PSY 1010: Mod 2 Quiz

Match the design on the left with the description of the study on the right. True Experiment

A. You want to test whether drinking milk may affect bone density in women. You randomly assign women to either drink 20 oz of whole milk every day for 2 months, or to drink only water. You then compare the bone density of the women

Match the perception/thinking errors on the left with the examples on the right. Vividness

A. Your little sister has a severe allergy to bee stings. The last time she got stung, you watched her swell up and struggle to breathe until the paramedics got there. You also have a friend with mild asthma. When the news reports that asthma threatens the lives of more people than do allergies, you don't believe it.

Match the perception/thinking errors on the left with the examples on the right. Overconfidence

B. You are so sure that your brainy roommate is going to ace all of her classes, you publicly predict she will get a 4.0. When she gets a 3.8, you point out that she got A's in all but one class. You were mostly right.

Match the design on the left with the description of the study on the right. Quasi-Experiment

B. You want to test whether smoking cigarettes affects memory. You find a group of self-described heavy smokers, and match them to a group of non-smokers (of the same age and gender). You then administer a memory test to both groups, to see whether the smokers memories are better or worse than the non-smokers' memories.

Match the design on the left with the description of the study on the right. Descriptive Study

C. You perform a case study on your little sister in order to better understand the inner workings of the 10-year old female mind.

Match the perception/thinking errors on the left with the examples on the right. Hindsight Bias

C.Two friends are discussing whether the football game is on Thursday or Saturday this week. One of them looks it up, and announces the game is on Saturday. You think, "I knew that even before she looked it up."

Match the perception/thinking errors on the left with the examples on the right. Perceiving order in random events

D. You notice that your brainy roommate loves anchovy pizza. The biology TA also mentions that she loves anchovy pizza. When you find out that your physics professor also loves anchovy pizza, you deduce that smart people like anchovies.

Match the design on the left with the description of the study on the right. Correlational Study

D. You test whether income affects happiness by asking 200 people how much money they make, and to rate how happy they are.

Which of the following research questions would be best tested with a quasi-experimental design, rather than a true experimental design?

Do college women floss more often than college men?

One of the following statements about quasi-experiments is NOT TRUE. Which is it?

True Experiments use operational definitions, but quasi-experiments don't.

Match the way of knowing on the left with the example on the right. Authority

You consult a dictionary to find out how to spell the word "epistemology"

Match the way of knowing on the left with the example on the right. Intuition

You have an inexplicable liking for a person you just met. You just know you're going to be friends.

Match the way of knowing on the left with the example on the right. Empiricism

You notice that the parking lot is full on Mondays and Wednesdays by 8:00 am, but not on Tuesdays and Thursdays.

Match the way of knowing on the left with the example on the right. Logic

You reason that you will need to borrow a van to pick up 7 friends from the airport, because your car only holds 5.

In my experiment to test whether drinking caffeinated coffee will improve test scores, which of the following would make the best placebo?

a cup of decaffeinated coffee

If I want to test my theory that drinking caffeinated coffee right before an exam will improve performance on the exam, which of the following describes an appropriate control group?

a group of participants who do not drink caffeinated coffee before the exam

Random assignment is important in a true experiment because it...

allows you to manage confounding variables without having to measure and control each of them

Disclaimer: the following example statement is not necessarily true: I made it up for the purposes of this exercise. The correlation between minutes spent in daily aerobic exercise and mood (higher scores = better mood) is +0.64. This means that: (Choose all of the correct statements below: 2 are correct).

as exercise increases, mood increases the correlation is moderate

If I want to test my theory that drinking caffeinated coffee before an exam will improve performance on that exam. Match the following variables with their descriptions: Independent Variable

drinking 1 cup of caffeinated coffee

If I want to test my theory that drinking caffeinated coffee before an exam will improve performance on that exam. Match the following variables with their descriptions: Confounding Variable

drinking a caffeinated energy drink

If I want to test my theory that drinking caffeinated coffee before an exam will improve performance on that exam. Match the following variables with their descriptions: Dependent Variable

exam score

Is the following a theory or a hypothesis? People who spend more than $100 at the grocery store are more likely than those who spend less than $100 to donate cash to a charity when invited to by the cashier.

hypothesis

Is the following a theory or a hypothesis? Women will make more progress on a 500 piece puzzle than men will during a 20 minute period while they are talking on the phone.

hypothesis

Which of the following are necessary components for a true experiment? (hint: two are correct)

random assignment manipulation of the independent variable

Is the following a theory, or a hypothesis? Dog owners are friendlier than cat owners.

theory

Is the following a theory, or a hypothesis? Women can multi-task better than men.

theory

The best way to establish causality (figuring out whether changing one variable causes changes in another variable) is to perform a true experiment.

true

Disclaimer: the following is not necessarily true: I made it up for the purposes of this exercise. The correlation between minutes spent in daily aerobic exercise and mood (higher scores = better mood) is +0.64. Which conclusion can you draw?

we can predict people's moods based on exercise