating the sleep-waking cycle.
memory acquisition The processes of gaining new knowledge, that is, of establishing new memories in long-term storage.
memory encoding The process of "translating" information into a format in which it can be stored for later use.
memory span The number of items that can be recalled after a single presentation. See also magic number.
memory trace The record in the nervous system that actually preserves a memory of a past experience.
menstrual flow The discharge consisting of the sloughed-off uterine lining that was built up in preparation for a fertilized ovum, that signals the onset of menstruation.
mental disorders A clinically-significant problem in thinking, behavior, or emotion that is associated with distress, disability, or significantly increased risk of suffering.
mental health parity The policy position that insurance plans should reimburse for the costs of treating mental disorders on the same terms that they do for other medical disorders.
mental images Analogical representations that reserve some of the characteristic attributes of our senses.
mental maps A mental representation of the spatial layout of a scene, whether a small scene (so that the representation might show, say, the locations of various objects on a table top) or a larger scene (e.g., a representation of an entire city).
mental representations Internal symbols that stand for something but are not equivalent to it, such as internalized actions, images, or words.
mental rotation A task in which participants are presented with a rotated figure and must discern whether the figure is normal or, say, mirror-reversed. Participants apparently must visualize the figure rotated to an upright position before responding.
mental set The predisposition to perceive, remember, or think of one thing rather than another.
meta-analysis A statistical technique for combining the results of many studies even when the studies used different methods to collect the data. This technique has been useful in many areas, including studies on the outcome of psychotherapy.
metacognition A general term for knowledge about knowledge, as in knowing that we do or do not remember something.
method of loci A mnemonic technique that requires the learner to visualize each of the items she wants to remember in a different spatial location (locus). Recall requires that each location be mentally inspected for the item placed there.
MFB See medial forebrain bundle.
MHC See major histocompatibility complex.
microcircuitry Networks of interneurons within which most of the brain's information processing occurs.
midbrain The portion of the brain between hindbrain and forebrain that is involved in arousal, the sleep-waking cycle, and auditory and visual targeting.
middle ear An antechamber to the inner ear which amplifies the sound-produced vibrations of the eardrum and transfers them to the cochlea. See also cochlea.
midlife transition A period of time proposed by many authors in which individuals reappraise what they have done with their lives thus far and may reevaluate their marriage and career.
Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI) A structured (objective) test of personality; the most widely used personality test.
miss One of the four possible outcomes in a detection task. If the signal is present and the person says it is not, this is a miss. See correct negative.
mixed states A pattern sometimes observed with bipolar disorder in which the person displays a combination of mania and depression, for example, tearfulness and pessimism combined with grandiosity and racing thoughts.
MMPI See Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory.
mnemonics Deliberate strategies for helping memory, many of which use imagery.
mode See measure of central tendency.
monocular depth cues Features of the visual stimulus (e.g., linear perspective and motion parallax) that indicate depth even when it is viewed with one eye.
monogamy A mating pattern in which a reproductive partnership is based on a special, more or less permanent tie between one male and one female.
mood disorders A group of disorders distinguished primarily by changes in mood and motivation; these include bipolar disorder and major depression. See also bipolar disorder, major depression, mania.
morpheme The smallest significant unit of meaning in a language (e.g., the word boys has two morphemes, boy and s). See also content morpheme, function morpheme.
morphological sex Classification as male or female based on one's sex organs and bodily appearance (e.g., ovaries, vagina, and smooth facial skin versus testes, penis, and facial hair).
Motherese A whimsical term for the singsong speech pattern that mothers and other adults generally employ when talking to infants.
motion detectors Cells in the visual cortex that are sensitive to an image moving across the retina.
motion parallax A depth cue provided by the fact that, as an observer moves, the images cast by nearby objects move more rapidly on the retina than the images cast by objects farther away.
motoneurons Neurons whose cell bodies are in the brain or spinal cord and whose axons terminate on muscle fibers.
MRI (magnetic resonance imaging) A noninvasive neurodiagnostic technique that relies on nuclear magnetic resonance. An MRI scan passes a high frequency alternating magnetic field through the brain to detect the different resonant frequencies of its nuclei. A computer then assembles this information to form a picture of brain structure. See also functional MRI (fMRI) scan.
MS See multiple sclerosis.
multicausal models A conception of a particular effect that emphasizes the role of many factors in leading to that effect.
multiple intelligences In Howard Gardner's theory, the six essential, independent mental capacities, some of which are outside the traditional academic notions of intelligence, i.e., linguistic, logical-mathematical, spatial, musical, bodily-kinesthetic, and personal intelligence.
multiple sclerosis (MS) A progressive neurological disease wherein the immune system mistakenly destroys the myelin sheaths that comprise the brain's white matter, producing manifestations such as numbness, blindness, and paralysis.
myelin sheath The series of fatty wrappers, formed by special glial cells, that surround the axons of those neurons that must communicate over long distances in the nervous system and that allow for fast propagation of action potentials along those axons. See also nodes of Ranvier.
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