Exam 1

Gabriel and Jim were involved in a car accident and they both suffered a broken bone. Gabriel told Jim, "Hey, at least we only broke a few bones - we could've died!" Jim's response to Gabriel was, "Yes, but I'm now thinking about how I can be a better driver so that I never get in an accident again." Gabriel's statement reflects a(n) __________________ counterfactual and Jim's response reflects a(n) _____________________ counterfactual. a. downward; upward b. downward; downward c. upward; downward d. upward; upward e. lateral; lateral

a. downward; upward

Our personal beliefs about the way that certain traits occur together are known as __________________. a. implicit personality theories b. conceptual personality theories c. explicit trait theories d. central trait theories e. peripheral trait theories

a. implicit personality theories

The process during which we interpret, analyze, remember, and use information about the social world is known as ___________________. a. social cognition b. encoding c. schemas d. automatic processing e. heuristics

a. social cognition

People frequently fall prey to the planning fallacy because ___________________. a. they tend to try to plan for too many contingencies that may never arise b. when planning a task, they focus more strongly on the future than on the past c. they focus more strongly on the past than on the future d. they tend to engage in magical thinking when contemplating future tasks e. they tend to assume an external locus of control when they are successful

b. when planning a task, they focus more strongly on the future than on the past

The way we think about other people and the things we remember about them may have an effect on our behavior. These thoughts and memories are examples of ____________________. a. historical processes b. interpersonal processes c. cognitive processes d. cultural processes e. social processes

c. cognitive processes

Deborah has just spent a great deal of money on a new fur coat. When she showed it to her husband, she asked if he liked it. Without hesitation, her husband responded by saying, "Yes. It is beautiful." Before he spoke, however, a slight frown appeared on his face for less than a second. This might indicated that he is concealing his true feelings from his wife and is known as _________________________. a. linguistic style b. discrepant interchannel c. discounted attribution d. microexpression e. macroexpression

d. microexpression

Self-enhancement involves efforts to _______________, while other-enhancement involves efforts to __________________. a. increase the individual's self-esteem; increase the other person's self-esteem b. increase an individual's appeal to others; increase the other person's self-esteem c. make the individual feel good; increase an individual's appeal to others d. increase others appeal to us; increase our self-esteem e. increase an individual's appeal to others; make the other person feel good

e. increase an individual's appeal to others; make the other person feel good

Social psychologists focus their attention mainly on individuals because ________________________. a. some individuals are more strongly affected by society than are others b. cultural difference have a strong effect on the behavior of groups but only a weak effect on individuals c. the behavior of groups is too difficult to study in laboratory conditions d. society can direct and control the behavior of individuals e. our actions are performed by and thoughts occur in the minds of individuals

e. our actions are performed by and thoughts occur in the minds of individuals

The academic performance of certain students dramatically improved when teachers were led to believe that those students were intellectually gifted, regardless of the true ability levels of the students. This result shows the importance of ______________________. a. information processing and base rates b. hard work without the expectation of after-school help c. information overload d. the in-group phenomenon e. schemas and self-fulfilling prophecies

e. schemas and self-fulfilling prophecies

Blair watches the newscast each evening, with its usual diet of fired and other accidents. She often eats at Herby's Fried Snacks, a restaurant located in a brick building, despite the fact that her eating there has resulted in bad indigestion several times. She avoids the well-respected Korean restaurant because the Korean restaurant is in a wooden building. Blair's eating habits are probably being guided by _______________________. a. an anti-Korean prejudice b. the representativeness heuristic c. an addiction to fried snack d. the anchoring and adjustment heuristic e. the availability heuristic

e. the availability heuristic

Professor Garcia is studying how cancer patients are coping with their illness by giving them one of the following sets of instructions: they are to keep a daily diary and write about everything, keep a daily diary and write about how they are trying to cope with their illness, or not told to keep any diary whatsoever. After following this protocol for a month, Professor Garcia then measures the cancer patients' self-reported level of depression. The independent variable in this hypothetical study is __________________ and the dependent variable is ____________________. a. the type of diary kept, it any; the progression of the cancer b. how well the subject are coping; the type of diary kept, if any c. the self-reported level of depression; the type of diary kept, if any d. the cancer patients; the self-reported level of depression e. the type of diary kept, if any; the self-reported level of depression

e. the type of diary kept, if any; the self-reported level of depression

According to Kelley's theory, behaviors that arise because of an individual's traits, motives, or intentions are __________________ caused ,while those behaviors that arise because of some aspect of the social or physical environment are __________________ caused. a. internally; externally b. externally; internally c. genetically; environmentally d. ambiguously; distinctively e. consensually; externally

a. internally; externally

Schemas affect our use of stored memories by ____________________. a. making it easier to retrieve information that is consistent with the schema b. increasing the cognitive load on our reasoning abilities, making it more difficult to search our memories c. not allowing the use of memories to reduce cognitive load d. deactivating the anchoring and adjustment process whereby we make social judgements e. making the schema itself weaker and less useful in accessing such memories

a. making it easier to retrieve information that is consistent with the schema

Members of collectivistic cultures are more likely to recognize more of the situational determinants of behavior than are members of individualistic cultures. As a result, members of collectivist societies are _________________. a. somewhat less likely to make the correspondence bias b. somewhat more likely to make the correspondence bias c. able to avoid the correspondence bias completely d. unaware of the correspondence bias e. a great deal more likely to make the correspondence bias

a. somewhat less likely to make the correspondence bias

Abbie noticed that Kayla spends time talking to almost everyone she meets at work and believes that this is because Kayla is a friendly, outgoing person. In fact, Kayla is rather shy and withdrawn most of the time, but her job at a local bank requires that she talk with most of the bank's customers periodically. Abbie's perception of Kayla is mistaken because of _______________. a. the correspondence bias b. her perceptual salience c. a discounting error d. idiosyncratic behavior e. a self-serving bias

a. the correspondence bias

Research has demonstrated that most people are more sensitive to negative information than to positive information. This is known as _________________________. a. the negative bias b. a negative attitude c. a memory fault d. an attentional bias e. the positive bias

a. the negative bias

Imagine that you see a friend arguing with a salesclerk in a store. You have never seen your friend argue with anyone in public before. Therefore, you think that the clerk did something to cause the argument. The theory that most directly explains how you reached this conclusion is the ____________________. a. theory of correspondent inference b. inferential correspondence effect c. actor-observer effect d. theory of discounting and augmenting e. social comparison theory

a. theory of correspondent influence

Jack recently had a job interview that seemed to go exceedingly well by all objective standards. However, Jack noted that his interviewer seemed to be in a bad mood that day. To what extent should Jack be concerned about the latter piece of information? a. He should not be concerned because research indicated that experienced interviewers are not influenced by their moods b. He should be aware that he will likely be viewed less favorably by the interviewer than if the interviewer was in a good mood c. He should not be concerned at all because the interviewer's mood should have no bearing on how he or she evaluates Jack d. He should assume there is virtually no chance he will be offered the position due to the interviewer's negative mood e. He should be very concerned about the interviewer's bad mood unless something happened immediately after the interview to improve the interviewer's mood

b. he should be aware that he will likely be viewed less favorably by the interviewer than if the interviewer was in a good mood

An example of interchannel discrepancy during deception would be __________________________. a. using pronouns such as "I" or "we" very frequently b. managing one's facial expressions well while not making much eye contact c. showing one expression quickly followed by another d. smiling more frequently and broadly than would be expected in a given situations e. blinking very often

b. managing one's facial expressions well while not making much eye contact

One reason that social scientists put their faith in the scientific method is that the scientific method ___________________. a. substantiates the status quo b. produces more conclusive evidence than other methods c. assures acceptance of their conclusions by the general public d. allows scientists to rely on their own intuition e. produces incontrovertible proof of the accuracy of their theories

b. produces more conclusive evidence than other methods

The branch of psychology that seeks to understand the nature and causes of individual behavior and thought in social situations is _________________. a. organizational psychology b. social psychology c. applied psychology d. interpersonal psychology e. general psychology

b. social psychology

Which statement BEST described the attribution process? a. the process by which we combine information about others into unified impressions of them b. the process by which we seek to understand the causes of the behavior of others c. the process by which we focus attention inward for reflection d. the process by which we seek to understand our own feelings, traits, and motives e. the process by which we seek to predict others' behavior in the future

b. the process by which we seek to understand the causes of the behavior of others

One way that schemas influence social thought is by ______________________. a. increasing our cognitive load by activating more information from our long-term memory stores b. ensuring that inconsistent information is stored in our memories and retrieved rapidly c. acting as a filter to direct our attention towards some information and away from other information d. thinking consistently with the schema without being aware of the reason for the thought e. activating the availability heuristic and enabling automatic priming

c. acting as a filter to direct our attention towards some information and away from other information

Which of the following individuals is exhibiting behaviors or thoughts consistent with priming? a. Hector, a medical school student, realizes that his sore throat is probably the sign of a mild cold and not a serious illness b. John believes that if you keep on thinking of something, that thing will happen c. after finishing a romantic novel, Natalie passionately embraces her boyfriend and tells him how much she loves him d. George, a business student, decided that the fastest way for him to become wealthy is to start his own business while still a student e. after watching a horror film, Jane comments on the facts that she did not find the film to be scary at all

c. after finishing a romantic novel, Natalie passionately embraces her boyfriend and tells him how much she loves him

Random assignment of research participants to experimental conditions means that ______________________. a. participant characteristics will have an effect on the outcomes of the experiment b. each participant will experience all experimental conditions at different times c. each participant has an equal chance of being assigned to each experimental condition d. experimental conditions will be the same for all research participants e. a confounding of variables cannot occur

c. each participant has an equal chance of being assigned to each experimental condition

The process of giving participants as much information as possible about experimental procedures to be used before the participants agree to participate is known as ____________________. a. sustaining information overload b. providing thorough debriefing c. obtaining informed consent d. meeting ethical guidelines e. avoiding deception in research

c. obtaining informed consent

One advantage of knowing the correlation between two variables is that ___________________. a. the size of the correlation helps determine whether the variables are important enough to devote further research to them b. one variable can be eliminated from the theory c. one variable can then be used to predict another d. this knowledge helps us understand the limitations of social research e. since correlation does not indicate casual relationships, there is no advantage

c. one variable can then be used to predict another

The self-defeating pattern of attributions exhibited by many depressed individuals can successfully be treated by therapies that encourage people to ___________________. a. blame others for their failures b. take credit for significant others' accomplishments and to blame themselves for negative outcomes c. take credit for successful outcomes and to avoid blaming themselves for all negative outcomes d. view some success and failures as due to external factors that they can control to some extent e. examine the roots of their depression that can be found in their repressed urges, inner conflicts or traumatic childhood events

c. take credit for successful outcomes and to avoid blaming themselves for all negative outcomes

Chelsea and Anita are both required to give a speech supporting a woman's right to abortion on demand in a public-speaking class. Anita believes that Chelsea gave her speech because she is a strong supporter of the right-to-choose movement. Anita is neutral on the topic and only gave her speech because it was assigned. Anita's belief about Chelsea is probably a result of ___________________. a. base rate bias b. explicit theory formation c. the discounting principle d. the actor-observer effect e. implicit theory formation

d. the actor-observer effect

A multicultural perspective is recognized as increasingly important to research in social psychology because ____________________. a. cultural factors are only important in some areas of research, such as research dealing with facial recognition b. cultural factors have a weak influence on social behavior c. some cultural factors may be important, but these factors have not yet been identified d. a variety of cultural factors such as race or ethnicity, sexual orientation, or disability help determine self-identity e. cultural factors are relatively unimportant in a heterogeneous society

d. a variety of cultural factors such as race or ethnicity, sexual orientation, or disability help determine self-identity

The relationship between how accurate first impressions are and how confident people are in their impressions of others is ___________________. a. positive and linear b. nonexistent c. strong and positive d. curvilinear e. strong and negative

d. curvilinear

We might think that a waiter who flirts with a customer does so because he liked to flirt if we observe this waiter flirting with several different customers while we eat. This best represents the concept of _______________. a. controllability b. consensus c. stability d. distinctiveness e. consistency

d. distinctiveness

Jackie took longer to reply to certain questions and the pitch of her voice rose considerably; these aspects of her ___________________ gave away that she was lying. a. lack of effect b. logical coherency c. choice of proper nouns d. linguistic style e. nonverbal cue

d. linguistic style

Ralph has been severely depressed for about six months and has difficulty remembering when he was not depressed. He is illustrating the effects of ____________________. a. mood-discongruency memory b. mood-related memory c. mood-congruent memory d. mood-dependent memory e. mood-assimilation memory

d. mood-dependent memory

Eric is a social psychologist who is respected in his field. However, his colleagues are often apprehensive of challenging Eric's strongly held ideas, even when they know that Eric's ideas are laden with errors, because Eric has been known to get upset when he has to question his assumptions. Eric struggled with maintaining the core value of _______________________. a. skepticism b. carefulness c. objectivity d. open-mindedness e. accuracy

d. open-mindedness

When touching is considered appropriate, it often produces ___________________ reactions in the person being touched. a. negative b. hostile c. surprise d. positive e. neutral

d. positive

Suppose you are telling your friend about a woman you just met. You tell your friend that this person seemed very compassionate and was interested in helping others; however, you couldn't recall whether she said she was a nurse or a businesswoman. On the basis of the ___________________ heuristic, your friend would probably think that she is a ___________________. a. availability; businesswoman b. priming; businesswoman c. representativeness; businesswoman d. representativeness; nurse e. availability; nurse

d. representativeness; nurse

Research has shown a positive correlation between 1) socio-economic status of the family of origin and 2) college graduation rates. Based on this information, we can conclude that _________________. a. students from wealthier families are more likely to have attended college preparatory schools b. students from poorer families have a more difficult time adjusting to college life c. socio-economic status of the family of origin is the cause of college graduation rates d. students born into wealthier families are more likely to complete college than students born into poorer families e. financial aid such as scholarships and student loans does not take the place of having strong financial backing from one's family during the college years

d. students born into wealthier families are more likely to complete college than students born into poorer families

Information that is consistent with our current affective state is more easily noticed and encoded into memory than is information that is inconsistent with our current affect. This is known as _________________ a. affect-cognition feedback b. affective state determined retrieval c. the Ebbinghaus effect d. the mood congruence effect e. mood dependent memory

d. the mood congruence effect

The evolutionary perspective on social behavior suggests that __________________. a. we are driven by our environments to act in specific ways b. we inherit specific patterns of social behavior c. much of our behavior is biologically determined and cannot be consciously known d. much of our behavior is controlled by our thought e. we inherit tendencies or predispositions to behave in certain ways

e. we inherit tendencies or predispositions to behave in certain ways