PSY 201 - Test #2

Which of the following areas is located in the frontal lobe of the brain?

Broca's area

The scientific process is ________, involving both inductive and deductive reasoning.

circular

When a child works on a "connect the dots" puzzle, she can often see the completed work before she has finished all of the dots. Once there is enough visual information present, she's able to perceive the completed picture even though it is still incomplete. Which Gestalt principle does this demonstrate?

closure

Which one of the following processes does not occur to excess neurotransmitters in the synapse?

collection by scavenger vesicles left over from the neurotransmitter release

How is an explicit memory different from an implicit memory?

Explicit memories are memories we consciously try to remember and recall, while implicit memories are those that are not part of our consciousness.

Lesley, a sociology major, believes that money is the key to happiness. Her friend Stephen, a psychology major, believes that good health is the key to happiness. How might the two friends resolve their disagreement?

They could research peer-reviewed articles to see if either perspective is supported.

Within the semantic network model of memory, what would happen to concepts that are related to (or attached) to one that is currently being activated by thinking about it?

They would also be activated, though at a lower level.

Parsons and her colleagues are doing a study comparing differences in brain activity levels between patients with schizophrenia and controls with no psychological disorders. Their hypothesis requires a high level of detail and good detection of differences over time. Which of the following is the best brain imaging technique to use?

functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI)

Wendy's mother has blue eyes and her father has brown eyes. The allele for brown eye color is dominant (B) to the allele for blue eye color (b), but Wendy has blue eyes. Therefore, Wendy's ________ must be ________ and her father's must be Bb.

genotype; bb

The myelin sheath is made from ________.

glial cells

One principle of civil engineering is that when you design a highway you should have traffic flow in the same direction and avoid interruptions to that flow as much as possible. Exit ramps tend to be curved so that cars don't have to stop rather than having 90-degree angles that force stops and starts. This is an application of which Gestalt principle?

good continuation

Terri Schiavo went into cardiac arrest and her brain was deprived of oxygen, leaving only her brainstem functioning. Which of the following functions could Schiavo still accomplish?

groan and move her eyes

A public opinion poll was administered to 50 people before the election of President Barack Obama. Polls taken before election night showed 50% of the people polled believed Barack Obama would be elected president. After the election results, the same people were asked if they believed Barack Obama would be elected president, and this time 75% of the people said yes. This may be an example of ________ bias.

hindsight

Which part of my brain is probably damaged if I am unable to recognize basic objects around my house?

hippocampus

________ is a state of equilibrium, in which biological conditions (such as body temperature) are maintained at optimal levels

homeostasis

Elaina has been diagnosed with a small brain tumor. She first went to see her doctor after experiencing symptoms such as feeling very cold, almost fainting, a reduced appetite, and reduced sexual desire. Which of the following structures is her tumor most likely affecting?

hypothalamus

The belief that strange behavior is linked to the occurrence of a full moon is an example of a(n) ________.

illusory correlation

Your memory of how to ride a bicycle is probably something that you don't actively think about while you're riding. You just sort of "do it" without thinking of how you do it. This is an example of a(n) ________ memory.

implicit

In a resting state, sodium (Na+) is at a higher concentration outside the cell and potassium (K+) is more concentrated inside the cell. During an action potential, the sodium levels ________ inside the cell.

increase

As you are talking to a friend on your cell phone, you might find that you can't hear them because they are speaking very softly. If you ask them to "speak up," from a physical perspective you are asking them to ________ of the sound waves they are producing.

increase the amplitude

A group of researchers investigated the effects of two vocabulary learning strategies on word retention two weeks later. In this example, learning strategy is the ________ variable and word retention is the ________ variable.

independent; dependent

What is episodic memory?

information about events we have personally experienced

Kelsey had a CT scan that showed a tumor in the right frontal cortex. Which of the following behavioral symptoms most likely prompted the scan to take place?

motor skill deficits in the left side of her body

Dmitris is in a car accident and his parietal lobe is injured. Which of the following is the most likely behavioral effect of his accident?

no sensation in his legs and feet

Felicia smacks her thumb with a hammer while building a doghouse. The sense of ________ provides her brain with information about the pain she feels.

nociception

People who have their corpus callosum severed for medical reasons would be able to tell you about which images shown to ________.

only the right visual field

A(n) ________ is a description of how the researchers will measure the variables of interest.

operational definition

Which nerve carries visual information from the retina to the brain?

optic

The ________ nervous system is responsible for stimulating digestion and causing the bladder to contract.

parasympathetic

Ainsley is participating in a study that aims to determine whether the occipital cortex becomes more active in response to moving versus stationary stimuli. When she arrives at the lab, she ingests a "tracer" and then enters the scanning machine. What type of brain imaging is most likely being conducted in this study?

positron emission tomography (PET)

Kenethia enjoys knitting. When she begins college, she has less time for knitting and finally stops altogether. After graduation, she wants to knit again, so she practices with her needles until she is good at it again. This is an example of ________, a means of retrieving information out of your long-term memory storage system.

relearning

The ability of a research study or psychological instrument to consistently produce a given result is called ________.

reliability

Which of the following is a good example of the use of a mnemonic?

remembering the names of the Great Lakes with the acronym HOMES

The act of getting information out of memory storage and back into conscious awareness is known as ________.

retrieval

Katya studies Spanish for three years, and then switches to Pashto. When asked to remember Spanish vocabulary she can't; instead she can only remember Pashto vocabulary. This is an example of ________ interference.

retroactive

Elaine wakes up in the hospital with a head injury. She gets to know her doctors and nurses over time, but it soon becomes clear that she has no memories from before she woke up in the hospital. Elaine has ________ amnesia.

retrograde

________ are the most commonly used species for animal research.

rodents

Wesley is in a movie theater with no windows—the only light is low illumination from the emergency lights on the floor. Which photoreceptors will be most useful to Wesley as he attempts to leave the theater?

rods

Ben is asked to memorize the words canine, feline, and avian. He remembers the words by associating them with their synonyms: dog, cat, and bird. This is an example of ________

semantic

What kind of memory involves storage of brief events, such as sights, sounds, and tastes?

sensory

Catherine is at a crowded baseball game when she loses track of her son, Nick. Despite the loud cheering and noise of the crowd, she can pinpoint his location when he calls for her because she can distinguish the sound of his voice from the all the other voices. This illustrates ________ theory.

signal detection

Nikki was walking around a department store shopping one day, and did not realize that the shirt she was wearing looked just like the shirts worn by employees. When a stranger asked, "do you work here," she thought it was funny. The other customers' assumption that Nikki was a store employee demonstrates the Gestalt principle of _______.

similarity

Which of the following senses is not first routed through the thalamus?

smell

Sensory and motor neurons of the ________ nervous system are associated with activities traditionally thought of as conscious or voluntary.

somatic

Which of the following is not a way you can use what you know about memory to help you remember the names of all 50 states?

stay up the night before your exam to maximize the amount of time you have to study

Jeremy has Parkinson's disease, a progressive neurodegenerative disease that affects motor skills. In addition to motor symptoms, Jeremy has noticed changes in his mood. It is likely that Jeremy's ________ is producing less ________ than it needs to.

substantia nigra; dopamine

Dozens of people witness a purse snatching. One of the eyewitnesses loudly yells "the man with the blue shirt did it." Later, when questioned by police, several other eyewitnesses remember the purse snatcher wearing a blue shirt, even though the purse snatcher was a woman in flowered dress. This is an example of ________, or the effects of misinformation from external sources that leads to the creation of false memories.

suggestibility

The ________ nervous system is responsible for responses such as pupil dilation, increased heart rate, and increased respiration

sympathetic

The space between two neurons is called the ________.

synapse

The somatosensory cortex is responsible for processing ________.

temperature, touch, and pain

Sandra strongly believes that attending daycare is detrimental to children's development so she decides to write her psychology term paper on this topic. She does a literature search and finds several sources supporting her opinion, but she finds that the majority of research indicates that children attending daycare experience healthy development. She writes a paper using the sources that find negative associations with daycare attendance. This is an example of ________.

confirmation bias

A(n) ________ variable is a factor that affects both variables of interest in research and may falsely give the impression of a cause-and-effect relationship.

confounding

Ronaldo was born without the ability to experience pain, though he can perceive temperature differences and changes in pressure. What is his condition called?

congenital analgesia

The formulation of new memories is sometimes called ________, and the process of bringing up old memories is called ________.

construction; reconstruction

An upper-level psychology class is conducting an experiment on racial prejudice that involves having participants rate the likeability of faces in a set of photos. However, they tell participants that the study is about the effects of aging on likeability. When participants are finished, they are thanked for their time and leave the experiment. In this example, the class forgot to ________ in order to resolve the ________ in the study.

debrief participants; deception

Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) are drugs commonly prescribed for ________.

depression

Which of the following is not a part sympathetic activation during the fight or flight response?

digestion functions become more active

Amarah has an exam in a week, so she schedules 30 to 60 minutes each night to review her course material. She does this rather than waiting until the night before the exam so that she can avoid a "cram session." Amarah's approach to studying is called ________ practice.

distributed

Which two neurotransmitters have roles in appetite suppression?

dopamine; norepinephrine

In a ________ study, both the researchers and the participants are unaware of the group assignments.

double-blind

Barney used to live in Pittsburgh, and his telephone number started with the area code 412. Now he has moved to Baltimore, and his new telephone number has an area code of 410. Barney remembers his new area code by connecting it to the old one and just "subtracting two." This is an example of ________ rehearsal.

elaborative

The theory of ________ states that organisms that are better suited for their environment will survive and reproduce, while those that are poorly suited for their environment will die off.

evolution by natural selection

Changes in behavior and cognitive processes over time are studied by ________.

evolutionary psychologists

Which of the following research designs will allow cause-and-effect conclusions?

experimental

Which of the following is not part of obtaining informed consent?

explaining the hypothesis to the participants

I am trying to learn the names of all 50 states. Because I am actively and consciously remembering and recalling this information, it is considered ________ memory.

explicit

What type of memories do we consciously try to remember, recall, and report?

explicit memories

Gyri and sulci are the ________ and ________, respectively, which characterize the surface of the human brain.

folds; grooves

Psychological knowledge is advanced through a process known as ________, which involves a prescribed series of steps designed to achieve the desired knowledge.

the scientific method

Elaborative rehearsal involves ________.

thinking about the meaning of the new information and its relation to knowledge already stored in your memory

A particular electrical signal being transmitted to a neuron is sufficient to generate an action potential. If the magnitude of the incoming electrical signal is doubled, the action potential will ________.

undergo no changes in strength, speed, or duration

Ebbinghaus found that about one day after you learn new material, you will only remember ____ percent of it if you have not reviewed it a second time.

30

Recent research conducted by Cowan (2010) has found that the capacity of working memory is how many units of information?

4 plus or minus 1

Which school of thinking in psychology includes the following concepts: figure-ground relationship, law of continuity, and principle of closure?

Gestalt

What was the overall result of Lashley's research that sought out the engram of human memory?

He found no evidence that an engram actual exists.

Henry Gustav Molaison (H. M.) had brain surgery for which of the following reasons?

He had severe seizures

What is the main idea of levels of processing theory?

If you want to remember a piece of information, you should think about it more deeply and link it to other information and memories to make it more meaningful.

What has research shown about processing subliminal messages?

In laboratory settings, people can process and respond to information outside of their awareness

The first woman to earn the PhD degree in psychology was ________.

Margaret Floy Washburn

Which of the following conclusions can be drawn from the case study of Phineas Gage's accident, which led to brain injury?

Injury to the brain causes changes in behavior, and specific brain areas are linked to particular behaviors.

________ (IRB) reviews research that is involves the use of human participants.

Institutional Review Board

From a cognitive psychology perspective, why is getting plenty of sleep the night before an exam important?

It allows for consolidation of studied material in long-term memory

Two lines appear to be a different length, though in reality they are the same length. This is known as the ________ illusion.

Müller-Lyer

________ refers to the way that sensory information is interpreted and consciously experienced; ________ refers to what happens when sensory information is detected by a sensory receptor.

Perception; sensation

This organization, one of the largest professional groups of psychologists in the world, was founded in 1892.

The American Psychological Association

Imagine yourself in a dark classroom reading PowerPoint slides. If an audience member were to check the internet using her cell phone and causing her screen to light up, chances are that many people would notice the change in illumination in the classroom. However, if the same thing happened in a brightly lit classroom during a discussion, very few people would notice. The cell phone brightness does not change, but its ability to be detected as a change in illumination varies dramatically between the two contexts. This is an example of ________.

Weber's law

When considering the wavelength of a radio wave - like the kind you hear when listening to music as you drive along - you would be correct to think that the size is this wave is about as long as

a building

When you watch the teacher at the front of the room, you are easily able to distinguish her from the white board (or chalk board) behind her. This demonstrates the Gestalt principle of ________.

a figure-ground relationship

Sharmila cannot remember what she had for breakfast last week, but she can remember the day she got married ten years ago as clearly as if it just happened. This example illustrates the ________ theory.

arousal

What is an engram?

a group of neurons that serves as physical representation of a memory

Which word is the most appropriate synonym for the term validity?

accuracy

Terrance finds it difficult to learn the alphabet, until he hears the alphabet song. Then he can easily remember it. This is an example of ________ encoding.

acoustic

A(n) ________ is the electrical signal that typically moves from the neuron's cell body down the axon to the axon terminals.

action potential

What term describes the continuation of a visual sensation after removal of the stimulus?

afterimage

If I am looking at a snake and processing the fear caused by the snake, what part of my brain am I using?

amygdala

Which is the main type of chemical messengers secreted by the male gonads?

androgens

What does the equipotentiality hypothesis suggest would happen if the hippocampus was damaged?

another part of the brain would compensate for the damage by taking over the memory function normally managed by the hippocampus

The famous case of H.M. demonstrated ________ amnesia, a condition in which a person can remember previously encoded memories but cannot encode new ones.

anterograde

________ is a neurotransmitter with roles in pleasure and pain modulation

beta-endorphin

Akeelah extended her arm in front of her and then extended one of her fingers. She focused on that finger. Next, she closed her left eye without moving her head; then she opened her left eye and closed her right eye without moving her head. She noticed that her finger seemed to shift as she alternated between the two eyes because of the slightly different view each eye had of her finger. What is illustrated by this example?

binocular disparity

Which of the following brain processes is not a function of the cerebral cortex?

breathing

Studies that cannot ethically be conducted as experiments with typical human participants ________.

can sometimes be tested with animal studies

The two major divisions of the nervous system are the ________ and ________.

central; peripheral nervous systems

Which part of the brain is most involved in creating implicit memories?

cerebellum

Human eggs and sperm each contain 23 ________, which are composed of long strands of ________.

chromosomes; DNA

Elena finds it very difficult to remember a long string of numbers, so she tries to memorize three numbers at a time. Later, she is able to repeat the numbers correctly because she grouped the numbers into more manageable groups of three. This is an example of ________.

chunking

One example of ________ is the differences between hemispheres in the areas underlying language function.

lateralization

In a person whose eyes work in the usual fashion, the ________ will focus images perfectly on a small indentation in the back of the eye known as the ________.

lens; fovea

Randolf is walking down the street of his hometown, after being away for several years, when he smells the scent of freshly baked pie coming from a local baker. He suddenly has vivid memories of walking down this street as a child, holding both of his parents' hands, and swinging between them, feeling relaxed and happy. This is because the sense of smell projects directly to the ________, which is responsible for emotional memories.

limbic system

The ________ is the difference in charge between the intracellular and extracellular space of a neuron

membrane potential

Hyperpolarization means that the ________.

membrane potential becomes more negative than the resting potential

What is the set of processes used to encode, store, and retrieve information over different periods of time?

memory

When Benito was five he cut his leg on some glass and needed stiches. Years later, his mother tells him the scar came from being bit by a dog. Now, when people ask about his scar he distinctly remembers the dog biting him. This is an example of the ________.

misinformation effect paradigm

If you watch a flock of birds flying overhead, each very close to the next one, you may perceive them as all being part of the same group. If they were all spaced very much apart, however, you may see them as individual birds not flying together. This distinction takes advantage of which Gestalt principle?

proximity

In order to maximize the chances that experimental groups represent the population of interest, researchers should conduct ________ and ________.

random sampling; random group assignment

________ asserts that our genes set the boundaries within which we can operate, and our environment interacts with our genes to determine where within those boundaries we will fall.

range of reaction

When you take a multiple-choice test, you are relying on ________, because you are comparing the information in front of you to that which is already stored in your long-term memory.

recognition

In order to remember his lines for the play, Guy repeats his lines over and over again. This process is called ________.

rehearsal

You see a television commercial for a product you may want to buy, and there is a telephone number you must call to place an order. Because you don't have anything with which to write down the number, you repeat it to yourself over and over again until you feel like you won't forget it. This process is called ________.

rehearsal