Psych Unit 3

In a study on taste, what would researchers need to do to test participants' ability to distinguish umami from similar sensations?

Blindfold the participants and ask them to distinguish between the smell of a rose and the smell of a honeysuckle.

Dr. Ramen recruited 100 adults to participate in her study. The taste buds of each participant were measured, and the participants tasted a number of foods. She found there was a relationship between the size of a participant's taste buds and the number of foods that a participant could taste. What research method did Dr. Ramen use, and what was she most likely studying?

Experimental; sensitivity to the taste of umami

Tracey was in pain from an ear infection, which her doctor said was in her inner ear. Which of the following is the most likely location of the infection?

The eardrum

Human tactile sense is actually a mix of which of the following distinct skin senses?

Pressure, warmth, tickle, pain

Which of the following is the correct order of the eye-to-brain pathway of vision?

Retina, optic nerve, thalamus, occipital lobe

Which of the following scenarios is the best example of synesthesia?

Anastasia sees swirls of color when she hears music because stimulation of one sensory pathway leads to the experience of another sensation.

Which of the following examples best illustrates the concept of interposition?

Because the tree was higher than the bush in Jane's field of vision, she perceived the tree as being farther away than the bush.

Bryan perceived a duck instead of other animals when viewing an ambiguous image because he watched a documentary about ducks the previous night. Which of the following best explains why Bryan perceived a duck?

Bottom-up processing, because his perception of the duck was influenced by past experience.

Kimmie stood on the sidewalk rather than crossing the street because she saw that the approaching car was quite close to her. Which of the following concepts is best illustrated in this example?

Depth perception

Which of the following best illustrates the most predictable effect of schemas on perception?

Grant has more difficulty recognizing a penguin as a bird than he does a blue jay.

Which of the following scenarios best illustrates the opponent-process theory of color vision?

Kayla sees afterimages of opposing colors when she stares at a poster for a long time.

Which of the following anatomical structures is involved in the vestibular sense?

Olfactory bulb

Helena did not recognize her English teacher when she unexpectedly saw him while traveling in Paris, even though she knew him well back in the classroom. The fact that Helena can recognize her teacher back home more easily than in Paris best demonstrates what concept?

Perceptual set

Which of the following is the process of detecting environmental stimuli and converting them into signals that can be detected by the nervous system?

Sensation

Which of the following concepts refers to the diminished sensitivity to a stimulus that occurs due to constant exposure to that stimulus?

Sensory adaptation

Orville is talking with his friends at a cafeteria table when suddenly he is distracted by hearing his name at a neighboring table. Orville's shift of attention most clearly illustrates which psychological concept?

The cocktail party phenomenon

Denise has damaged her auditory nerve and now has difficulty understanding what people are saying. Which of the following descriptions explains how that damage impairs her hearing?

The hair cells fail to vibrate sufficiently to transmit the message.

Which of the following is the best definition for absolute threshold?

The lowest strength of a stimulus that a person can detect 50% of the time

A researcher wants to study the human sense of taste over a life span. The researcher has a group of participants taste foods that are salty, bitter, sweet, sour, and umami. Which study would best allow the researcher to test the sensation of taste as people age, and what is the likely outcome?

The researcher tests a group of 50 ten to twenty-five year olds, 50 twenty-six to fifty year olds, and 50 fifty-one to seventy-five year olds. The researcher also measures the number of the people's taste buds for each group. The researcher finds that as people grow older, their sense of taste remains the same because as their number of taste buds increases, each taste bud becomes less sensitive.

According to the gate control theory of pain, which of the following contains a neurological gate that controls the transmission of pain messages to the brain?

The spinal cord

Marlene had an infection that led to deafness in her left ear. Which of the following will be the most likely impact of losing her hearing in her left ear?

She will show less activity in her left temporal lobe.