Unit 1 psych
Which of the following most accurately describes a dependent variable?
Some aspect of a participant's response that is measured in an experiment
In an experiment designed to determine whether watching violent scenes on television increases the frequency of aggressive behavior in children, one group of subjects saw a nonviolent cartoon and another group saw a violent cartoon. In the play period that followed the viewing of the cartoons, researchers observed the two groups of children together and counted instances of aggressive behavior. The dependent variable in the experiment is the
amount of aggressive behavior exhibited by the children
Which of the following perspectives argues that every person has the potential to become self-actualized?
humanistic
Research on human mating preferences suggests that men place greater value on physical attractiveness and youthfulness, whereas women place greater value on social status and financial resources. Which of the following psychological points of view best explains this behavior?
Evolutionary
dr. grayson is interested in studying the relationship between weight loss and mood. to conduct the study, dr.grayson analyzes the results of several previous studies on weight loss and emotional state. which research strategy is dr. grayson using?
Meta analysis
Operational definitions are used for which of the following reasons?
They enable researchers to replicate studies by precisely describing the variables and how they are used.
Which of the following best describes the response of members of the American Psychological Association to ethical issues in research?
They have developed codes of ethics for research with both human participants and animal subjects.
the first area of psychology to be studied as a science is known as
psychophysics
In order to yield information that is generalizable to the population from which it was drawn a sample must be
representative of the population
Dorothea Dix was known for
documenting the poor conditions of mental asylums, which eventually led to their reform
which of the following is the strongest correlations
-.90
2, 11, 2, 3, 3, 4, 2, 5 What is the mode of the number set above?
2
−3, 3, 0, 3, −3 What is the standard deviation of the numbers above?
3
10,3,5,7,10,3,105,2 the numbers above represent the quiz results for a psychology class. What is the median score for the class?
5
12, 3, 3, 4, 8 What is the mean of the set of numbers above?
6
A test has a mean of 80 with a standard deviation of 4. Which of the following scores is within one standard deviation of the mean?
77
Which of the following accurately describes a major change in perspective in the field of developmental psychology over the past twenty-five years?
A shift from an emphasis on childhood and adolescence to an interest in development over the life span
Which of the following characterizes a behavioral approach to psychology?
A study of how reinforcement affects learning
A research design involves two randomly assigned groups of participants. One group receives a onetime treatment and the other does not. Later the two groups are compared to see whether the treatment had the effect. Psychologists call this kind of research
An experiment
To determine whether a cause effect relationship exist between two variables a researcher must use
An experimental approach
Which of the following would an industrial organizational psychologist be least likely to study
Corporate profitability
There is a strong positive correlation between ice cream sales and instances of snakebites. Which of the following is the most likely explanation for this correlation?
Hot weather is related to both ice cream sales and snake activity.
In studying the behavior of five year olds in free play situations, a cognitive psychologist would be most interested in the children's
Problem solving strategies
Respondents to surveys and questionnaires often report that they are healthier, happier, and less prejudiced than would be expected based on the results of other types of research. This finding can best be explained by which of the following?
The social desirability bias
Ethical principles developed by the American Psychological Association help ensure that human participants in psychological research
are protected from physical and psychological harm
The social desirability bias
change in hair length
Although Paul seems bright and capable to his parents and friends, he has been failing in school. Paul agrees to speak with a psychologist, who suggests that his problems stem from internal processes such as unrealistic expectations and negative thinking. The psychologist's view is typical of which of the following models of behavior?
cognitive
C documenting the poor conditions of mental asylums, which eventually led to their reform
cognitive
Drawing a random sample of people from a town for an interview study of social attitudes ensures that
each person in town has the same probability of being chosen for the study
Cognitive theorists emphasize the
formation and modification of schemas
A survey shows that children who have encyclopedias in their homes earn better grades in school than children whose homes lack encyclopedias. The researcher concludes that having encyclopedias at home improves grades. This conclusion is erroneous primarily because the researcher has incorrectly
inferred causation from correlation
Which of the following is a statistical approach concerned with forming conclusions about the effect of the independent variable on variations in the dependent variable?
infertinal
the men's is higher than the median in any distribution that
is positively skewed
In which of the following types of research are the same children tested periodically at different points in their development?
longitudinal
Which of the following research methods is being used if the same subjects are tested at two four and six years of age
longitudinal
The correlation between two measures obtained on a group of individuals is graphically represented as a
scatter plot
The most distinctive characteristic of the experimental method is that it
seeks to establish cause-effect relationships
The next question(s) are based on this scenario: A researcher randomly assigned boys and girls to each of two groups. One group watched a violent television program while the other group watched a nonviolent program. The children were then observed during a period of free play, and the incidence of aggressive behavior was recorded for each group. independent variable
type of television programs
Marjorie's little brother tends to bother her when he is bored. Marjorie wants to figure out which toy will keep her brother occupied the longest so he will not bother her. She conducts a study where each day at 6P.M. for a week she gives her brother a different toy and on one of the days she gives him no toys to play with. She measures the amount of time he spends playing with each toy before he comes to bother her. Which of the following is the independent variable in this example?
type of toy
Which of the following studies is from an evolutionary perspective
A study to see if women were more attracted to men who liked children than men who did not like children
What is the correct chronological order of the following perspectives of psychology, from past to present? Behaviorism Psychoanalysis Structuralism Humanism
III, II, I, IV
A research psychologist generalizes from a particular to an entire population. This is an example
Statistical inference
A person displays a set of rare behaviors that psychologists had not known about previously, because nobody had ever shown them before. The best strategy to investigate the nature of those behaviors is
a case study
Dr. Larson was interested in whether classical music helps students perform better on a test. Dr. Larson randomly assigned half of the study's participants to a group that listened to classical music while taking a test. The other half of the participants did not listen to music while taking a test. The research design Dr. Larson used is
an experiment
A basic assumption underlying the evolutionary approach to sexual attraction is that men seek potential mates who
appear fertile
Synesthesia is a phenomenon that has been estimated to occur in only a few people in a million. Because of its rarity, researchers are likely to choose which research method to study it?
case study
in a research study informed consent is a concern of a
ethics
The next question(s) are based on this scenario: A researcher randomly assigned boys and girls to each of two groups. One group watched a violent television program while the other group watched a nonviolent program. The children were then observed during a period of free play, and the incidence of aggressive behavior was recorded for each group. dependent
incidence of aggressive behavior
Martha is an undergraduate student who is interested in pursuing a career in psychology. She wants to use her knowledge of psychology to help employees become more productive in the workplace. Which field of psychology should Martha select in graduate school?
industrial/organizational
Jane Goodall lived among wild chimpanzees intermittently for decades, studying their social and family systems while keeping her interaction with the chimpanzees to a minimum. Her research method can most accurately be described as
naturalistic observation
In psychology, Gestalt principles are used to explain
statistical probabilities
cognitive psychologists are most likely to study
the acquisition of knowledge, planning, and problem solving
A teacher finds the distribution of scores on a final exam to be positively skewed with low variability. On the basis of this information, the teacher would be most justified in concluding that
the exam was to difficult
A researcher is trying to determine whether a new painkilling medicine is effective in reducing headaches. Twenty adult participants sit in a noisy environment for 30 minutes and then rate the severity of their headaches on a scale from 0 (none) to 5 (intense). Group M (the medicine group) receives a normal dose of the medicine. Group C (the control group) rests quietly. After 20 minutes, all participants again complete the headache rating scale. The statistically significant differences in headache severity on the posttest appear in the graph below.
the medicine
Gestalt psychology is concerned primarily with understanding which of the following?
development
Of the following, an evolutionary psychologist will most likely investigate the
reason why many people have an innate fear of the dark
In developmental psychology, one advantage of cross-sectional over longitudinal studies is that cross-sectional research
requires comparatively little time
Professor Ahad has forty-three students in section one of the psychology classes she teaches and fifty-two students in section two. Section one meets at eight a.m. and, section two meets at one p.m. Professor Ahad gives all of her students the same final exam, and those in section two score significantly higher than those in section one. Professor Ahad concludes that her section one students are academically inferior to students in section two. The biggest problem with Professor Ahad's conclusion is that
time of day is a confounding variable in this scenario.
Researchers have found a negative correlation between income and dental problems. What conclusion can correctly be drawn from this statement?
As income increases, the likelihood of dental problems decreases.
A double-blind control is essential for which of the following?
Assessment of a treatment designed to reduce schizophrenic symptoms
John B. Watson is best known as the founder of
Behaviorism
What is the best way to ensure that results of a study are generalizable to a population
By using a random selection of people in that population
In a normal distribution, which of the following statements is true about the area that falls between one standard deviation above and one standard deviation below the mean?
D It contains the middle 68% of the distribution.
In an experiment to test the effects of hunger on aggressive behavior aggressive behavior would be the
Dependent variable
An important difference between humanistic approaches is that humanistic psychologists believe in the importance of
Free will
According to the ethical guidelines set by the APA which of the following is true of psychological research in which animals are used as subjects
It should conform to all APA ethical guidelines for animal research
In their discussions of the process of development the advocates of nature nurture controversy emphasize which of the following
Maturation
disadvantage of longitudinal studies that
Participants who drop out during the course of the study may be different in important ways from ones who do not drop out
Of the following topics, which would a cognitive psychologist be most likely to study?
Problem-solving strategies in chess
The belief that human behavior is the result of unconscious drives and conflicts represents which of the following theoretical perspectives?
Psychoanalytic
Introspection a research tool used by early psychologist is a technique which involves
Self examination of mental processes
Which of the following studies demonstrates a cross sectional research design
Testing first, third, and fifth graders at the beginning of the school year
A research group conducted a study investigating the connection between self-reported number of hours slept in a given week and scores on a happiness measure. Based on the scatterplot above, the group can report that there is
a positive correlation
Research finds that, in general, the higher an incoming college student scores on a given test, the higher the student's college grade point average (GPA). Which of the following best describes this relationship?
a positive correlation
Ivan Pavlov was most well known for which of the following?
conditioning dogs to salivate to the sound of a bell
Which procedure can reduce problems associated with the use of deception by a researcher
debriefing
In an experiment which of the following variables refers to the outcome that is measured by the experiment
dependent
Introspection as practiced by early structuralists is best illustrated by which of the following behaviors?
describing one's immediate sensations while looking at a rose
Experimental research differs from correlational research in that experimental research
may reveal a causal relationship
Which of the following is used to reduce the effects of confounding variables in experiments?
random assignment
all of the following are American Psychological Association ethical guidelines for researchers EXCEPT:
researcher may not involve deception
A researcher surveyed social adjustment in the same group of 20 people from early childhood through adulthood. In this example, the group of 20 people surveyed was the study's
sample
Researchers find that there is a significant, positive correlation between the number of hours students sleep and their grades. The researchers would be justified in concluding that
students who earned good grades tend to sleep more than those who do not
An evolutionary psychologist would explain that humans desire social interaction social acceptance and social affiliation due to a need for
survival
A researcher is trying to determine whether a new painkilling medicine is effective in reducing headaches. Twenty adult participants sit in a noisy environment for 30 minutes and then rate the severity of their headaches on a scale from 0 (none) to 5 (intense). Group M (the medicine group) receives a normal dose of the medicine. Group C (the control group) rests quietly. After 20 minutes, all participants again complete the headache rating scale. The statistically significant differences in headache severity on the posttest appear in the graph below.
the medicine was more effective than quiet rest
Which of the following approaches to psychology emphasizes observable responses over inner experiences when accounting for behavior?
behaviorist
Which of the following is a term for a variable that researchers do not control and that can affect the results of a study?
confounding variable
According to Wilhelm Wundt, the focus of scientific psychology should be the study of
conscious experience
The debate over whether development occurs gradually,without discernible shifts or through a series of distinct stages is termed
continuity vs. discontinuity
One major objection to the early Skinnerian approach to psychology is that it
did not take into account the internal thoughts and feelings
In experimental psychology, a significant difference refers to a
difference not likely due to chance
An industrial-organizational psychologist would be most likely to study the
effectiveness of management training
Of the following, a behavioral psychologist is most likely to study the
effects of token economies on establishing social skills among children with emotional disturbances
The next question(s) are based on this scenario: A researcher randomly assigned boys and girls to each of two groups. One group watched a violent television program while the other group watched a nonviolent program. The children were then observed during a period of free play, and the incidence of aggressive behavior was recorded for each group. This research method is best characterized as
experimental
Which of the following research approaches would be best for testing the hypothesis that the presence of certain odors causes people to gamble more?
experimental
a researcher use debriefing when he
explains the true purpose of the study immediately after the study has ended
The most important reason to use operational definitions in psychological research is it
helps everyone involved with the research understand and collect data in the same manner.
