exploratory procedure

1. a surgical procedure used to diagnose disease when less invasive methods are inconclusive.

2. a method used by people for feeling the surfaces of objects. People tend to modify their use of touch to optimize the acquisition of information. Thus, they may push on a surface to judge its hardness or stroke it with the index finger to perceive texture. [described in 1987 by Canadian psychologist Susan J. Lederman and U.S. psychologist Roberta L. Klatzky (1947– )]

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Psychology term of the day

July 27th 2024

object constancy

1. in object relations theory, the ability of an infant to maintain an attachment that is relatively independent of gratification or frustration, based on a cognitive capacity to conceive of a mother who exists when she is out of sight and who has positive attributes when she is unsatisfying. Thus, an infant becomes attached to the mother herself rather than to her tension-reducing ministrations; she comes to exist continuously for the infant and not only during instances of need satisfaction. This investment by an infant in a specific libidinal object indicates that he or she no longer finds people to be interchangeable.

2. see perceptual constancy.