Midterm Study Guide
29 __________is a method of brain imaging that passes a narrow X-ray beam through the head and measures the structures that reflect the beams from various angles, generating a three-dimensional image.
Computerized axial tomography
9 Structuralists tended to ask, "What are the pieces that make up thinking and experience?" In contrast, _____ tended to ask, "How do behavior and mental processes help people adapt to the requirements of their lives?
Functionalists
85 _____ is an altered state of consciousness in which people are highly suggestible and behave as though they are in a trance.
Hypnosis
88 Which of the following statements is true of alcohol?
It dilates blood vessels.
20 Which of the following is a function of norepinephrine?
It is involved in general arousal, learning and memory, and eating.
66 Which of the following best describes psychokinesis?
It refers to the ability to mentally manipulate or move objects.
67 Which of the following is an altered state of consciousness?
Meditation
92 __________is an example of a hallucinogenic drug.
Mescaline
82 __________may accompany narcolepsy and is characterized by the collapse of muscle groups or the entire body.
Sleep paralysis
10 Sean believes that many of our unconscious ideas and impulses stem from our childhood conflicts. Based on his beliefs, it can be said that Sean is a _____.
Psychoanalyst
14 Which of the following statements is true of the scientific method?
Psychologists are guided by principles of critical thinking as they try to draw conclusions from research evidence collected through the scientific method.
5 _____ is the scientific study of behavior and mental processes.
Psychology
90 Which of the following statements is true of stimulants?
They increase the activity of the nervous system.
91 Which of the following statements is true of amphetamines?
They provide a euphoric rush when consumed in high doses.
45 Which of the following is true of feature detectors?
They refer to neurons that fire in response to specific features of sensory stimuli.
What is the purpose of a split-brain operation?
To confine epileptic seizures to one hemisphere of the cerebral cortex
139. The _____ is the feeling that information is stored in memory although it cannot be readily retrieved.
b. tip-of-the-tongue phenomenon
62 Vibrations in the fluids within the chambers of the inner ear press against the________
basilar membrane
129. Which of the following is true about maintenance rehearsal?
c. It involves mentally repeating a list or saying the information to oneself.
145. Which of the following statements is true about retroactive interference?
c. It is the interference of new learning with the ability to retrieve material learned previously.
128. Jason, while standing on the deck of a ship, is trying to memorize distant landmarks to the harbor entrance; he is trying to create a mental picture of all the names. He is using _____.
c. a visual code
104. Albert was once awoken from his sleep by a white rat that fell on him. Following this incident, he began fearing all furry white objects including white fur coats and white stuffed animals. In this scenario, Albert's fear of all furry white objects is due to _____.
c. generalization
119. In a variable-interval schedule, reinforcement is provided after a _____.
c. random amount of time has passed
133. When we look at a visual stimulus, our impressions may seem fluid enough; however, they consist of a series of eye fixations referred to as _____.
c. saccadic eye movements
147. The difference between the number of repetitions originally required to learn a list and the number of repetitions required to relearn the list after a certain amount of time has elapsed is known as__________.
c. saving
132. When we look at a visual stimulus, our impressions of it may seem fluid enough. This is because
c. sensory memory briefly holds perceptions, making them seem connected.
30 The electroencephalograph is a method of:
detecting brain waves by means of measuring the current between electrodes placed on the scalp.
68 The knowledge of one's own thoughts, feelings, and memories without the use of sensory organs is known as _____.
direct inner awareness
60 Which of the following is contained in the middle ear?
The eardrum
65 __________is the sense of equilibrium that informs us about our bodies' positions relative to gravity.
The vestibular sense
13 Identify a true statement about social-cognitive theorists.
They note that people engage in intentional learning by observing others.
59 _____ is the process by which we organize or make sense of the sensory impressions caused by the light that strikes our eyes.
Visual perception
122. Which of the following statements is true of programmed learning?
a. It reinforces correct responses.
127. __________is the activation of specific associations in memory, often as a result of repetition and without making a conscious effort to access the memory.
a. Priming
138. In the context of Long-term memory, which of the following statements is true of flashbulb memory?
a. Stimuli that stand out are preserved in detail in a person's long-term memory.
117. Identify a true statement about the types of reinforcers.
a. The short-term consequences of behavior often provide more of an incentive than the long-term consequences.
106. Zoya is teaching her dog to salivate every time she flashes a blue torchlight. To teach him to do this, she flashes the torchlight every time she gives him food. Later, he salivates on seeing the torchlight even when it is not paired with food. In this scenario, Zoya's dog salivating to the blue torchlight is an example of a(n) _____.
a. conditioned response
146. In the context of forgetting, the failure to identify something that one has experienced is measured through__________.
a. recognition
149. In the context of neural activity and memory, the brain stores parts of memories in the appropriate areas of the__________.
a. sensory cortex
116. In the context of operant conditioning, gamblers at slot machines win on a _____.
a. variable-ratio schedule
19 Every time a neuron fires, it transmits an impulse of the same strength. This occurrence is known as the__________.
all-or-none principle
72 People with frequent nightmares:
are more likely than others to have anxiety and depression.
84 In the context of hypnotic suggestibility, suggestible people:
are prone to fantasy.
144. _____ is the loss of memory of personal information that is thought to stem from psychological conflict or trauma.
c. Dissociative amnesia
135. __________is the sensory register that briefly holds mental representations of auditory stimuli.
c. Echoic memory
108. Identify a true statement about taste aversions.
c. They motivate organisms to avoid harmful foods.
111. In the context of operant conditioning, the removal of a pleasant stimulus is known as__________.
c. negative punishment
121. Biofeedback training, behavior modification, and programmed learning are all applications of__________.
c. operant conditioning
150. If the__________is damaged, a person can form visual memories but not verbal memories.
c. thalamus
12 Psychologists with a(n) _____ perspective primarily venture into the realm of mental processes such as sensation and perception, memory, intelligence, language, thought, and problem solving to understand human nature.
cognitive
16 A(n) _____ expresses the strength and direction (positive or negative) of the relationship between two variables.
correlation coefficient
8 Which of the following is a defining feature of psychoanalysis?
The emphasis on unconscious ideas and impulses that originate in childhood conflicts.
63 In the context of auditory perception, which of the following statements is true?
The frequency theory appears to account only for pitch perception between 20 and a few hundred cycles per second.
58 __________refers to the tendency to perceive a broken figure as being complete or whole.
The principle of closure
32 Shana is a young girl who was in a bus accident a few years ago. Since her accident, Shana is only able to remember people she had met before the accident and instances from her childhood. However, she is unable to remember people she met recently or events that are currently happening in her life. She reads the same newspaper for several days without realizing that she has read it before. The accident has disabled Shana's ability to permanently store new information because she sustained an injury to her _____.
hippocampus
31 Among lower animals, stimulation of various areas of the__________can trigger instinctual behaviors such as fighting, mating, or nest building.
hypothalamus
4 ____ proposes reasons for relationships among events and allow us to derive explanations and predictions.
Theories
48 Which of the following statements is true of rod cells in the retina of the eye?
They are sensitive only to the intensity of light.
64 The term__________is derived from the ancient Greek words for "motion" and "perception".
kinesthesis
95 According to cognitive theorists, _____ is the process by which organisms make relatively permanent changes in the way they represent the environment because of experience.
learning
49 Once light passes through the iris, it encounters the _____.
lens
34 The__________is a group of structures involved in memory, motivation, and emotion that forms a fringe along the inner edge of the cerebrum.
limbic system
35 The__________is an oblong area of the hindbrain involved in regulation of heartbeat, blood pressure, movement, and respiration.
medulla
25 Messages from the brain or spinal cord are transmitted to muscles or glands through _____.
motor neurons
89 Side effects of__________include cancer, heart disease, and lung and respiratory diseases.
nicotine
41 Sara is a pregnant woman who is well past her due date, which was three weeks ago. The doctors decide that they must induce labor in Sara and inject her with _____.
oxytocin
53 The retina consists of cells called _____ that are sensitive to light.
photoreceptors
42 Traits such as sociability and aggressiveness are thought to be__________.
polygenic
70 Liz sustained a head injury in a car accident. When she was fully awake, the doctor approached her and asked her questions such as "What is the last thing you remember?" and "When were you born?" Liz was able to answer all these questions correctly. In this scenario, the questions asked to Liz summon up__________.
preconscious information
55 In the context of the human eye, the size of the__________is sensitive to an individual's emotions.
pupil
78 Frightening, dreamlike experiences that occur during the deepest stage of non-rapid eye movement (NREM) sleep are known as__________.
sleep terrors
76 Kira, an eight-year-old girl, sometimes walks in her sleep. She also responds to questions while she is up and about. However, when she wakes up in the morning, she does not remember the incident. In the context of sleep disorders, Kira is exhibiting symptoms of _____.
somnambulism
96 In the context of classical conditioning, _____ helps organisms adapt to situations that recur from time to time.
spontaneous recovery
17 One of the advantages of__________is that by distributing questionnaires and analyzing answers with a computer, psychologists can study many thousands of people at a time.
surveys
38 The hearing or auditory area of the cortex lies in the _____ lobe along the lateral fissure of the cerebral cortex.
temporal
94 According to cognitive psychologists, _____.
the changes caused by learning influence an organism's behavior
83 People practice _____ by concentrating on words or sounds that are claimed to help the person achieve an altered state of consciousness.
transcendental meditation
57 Stimuli suggestive of depth that involve simultaneous perception by both eyes are known as__________.
binocular cues
87 In the context of the altered states of consciousness, _____ is a system that provides information about a bodily function.
biofeedback
101. Peter was attacked by a black cat when he was young. Due to this, he developed a fear of cats. A few years later, his parents got him a black kitten, and his fear gradually extinguished. On his way to work one day, he saw a black cat running toward him and felt his old fear resurfacing. In this scenario, the recurrence of Peter's fear of cats is known as _____.
c. spontaneous recovery
148. The interference by old learning with the ability to retrieve material learned recently is known as__________.
d. proactive interference
79 The first four sleep stages are considered__________.
non-rapid eye movement sleep
40 During puberty,__________stokes the growth of muscle and bone and the development of primary and secondary sex characteristics in a male body.
testosterone
The pain message is relayed from the spinal cord to the__________and then projected to the cerebral cortex, making us aware of the location and intensity of the damage.
thalamu
24 Which of the following statements is true of neurotransmitters?
"Loose" neurotransmitters are either broken down or reabsorbed by the axon terminal.
27 Which of the following refers to a time during which a neuron is insensitive to messages from other neurons and does not fire?
A refractory period
36 Which of the following best describes association areas?
Areas of the cerebral cortex that are not primarily involved in sensation or motor activity
26 Which of the following diseases stems from food poisoning and prevents the release of acetylcholine?
Botulism
56 How do pigments gain their colors?
By absorbing light from certain segments of the spectrum and reflecting the rest
2 A person has trouble adjusting with the new students in the classroom. He does not have any serious psychological disorders but has trouble making new friends. A(n) ____ would most likely be consulted to help the person.
Counseling Psychologist
54 In the context of color blindness, which of the following statements is true?
Dichromats are sensitive to black-white and either red-green or blue-yellow colors.
1 A(n) ______ primarily focuses on the relationships between people and work.
Industrial Psychologist
28 Which of the following is a feature of gray matter?
It consists of non-myelinated neurons.
44 Which of the following statements is true of the absolute threshold?
It is determined by exposing individuals to progressively stronger stimuli until the minimum stimuli the person can detect is found.
73 People with__________stop breathing periodically, up to several hundred times per night. sleep apnea
Sleep Apnea
77 In _____, a person cannot move during the transition from consciousness to sleep, and hallucinations occur.
Sleep Paralysis
75 Which of the following is a difference between sleep terrors and nightmares?
Sleep terrors usually occur during the first two sleep cycles of the night, whereas nightmares are more likely to occur toward morning.
7 What similarity did Wilhelm Wundt share with Aristotle?
Both saw the mind as a natural event that could be studied scientifically, like light and heat.
39 Phoebe recently suffered a major fall in which she sustained brain injuries. Since then, she has had immense difficulty in communicating with others. She appears to understand what others tell her, but her responses are slow and laborious. Her sentences are always incomplete, with important grammatical words missing. Which of the following conditions best reflects Phoebe's case?
Broca's aphasia
46 When Anna moved to her new apartment, she found it very difficult to sleep because of the traffic noise in the neighborhood. However, she gradually became accustomed to the sound of the vehicles as days progressed, and now the noise outside no longer disturbs her sleep. This scenario illustrates an instance of _____.
negative adaptation
69 Circulation of blood is an example of a__________.
nonconscious process
50 The__________conducts sensory input to the brain, where it is relayed to the visual area of the occipital lobe.
optic nerve
51 On a bright, sunny day, Manny leaves a dimly-lit movie theater and goes out into the street. The _____ in his eyes adjust to the sudden increase in light.
pupils
99 In the context of classical conditioning, the term__________is defined as a simple unlearned response to a stimulus.
reflex
15 Carl is conducting a study to determine the effects of the new technology-assisted learning methods among students. As part of this study, he has selected a group of university students, male and female, in the age group of 18 to 24 years. These students have been using the new methods of learning. In terms of research methodology, this group best describes a _____.
sample
80 Which of the following statements is true of dreams?
Freud argued that dreams express impulses we would censor during the day.
11 Identify a true statement about functionalism.
Functionalists focus on behavior as well as the mind or consciousness.
3 Caroline is a psychologist who studies how stress induces ailments such as heart problems and headaches. Some of her clients are smokers, and she is helping them quit smoking. She also suggests lifestyle changes that help her clients reduce and cope with stress. Caroline can best be described as a(n) _____.
Health Psychologist
100 __________is a classical conditioning procedure in which a previously neutral stimulus comes to elicit the response brought forth by a conditioned stimulus by being paired repeatedly with that conditioned stimulus.
Higher-order conditioning
33 Which of the following is a function of the medulla of the brain?
It plays roles in sleeping, sneezing, and coughing.
47 In the context of the difference threshold, identify the correct statement.
On average, people can tell when a tone rises or falls in pitch by an extremely small one-third of 1 percent.
21 Which of the following statements highlights the relationship between dopamine and schizophrenia?
People with schizophrenia may have more receptor sites for dopamine in an area of the brain that is involved in emotional responding.
86 __________explains hypnotic events in terms of a person's ability to act as though he or she were hypnotized.
Role theory
71 __________refers to focusing one's consciousness on a particular stimulus.
Selective attention
61 __________ usually stems from damage to the structures of the inner ear, most often the loss of hair cells. People with this condition tend to be more sensitive to some pitches than others.
Sensorineural deafness
18 Amelia is a general physician. One of her patients claimed to be suffering from constant stomach aches. After running some tests, Amelia concludes that the patient is not suffering from any medical disorder. However, the patient insisted that she has stomach cancer. The patient was then made to participate in an experiment where she was given sugar pills and was told that it was a new medicine for treating cancer. Some other participants in the experiment were also given sugar pills. This best exemplifies _____.
a placebo
113. B. F. Skinner taught pigeons and other animals to engage in behavior that manipulates the environment. This kind of behavior is called__________.
a. operant behavior
112. In the context of operant conditioning,__________is the act of following a response with a stimulus that increases the frequency of the response.
a. reinforcement
22 Bobby was standing in line to purchase a movie ticket. All of a sudden, the man in front of him took a few steps back and stepped on Bobby's foot. Bobby immediately felt pain in his foot. This sensation was transmitted to the spinal cord and the brain through _____.
afferent neurons
52 A(n)__________is the lingering visual impression made by a stimulus that has been removed.
afterimage
125. Children who watch violent shows may act less aggressively when they are informed that the
b. apparently aggressive behaviors they watch reflect camera tricks, special effects, and stunts. c. conflicts in real life are resolved by violent means.
110. People seem to be ready to fear thunder, threatening faces, sharp objects, darkness, and heights. According to Arne Öhman and Susan Mineka, this is referred to as _____.
b. biological preparedness
107. Benjamin entered a pizza-eating contest when he was in college. He finished five large pizzas by himself, but he felt nauseated and threw up a few hours later. For several years, the sight and smell of pizza made him feel sick. In this scenario, Benjamin's aversion toward pizza occurred through _____.
b. classical conditioning
137. In memory theory, the term__________means to cause information to be lost from short-term memory by adding new information.
b. displace
114. In the context of reinforcement schedules, a piece worker that gets paid on a per-shirt basis is on a__________.
b. fixed-ratio schedule
143. In the context of organization in long-term memory, a(n)__________is an arrangement of items into groups or classes according to common or distinct features.
b. hierarchy
105. Johnny has always feared going to the dentist as he associated these visits with pain. After repeated visits to the dentist, Johnny also developed the fear of bright lights as he had started associating it with the dentist's cabin. In the given scenario, the development of Johnny's fear of bright lights is due to _____.
b. higher-order conditioning
118. In operant conditioning, organisms learn to do or not do things because
b. of the consequences of their behavior.
142. When Claire was baking an apple pie, the odor of the pie triggered some memories of her childhood. She remembered playing with her brother in the living room while her mother baked apple pies. Her memory is an example of a(n) _____.
c. context-dependent memory
103. In Pavlov's experiment, he conditioned his dog to salivate when it was shown a circle. Later, the dog salivated when it was shown other closed geometric figures including squares. Through his experiment, Pavlov demonstrated _____.
c. generalization
140. A(n)__________is a way of mentally representing the world, such as a belief or an expectation, which can influence perception of persons, objects, and situations.
c. schema
136. The series of eye fixations that we perceive as visual sensations seem continuous, or stream like, because of _____.
c. sensory memory
115. With a _____, an organism's response rate falls off after each reinforcement and then picks up again as the time when reinforcement will occur approaches.
d. fixed-interval schedule
102. Paula taught her dog to lie down every time she rang a hand bell. However, the dog began to apply this command even to the sound of a doorbell. In this scenario, the dog's action of lying down as a response to a similar stimulus is due to a tendency called__________.
d. generalization
134. The flow of visual information seems smooth and continuous because of__________memory, which can hold visual stimuli for up to a second.
d. iconic
98 Jeff's dog barks and growls at the sound of a stranger's car pulling into his driveway, yet the dog wags its tail and gets excited at the sound of Jeff's car. In this scenario, the difference in the dog's reactions to the sound of Jeff's car and that of a stranger's car is due to _____.
discrimination
23 Nicotine, alcohol, and many other drugs are pleasurable because they heighten levels of _____.
dopamine
93 Some lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) users have__________, which are distorted perceptions or hallucinations that mimic the LSD "trip" but occur days, weeks, or longer after usage.
flashbacks
97 Bethany taught her dog to jump every time she raises her right hand. Later, the dog started jumping even if she raised her left hand. In this scenario, the dog's action of jumping as a response to a similar stimulus is due to a tendency called _____.
generalization
43 Monozygotic twins share _____ of their genes.
100 percent
81 __________are rapid, low-amplitude brain waves that have been linked to feelings of relaxation.
Alpha waves
6 Which of the following is true of behaviorism?
Behaviorists define psychology as the scientific study of behavior, not of behavior and mental processes.
124. __________is Robert Rescorla's viewpoint that suggests that learning occurs only when a conditioned stimulus (CS) provides information about an unconditioned stimulus (US).
b. Contingency theory
126. _____ are memories of events that happen to a person or that take place in the person's presence.
b. Episodic memories
130. _____ is the processes by which information is encoded, stored, and retrieved.
b. Memory
123. In _____, people receive reinforcement in the form of information.
b. biofeedback training
109. __________is a behavior therapy method in which fear-evoking stimuli are presented continuously in the absence of actual harm so that fear responses are extinguished.
d. Flooding
120. __________is a procedure for teaching complex behaviors that at first reinforces approximations of the target behavior.
d. Shaping
141. An old Frank Sinatra song on the radio reminds Roberta of her father and his vintage record collection that, which they used to listen to when she was young. Roberta is being influenced by her__________memory.
d. context-dependent
131. At a painting exhibition, Martha admired a painting that depicted a farm. Half an hour later, when she was having lunch with a friend, Martha was able to recall several details depicted in the painting. She remembered correctly the colors that were used, the animals that were drawn, and even the number of trees in the painting. Martha's ability to remember these details is known as _____.
d. eidetic imagery
