Chapter 8: Thinking, Language and Intelligence

Compared with men, women are _____ capable of remembering objects' spatial locations, and they are _____ sensitive to taste and color.

more; more

Expanding the number of possible solutions to a problem is known as:

divergent thinking.

When Andy becomes upset about getting a poor grade, he typically fails to realize that he feels scared. This lack of self-insight BEST illustrates an inadequate level of:

emotional intelligence.

Dr. Archie has been studying monkeys' ability to classify photographs of different kinds of animals. After the monkeys became competent at this classifying task, Dr. Archie found that some of their frontal lobe neurons fired in response to new images of animals. This suggests that the monkeys:

can form concepts.

Psychologists refer to the mental activities associated with thinking, knowing, remembering, and communicating as:

cognition.

Pigeons can reliably discriminate pictures of cars from pictures of chairs. This BEST illustrates their capacity to develop:

concepts.

Chomsky states that all languages share some basic elements, which he called universal grammar. Which item is NOT one of these basic elements?

conjunctions

At a single point in time, researchers may test and compare the intelligence of members of different age groups. This BEST illustrates a(n) _____ study.

cross sectional

Maggie, a graduate student at a local university, is interested in the impact of the No Child Left Behind legislation on intelligence. As a result of this, she gives an intelligence test to people ranging in age from 15 to 45. Maggie is conducting a(n) _____ study.

cross-sectional

Jody is completing a test in which she has to name as many state capitals as she can in one minute. Aditi is trying to complete analogies between pairs of abstract diagrams. Jody is completing a test of _____ intelligence, whereas Aditi is completing a test of _____ intelligence.

crystallized; fluid

Researchers studying chimpanzees in the wild report that they have found at least 39 customs that are specific to local chimpanzee groups. Some researchers believe that these differences in tool use, grooming, and courtship rituals can be accounted for by:

cultural diversity.

According to the principle of belief perseverance, when faced with evidence that conflicts with one's point of view on a controversial issue, one tends to:

discount the information.

Twenty-eight-year-old Melissa is a research psychologist. She is known for her creative research problem solving and the ability to interpret research data abstractly. Melissa is demonstrating:

fluid intelligence.

Robert Sternberg distinguished among analytical, creative, and _____ intelligence.

practical

When someone mentions hamburgers, Trisha immediately thinks of a Big Mac. In this instance, a Big Mac is a(n):

prototype

When someone mentions that she saw a bird outside a window, DeJuan immediately thinks of a robin. A robin is an example of a(n) _____.

prototype

Lee says things like "doggy," "mama," and "dada." He is in the:

one-word stage.

A logical, methodical step-by-step procedure for solving a problem is called a(n) _____.

algorithm

Zac and Nina are studying for a psychology test. Zac states that heritability refers to the extent to which genes are responsible for an individual's level of a particular characteristic is genetic. Nina disagrees, stating that heritability refers to the extent to which genes are responsible for variation among individuals in a particular characteristic. Which student is correct?

Nina is correct.

Laverne's scores on different parts of an IQ test are very different from one another. Laverne's profile of scores on the test:

contradicts the view of intelligence offered by such early theorists as Spearman.

Alessa achieved an intelligence test score of 100 on a current version of the Stanford-Binet test. This indicates that relative to other adults her age, her intellectual abilities are _____ average.

exactly

For years, the most common grade in Dr. Gunn's class has been a B. The second most common has always been a C. At the beginning of each semester, Dr. Gunn asks his class which grade they think they will get at the end of the semester. Most students indicate that they think they will get an A. This example BEST illustrates:

overconfidence.

Erica is a figure skater preparing for the upcoming national championships. Her coach has suggested that she practice mentally for the competition. Which scenario would you recommend she imagine?

She should imagine her jumps and spins while listening to her skating music.

Ape language appears to be less complex than human adult language. In addition, ape vocabularies and sentences are simpler, much like those of a _____-year-old child.

2

The widely used American revision of Alfred Binet's original intelligence test was developed by _____.

Lewis Terman

Which statement is NOT a criticism of Howard Gardner's theory of multiple intelligences?

Low ability in one area is balanced by high ability in another.

Which statement is true regarding gender/sex differences in intellectual abilities?

Males' mental abilities vary more than those of females.

How are the theories of Howard Gardner and Robert Sternberg similar?

They both agree that multiple abilities can contribute to life success.

Some athletes use mental practice to try to improve performance. In one study, a group of people threw darts at a target 24 times. Next, half of the group mentally practiced throwing 24 darts. Finally, the entire group threw 24 more darts. What were the results?

Those who had rehearsed mentally showed improvement.

The part of the left temporal lobe that is involved in understanding language is known as _____ area.

Wernicke's

The SAT is intended to predict high school seniors' performance in college. The SAT is therefore a(n) _____ test.

aptitude

The spontaneous utterance of a variety of sounds by infants is called _____.

babbling

Which type of game is MOST likely the prototype of the concept "sport"?

baseball

When people suddenly have the realization that they solved a problem, it is called:

insight

When he was very young, William took an intelligence test as part of a research study. Decades later William is asked if he would be willing to take another intelligence test in order to test the stability of intelligence. By agreeing to take another intelligence test, William is engaging in a(n) _____ study.

longitudinal

In "person-who" reasoning, one offers the experience of a single individual as evidence to evaluate a claim. "But I know a person who smokes two packs a day. He's 88 and in great health!" Person-who reasoning is persuasive because it is easy to imagine the individual whose experience is cited. Person-who reasoning is BEST seen as capitalizing on:

the availability heuristic.

People overestimate the frequency of school shootings because such events are highly publicized when they do occur. This illustrates:

the availability heuristic.

When we estimate the likelihood of events based on the ease with which we retrieve them from memory, we are demonstrating:

the availability heuristic.

At the zoo, a group of chimpanzees has found a way to groom each other with branches from a fake tree in their cage. The younger chimpanzees invented this grooming technique and are passing it on to their peers and offspring. Thus, they are:

transmitting cultural innovations.

Chen Yu suffered a head injury after crashing his motorcycle. When he awoke from a two-day coma, he found that he could formulate his thoughts linguistically, but he lost the ability to speak. Chen Yu suffered damage to _____ area in the left hemisphere.

Broca's

The portion of variance among people's test scores on traditional measures of intelligence that can be attributed to genetic differences is often estimated as 50 percent. What does this mean?

If you study a large group, then 50 percent of the variation in intelligence scores can be attributed to genetic differences.

Are U.S. intelligence tests biased in the scientific sense?

No, their predictive validity is the same for men and women, various races, and the rich and poor.

Which statement BEST describes the relationship between imagery and performance?

Performing a task and imagining doing a task uses similar areas of the brain.

_____ refers to the rules for combining words into grammatically sensible sentences in a given language.

Syntax

Which statement have critics of ape language research argued?

There is little evidence that apes can equal a 3-year-old's ability to order words with proper syntax.

Dr. Pennington conducted a test comparing Black and White participants in a measure of information processing. Each group was given the same information and task. What is the MOST likely result of the experiment?

You cannot determine individual differences through this experiment.

A mental grouping of similar objects, events, ideas, and people is known as a(n):

concept

Marshall has such low self-esteem that he often listens for critical comments that others make about his appearance and personality. Marshall's behavior BEST illustrates the dangers of _____ bias.

confirmation

Raul is very skilled at taking aptitude tests and finding solutions to mathematics and science problems. Raul's skills illustrate:

convergent thinking.

Meg is extremely creative when it comes to her development psychology course. Her written assignments always demonstrate not only knowledge on the subject matter but also a unique perspective on the topic, originality, humor, and excellent writing skills. Which quality does NOT help Meg be creative?

extrinsic motivation

Those who emphasize the importance of the g factor would be most likely to encourage:

quantifying intelligence with a single numerical score.

"It gives me a completely different result each time I take it!" Kishara exclaims, after completing a social media quiz for the third time. Kishara is disputing the quiz's:

reliability.

A _____ test gives consistent scores no matter when an individual takes the test.

reliable

In which of the following conditions does a person with otherwise limited mental ability have an exceptional special skill, such as drawing?

savant syndrome

Research speculates that evidence exists of multiple intelligences and uses observations of people with this disorder to help support the claim.

savant syndrome

Although he is unable to speak coherently and has been diagnosed with autism, 18-year-old Andrew can produce intricate and detailed drawings of scenes he viewed only once. Andrew illustrates a condition known as:

savant syndrome.

Stephanie says things like "me go," "mama bye," and "dada go." She is in the:

stage of telegraphic speech.

David enjoys watching from the window in his apartment. He is interested in all of the activity going on outside, especially the cars. His mother hears him say "go car." This is an example of:

telegraphic speech.