Psychology Unit 1 Test Questions

A writer from a popular fashion magazine has penned an article titled "Dating in the 21st Century." She analyzed her own dating experiences and incorporated them into this piece. This type of psychology is known as _____________.

folk psychology

Children and teenagers act more impulsively than adults partially because their ______ are not fully developed.

frontal lobes

Samantha sees a sign on a club's marquee that says "CLUB _ EN FRO_ 8PM TO 4AM." Although some letters are missing from the sign, she knows it is listing the hours when the club is open. Samantha's perception would be of greatest interest to ______________ psychologists.

Gestalt

The corpus callosum:

provides a channel for extensive communication between the two hemispheres.

James has received training in medicine and has an MD degree; in addition to offering therapy he can prescribe drugs. Based on this information, it can be concluded that James is a:

psychiatrist.

Psychoanalysis assumes that:

the unconscious mind is the most powerful motivator of behavior.

Fraternal twins develop from:

two different eggs fertilized by two different sperm.

___________ are the central nervous system cells that provide structural support, promote efficient communication between neurons, and remove cellular debris.

Glial cells

Informed consent to participate in a psychological study means that the:

participant knows his or her role in the study and understands its risks and benefits.

Skin color and mental disorders that are determined by an interaction of many genes are examples of _____________.

polygenic traits

Which of the following tasks is most likely to be performed by a forensic psychologist?

Evaluating the state of mind of a defendant at the time of a crime

Which of the following statements regarding correlational studies is true?

Correlational designs measure two or more variables and their relationship to one another.

What happened when Phineas Gage sustained an injury to his frontal lobes when he was shot through the head with an iron bar in a railroad accident?

His personality changed.

Which of the following is ethically permissible while conducting research on humans?

Not informing the participants of the research hypothesis

Dr. Singh, a scientist, wants to study how anxiety affects adolescents. For this purpose, he measures the electrical changes in their heart rates, their sweating and respiration patterns, as well as the hormonal changes in their blood. Which psychological measure has been used by Dr. Singh in this scenario?

Physiological measures

Dr. Adriana conducts a study to determine if players who wear a new type of soccer uniform made from a specially designed fabric will perform better in soccer matches. She recruits a professional soccer team to participate in her study. She randomly assigns half of the men to wear the new-material uniforms made in the color blue and the other half to wear old-material uniforms made in the color red. Although the men know about the test, they are not told which of the two uniforms is made from the new material. They are asked to wear their assigned uniforms and score as many goals as possible in a game against one another. Dr. Adriana notes the number of goals scored. Ultimately, the players who are wearing the old uniforms score more goal, and therefore, win the game. Dr. Adriana speculates that the new uniforms are not more beneficial to performance than the old uniforms, but she decides to rerun the test a few more times. From a scientific viewpoint, why was it important for Dr. Ariana to randomly assign the players to wear new or old uniforms?

She wanted to ensure that each player had an equal chance of wearing the new or old uniform.

Dr. Ahmed calculated a +0.87 correlation coefficient between the number of days students attended their classes for the semester and their final exam scores. What can he interpret from this finding?

Students who attended classes regularly performed well in exams.

Sarah wants to conduct a study about differences in the levels of emotion of jealousy between men and women. She asks 400 male and female college graduates in the United States a series of questions about hypothetical scenarios of partner infidelity. What is Sarah's sample?

The chosen male and female college graduates

Tamara sustained a brain injury and as a result cannot comprehend speech. Her doctors note that she speaks fluently, but her words are streams of speech that lack meaning. Which of the following disorders best explains Tamara's symptoms?

Wernicke's aphasia

When can scientists help ensure accurate and honest presentation of results?

When they allow their work to be evaluated by other scientists

Madeline is an elderly person who takes medicine to treat memory loss that accompanies her Alzheimer's disease. Madeline's medication likely enhances the effects of the neurotransmitter ______________.

acetylcholine

Early humans, as hunter-gatherers, did not know when they would find food. If they found fat, they ate it, because fat could be stored in the body and used later when food might be scarce. For this reason, humans evolved to like fat. Human cravings have not changed much, even though our environments have. So our preference for fatty foods can be attributed to _____________.

adaptation

A variable can be defined as:

anything that changes, or differs, within or between individuals.

The process of scientific discovery is cumulative. This means that:

previous knowledge builds on older knowledge.

Using noninvasive advanced imaging techniques and electrical recordings, _______ study the structure and functions of the living brain.

behavioral neuroscientists

Dr. Hennessy believes that psychologists should analyze only human conduct that can be observed, not ideas, thoughts, feelings, or motives. He is most likely a strict _____________.

behaviorist

Ed, an early researcher in psychology, was interested in how the environment impacts tendencies to act. He believed that focusing on the mind through introspection was not scientific. Ed was most likely a:

behaviorist.

Dr. Hughes conducts laboratory studies of the thought processes involved in problem solving. Which of the following types of psychologists is she most likely to be?

cognitive

In research analysis and reports, data are never directly aligned with an individual respondent, thereby protecting his or her identity. Thus, ____________ is maintained.

confidentiality

Juan, a psychologist, is studying participants' perceptions of the attractiveness of several deodorants in a laboratory. However, as he conducts his study, people are cooking their lunches in the cafeteria nearby, and the smells of onions and fish are making their way into the laboratory. Juan should stop his experiment for the day because the odors of the food is most likely a __________.

confounding variable

Few of the patients undergoing treatment for phobic disorder agree to participate in a clinical trial of a new antidepressant medication. The patients are randomly divided into two groups. Both groups receive pills to be taken on a daily basis, but only one of the groups receives pills with the newly produced active ingredients. The other group's pills contain no active ingredients. In this study, the group that receives the pills that do not contain the active ingredients is called the _________.

control group

When interpreting correlations, it is important to remember that a

correlation does not mean there is a causal relationship between the two variables.

In a descriptive research design, a researcher will:

define a problem and variable of interest.

A(n) ____________ variable is the outcome, or response to an experimental manipulation.

dependent

Cocaine blocks reuptake of the neurotransmitter ____________, thereby increasing its availability in the synaptic cleft and stimulating feelings of euphoria

dopamine

Neuroscientists conducted research with taxicab drivers in London and found that taxicab drivers, who are required to learn and navigate large areas of cities, had the _______________ that was larger than that of other drivers.

hippocampus

Developmental psychology can be best described as the study of:

how thought and behavior change and show stability across the life span.

To compare psychophysics and physics, if physicists study the physical properties of light and sound, psychophysicists study:

human perception of light and sound.

During the process of reuptake, excess neurotransmitter _________.

is returned to the presynaptic neuron for storage in vesicles and future use

Axons that become ____________ are insulated and can transmit impulses more efficiently.

myelinated

Chan Lee, an Asian primatologist, studied different groups of gorillas over a period of 18 years. She studied them daily in the subtropical forests of Africa to understand their mating and reproductive habits. Based on her observations, Chan found that male gorillas are ready to mate when they are 15 years of age. In this scenario, descriptive method of research used by Chan can be best termed as a(n) ___________.

naturalistic observation

Sarah is observing high school students use Facebook and Skype. Her purpose is to see how these students perceive information, how they acquire and use language, and how these media change the way they communicate in the society. She is most likely a student of:

psychology.

A study was conducted by a group of researchers in Asian cities to determine the driving abilities of people of different age groups. The study found that older adults are better drivers than young adults. Another group of researchers conducted the same study in North American cities to determine if they could duplicate the results of the first study. In this scenario, the scientific method followed by the second group of researchers can be termed as ______.

replication

Psychology gained its independence from philosophy when researchers started to examine and test human sensations and perception using ______________ methods.

scientific

Sarah has major depressive disorder. The medication she takes to treat her symptoms likely increases the availability of ____________ in her brain.

serotonin

Ravi is a participant in a cognitive experiment, but he does not know if he is in the experimental group or the control group. The researchers, however, are aware of the condition to which he has been assigned. The study in which Ravi is participating is called a(n) ___________.

single-blind study

Melinda sees a bear in the woods and becomes extremely scared. She decides to run away as fast as she can. When she gets home, she calms down, because the bear did not follow her. In this situation, the ________________ prepared Melinda's body to deal with this emergency, and the ______________ relaxed her body after the crisis.

sympathetic nervous system; parasympathetic nervous system

Clinical psychology can be best defined as the study of:

the diagnosis and treatment of mental, emotional, and behavioral disorders, and the promotion of psychological health.

Researchers design a study in which neither the participants nor the investigators interacting with them know whether the participants have been assigned to a control group or to an experimental group because:

the experimenters' expectancies might influence the participants' behavior.