PSY Lecture Quiz Questions
Which of the following is an example of an episodic memory?
10 years from now, you can't remember exactly what the "wordstem completion task" is even though you remember that you learned about it in PSC001.
The following is a list of some of the shock levels in the Milgram obedience experiment. Indicate what percentage of participants went at least to that level (including those who went farther). For example, 100% of participants went to at least 450 volts even though none of them stopped there. A given percentage might apply to more than one shock level. 150 volts 300 volts (after confederate bangs on wall) 450 volts (max shock)
100% 100% 65%
Most researchers find that there are ______ dimensions of temperament in young children. For Buss & Plomin and also for Rothbart, one of these dimensions is related to ______. Rothbart included a dimension of _____, and Buss & Plomin later added a similar dimension.
3 emotion effortful control
Which of the following statements best reflects our current knowledge of the factors that predict success in school?
IQ is somewhat predictive of grades, but self-discipline is an even better predictor
Match the hypothetical psychological entity with its central characteristic. Id Ego Superego
Id - basic desires Ego - rational, conscious Superego - moral values
The critical distinction between the James-Lange and Cannon-Bard theories of emotion is:
James-Lange says physiological responses cause subjective feelings, whereas Cannon-Bard says physiological responses and subjective feelings happen separately and simultaneously
The psychologist ______ conducted a famous experiment in which he created a phobia-like condition in Little Albert. In this experiment, the psychologist _______ whenever Little Albert _______. Afterward, Little Albert whimpered and cried every time he ________, which is an example of generalization. This experiment was important because it showed that phobias could be explained by _______ rather than repressed sexual desires.
John B. Watson struck a bar with a hammer saw a rat saw a rabbit classical conditioning
Professor A conducts a study of IQ in homozygous (identical) twins that were adopted into different families and finds that genes account for 80% of the variation in IQ in these twins. Professor B conducts a similar study of IQ in homozygous twins that were adopted into different families and finds that genes account for only 40% of the variation in IQ in these twins. What might explain this large difference in the estimated heritability of IQ?
Professor A studied families that were all quite similar to each other, whereas Professor B studied families that were highly variable in factors such as income and education
Piaget proposed that development occurs by the processes of assimilation and accommodation. An example of assimilation would be ______, and an example of accommodation would be _______.
a child goes from knowing 3 color names (red, blue, green) to knowing 6 color names (red, blue, green, yellow, orange, purple) a child learns that "silver" and "grey" are actually the same color and differ in the property of "shininess"
The image above shows three brain areas prior to an associative LTP experiment. There is a strong connection between Area A and Area C, and there is a weak connection between Area B and Area C. At this point, if we stimulated A we would see ______, and if we stimulated B we would see _______. After a conditioning phase, which consists of _______, a test phase would be conducted. In the test phase, if we stimulated A we would see _____, and if we stimulated B we would see ______.
a large response in C little or no response in C simultaneous stimulation of A and B a large response in C a large response in C
If a person with an average IQ today took the 1910 IQ test, that person would have _______ IQ score compared to an average person from 1910.
a much higher
When neurotransmitter molecules bind to receptors, this creates _____. If this is large enough, it will generate ________ at the ________.
a postsynaptic potential an action potential axon hillock
Match each term to its definition. algorithm heuristic intermediate representation
a sequence of operations that is guaranteed to reach a correct solution a sequence of operations that usually yields the correct solution, but sometimes fails a representation that is temporarily created in the course of a series of mental operations
Kuzumaki et al. (2011) found that mRNA levels for the BDNF gene became greater after a few weeks in mice who were living in an enriched environment compared to mice who were living in an impoverished environment. This is an example of:
an epigenetic effect an environmental effect experimental research
In development, a "critical period" is a period of development during which:
an infant's or child's biology makes it especially easy to learn some specific thing or acquire some specific ability
People who score high on openness to experience tend to exhibit:
an interest in art a preference for variety active imagination curiosity
In terms of both 12-month and lifetime prevalence, the most prevalent general category of mental illness is:
anxiety disorders
In Solomon Asch's classic obedience experiment, participants were asked which of three lines matched a reference line. When participants were tested alone, their performance was _______. In the main experiment, the participant was tested in a group that contains several confederates. A confederate is someone who ______. Starting on the third trial of the group testing condition, all the confederates gave the wrong answer on most trials. On these trials, most participants at least occasionally gave the same wrong answer as the confederates. However, it's clear that the participants knew that this answer is incorrect because _______.
approximately 99% correct is working for the experimenter but appears to be just another participant the rate of conformity is greatly reduced if the participants write down their answers privately rather than saying them aloud
Gender-typical behaviors in children - such as roughhousing in boys and playing with dolls in girls - can be influenced by:
both social expectations and biological factors
The classic "readiness potential" study of Libet provided evidence that:
brain activity corresponding to a choice occurs before a person is conscious of having made the choice
Evidence for materialism includes:
brain stimulation studies show that it is possible to change the state of mind by changing the state of the brain recordings of brain activity show that the pattern of brain activity changes as the contents of the mind change lesion studies show that mental processes are changed in systematic ways when specific brain areas are damaged
Which of the following are key aspects of the process of science. Science ....
builds on previous research and makes links across seemingly different phenomena is a highly social process that involves a community of competing and cooperating researchers leads to practical applications and new technologies is a fallible human activity but endeavors to minimize the effects of human weaknesses and magnify human strengths continually reevaluates and refines ideas on the basis of new evidence
The case of Kitty Genovese is famous among psychologists for showing:
bystander apathy
Match each term to its definition. epigenetics myelination neurogenesis synaptogenesis pruning
changes in gene expression as a result of experience covering axons with an insulating material creation of new neurons creation of new synapses elimination of existing synapses
Brain stimulation studies provide evidence for a casual link between mind and brain because they show that:
changing the pattern of activity in the brain can cause a change in the state of mind
Imagine that you are at an amusement park, and you're on a ride that's completely in the dark. Every now and then, the ride swerves suddenly, which leads you to automatically tense your muscles. Right before each swerve, the ride makes a clanking sound. By the end of the ride, you find that you tense your muscles as soon as you hear the clanking sound. This is an example of _______ because ________.
classical conditioning the swerving is not contingent on your tensing
Science often involves:
competition between researchers cooperation among researchers incorrect conclusions (at least in the short term)
For Pavlov's original classical conditioning experiment, match each element of the experiment with the corresponding term. bell meat powder salivation (when elicited by the bell) salivation (when elicited by the meat powder)
conditioned stimulus unconditioned stimulus conditioned response unconditioned response
A researcher conducts an experiment in which a rat eats a piece of peanut butter, which it has never tried before. The peanut butter has been laced with a small amount of a tasteless, odorless poison, and this makes the rat feel sick. The next day, the rat is given a chance to eat some peanut butter and some cheese, and it avoids the peanut butter but eats the cheese. This experiment demonstrates which of the following?
conditioned taste aversion one-trial learning
People who score high on self monitoring tend to exhibit:
different patterns of behavior in different situations
Learning to speak a language requires the development of functioning vocal cords, development of the ability to control the vocal cords, learning the words of the language, and learning the grammar of the language. Which perspective on development would emphasize the interactions among all these factors in explaining the development of speech?
dynamic systems
Patient HM had a severe impairment in _______.
explicit long-term memory
Researcher A conducts a study in which she tests 50 college students and finds that students who eat a healthy breakfast have a slightly higher GPA than students who don't eat a healthy breakfast. Researcher B conducts the same study with a new group of 50 college students and finds no difference in GPA between students who do and do not eat a healthy breakfast. This would be a:
failure to replicate
Allostasis reflects the body's ability to:
flexibly adapt to changing environmental demands
A sonar operator looks at a display, showing the spatial layout of the distribution of echoes from the surrounding ocean. A submarine appears as a more intense green patch. We can think of this as a signal detection problem. The sonar operator looks at the display and _____ that at submarine is present. If this exceeds ______, the sonar operator tells the captain that a submarine is present.
forms an internal representation of the strength of evidence an internal, subjective threshold
Which of the following are examples of social loafing?
four students are working together on the final project for a class, and each of them works only an hour per week on it. another student in the same class is working alone on the project and spent three hours per week on it
There are three primary components of gender: gender identity, gender roles, and gender schemas. If Kris feels like she is a woman, whether or not she has female sex chromosomes and genitalia, this would be an example of a _______. If Kris presents as a woman, some people might be surprised to discover that she is a surgeon because this is not a typical ______ for a woman in many cultures. In fact, she almost wasn't accepted into a surgical residency program because of the _______ of the people on the admissions committee.
gender identity gender roles gender schema
People who score high on conscientiousness tend to exhibit:
good grades a preference for order attention to detail
Imagine that a researcher finds that dieters who are given a new medication are more successful at losing weight than dieters who are given a placebo. The researcher then explains this in terms of how the medication influences the release of the appetite-related hormone ghrelin. This explanation is at the scope of:
groups of people
Phineas Gage sustained major damage to his left prefrontal cortex in a construction accident. Which of the following symptoms did he exhibit following this damage?
he became rude he became impulsive his personality was changed
The field of health psychology focuses on:
how attitudes, behaviors, and social factors affect health
In the Banaji & Hardin (1996) study of implicit gender representations, each trial consisted of a prime and a target. Participants were instructed to _____ and ______. The primes were _______, and the targets were _______. They found that reaction times were faster when the target was preceded by a prime that was definitionally related to the gender of the target than when the prime was definitionally related to the opposite gender. When the prime was stereotypically rather than definitionally related to the gender of the target, they found ______.
ignore the prime word press a button to indicate the gender associated with the target word gender-related nouns (mechanic, secretary) male and female pronouns (he, she) the same pattern, but the effect was somewhat smaller
If you encounter someone who is suicidal, what should you do?
immediately call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline
In the digit span task, the experimenter reads lists of digits to the participant. The number of digits typically increases from one list to the next. After hearing a list, the participant ______. The participant's digit span is defined as ________. Typical adults have a digit span of approximately ____. Patients with medial temporal lobe lesions, such as HM, typically have a digit span that is ______.
immediately repeats the digits from memory the longest list that the participant can reliably do correctly 7 relatively normal
If all human behavior is caused by physical interactions among the components of the brain, this calls into question whether humans have free will. The question of whether people actually have free will is an important practical issue because:
in the U.S. legal system, people are not usually held responsible for actions that were not performed freely
Match the terms to their definitions. anterograde amnesia retrograde amnesia implicit memory explicit memory semantic memory episodic memory long-term memory short-term memory
inability to remember events that occurred after the time of the lesion inability to remember events that occurred immediately before the time of lesion memory that influences your behavior even when not intentionally trying to use that memory memory that you have intentionally accessed memory for facts memory for specific events that happened to you memory that lasts for minutes or longer memory that typically lasts for a few seconds or minutes and disappears when you shift your attention to something else
Learning is a result of changes in the strengths of synapses. Which of the following is an example of something that would increase the strength of a synapse?
increase in the number of receptors on the postsynaptic side of the synapse
You are sitting in a coffee shop, and the people at the table next to you are talking loudly about how hot it is. Although you are trying to ignore them, you keep hearing them say words like "hot" and "heat." This will lead to:
increased activation of the concept of cold in your conceptual network (because hot is related to cold)
Cognitive psychologists have shown that people judge a type of event as being more likely to occur if they can more easily retrieve instances of that event from memory. This is called the "availability heuristic." Child abductions are now reported in the media more widely than they were 50 years ago, and parents now have a greater fear of child abduction. A social psychologist might explain this in greater fear in terms of the availability heuristic: Because of greater media coverage of abductions, parents can more easily retrieve instances of abductions from memory and therefore overestimate how common they are. This psychologist's explanation is at the level of:
internal mental processes
Match the psychologist(s) with the corresponding concept. Wilhelm Wundt Sigmund Freud Edward Thorndike Saul Sternberg
introspection psychodynamic puzzle box memory scanning
Which of the following are properties of emotion (as defined by psychologists)?
involve physiological responses are triggered by specific internal or external events involves changes in behavior are relatively brief occur rapidly involve conscious feelings
Edwin Boring famously wrote that "Intelligence is what is measured by intelligence tests." This definition:
is circular assumes that the people who design intelligence tests knows what intelligence is
The idea of dualism is appealing to many people because:
it is not clear how the mind, which does not seem to be physical, could be causally related to the brain, which is clearly physical
Dr. Besson has invented a drug that she believes will be an effective treatment for migraines. If the drug is truly safe and effective, she may become quite rich, so she has a strong financial incentive to conduct research that proves that the drug is safe and effective even if it isn't. What aspects of the scientific process will tend to decrease the likelihood that she will publish low-quality research that mistakenly concludes that the drug is safe and effective?
journal articles are subjected to rigorous peer review before being published a person's reputation is very important in science, and scientists try to avoid publishing shoddy research to avoid getting a bad reputation
Although most developmental psychologists focus on infants, children, and adolescents, some developmental psychologists also look at developmental changes across adulthood and old age. This is called the study of:
lifespan development
Patient HM had his medial temporal lobes surgically removed to treat his epilepsy. What were the major problems he experienced as a result of the surgery?
major deficit in explicitly remembering events that occurred in the period just prior to the surgery major deficit in explicitly remembering anything that occurred after the surgery
An observation is considered objective if:
most other researchers would, if they followed the same protocol, make the same observation
Which of the following statements are true of the Big 5 personality dimensions:
most personality psychologists agree that the big 5 dimensions provide a reasonable approximation of the main dimensions of personality the dimensions are largely independent, which means that a person's score on one dimension is not very predictive of that person's score on the other dimensions
The connectivity of the human brain - and the development of this connectivity - can be described at coarse, intermediate, and fine levels. At the coarsest level, brain areas are created by the process of ______, which occurs ______. At the intermediate level, connections between individual neurons are created by the process of _______. The number of synapses peaks during adolescence and then declines as a result of a process called ______. At the finest level, the strengths of individual neurons are adjusted as a result of experience. This is the primary mechanism of plasticity __________.
neurogenesis primarily prenatally, but continues at low levels through childhood and adulthood synaptogenesis pruning in adults
The first part of a classical conditioning experiment is typically a Baseline Phase, which is used to show that the stimulus that will be used as the conditioned stimulus is initially a/an _______ stimulus that does not produce a/an _______ response and that the stimulus that will be used as the unconditioned stimulus does produce a/an ______ response. The second part is the conditioning phase, in which the ______ are paired for several trials. The final part is a Test Phase, in which the experimenter determines whether the ________ stimulus now produces a/an ________ response.
neutral unconditioned unconditioned neutral and unconditioned stimuli conditioned conditioned
Bees are able to learn an association between an odor and the presence of sucrose after a single pairing of these two stimuli. Researcher A explains this in terms of natural selection, saying that this ability must exist because it increases the ability of bees to survive and reproduce. The shortcoming of this explanation is that __________. However, the validity of the explanation would be increased if Researcher B showed that ________.
not all traits exist because they increase the likelihood of survival and reproduction eliminating this ability leads to decreased survival and reproduction
Match each study or case with the central principle exemplified by that study/case. Milgram experiment Kitty Genoveses Asch experiment Banaji priming experiment Jones & Harris essay experiment
obedience to authority bystander apathy social conformity implicit gender stereotypes fundamental attribution error
A class decides to pull a prank on their professor during a lecture. Every time the professor stands on the left side of the room, the class smiles and pays attention to what the professor is saying. Every time the professor stands on the right side of the room, the class frowns and looks away from the professor. After about 15 minutes of this, the students notice that the professor is lecturing almost exclusively from the left side of the room. This is an example of _________. When the professor stands on the left side of the room, this is the ________. When the students smile and pay attention, this is the _________.
operant conditioning operant response reinforcer
According to the study discussed in lecture, poverty during childhood may lead to:
poor health outcomes during adulthood by increasing allostatic load
The goals of psychology are to _____ the human mind and human behavior.
predict control describe explain
Which of the following are key aspects of science? Science ....
relies on methods, observations, and measurements that are objective and replicable aims to explain as well as describe the natural and social worlds focuses on ideas that make testable predictions depends on critical evaluation of evidence rather than deference to authorities can distinguish between random flukes and consistent patterns aims to find causes and not just correlations
What are the four main approaches to assessing the personality of a "target" individual?
reports of the target's thoughts and behavior by the target direct observation of the target's behavior reports of the target's behavior by people who know the target assessment of life outcomes from archival data
Studies such as the one by Kim Noble and her colleagues showing structural brain differences in children from lower-income families are examples of:
research that assesses the relationship between the environment and brain development correlational research
Scientists tend not to use words like "prove" or "fact" because:
science is not static, and scientists want to remain open to the possibility that a well-accepted conclusion might turn out to be not quite right
Scientific journal articles usually contain citations to other published studies. This reflects which of the following characteristics of science?
scientific research builds in previous research
All of these cubes appear to be the same except for their 3-dimensional positions. This exemplifies which of the following principles?
shape constancy perception involves an active construction of a representation of the world
One day, Ashley is standing at the edge of a sharp dropoff at the Grand Canyon, which makes her a little nervous. All of a sudden her friend Julia sneaks up behind her and yells "boo!", which causes a strong fear response in Ashley. From that point onward, Ashley feels an intense fear whenever she sees a sharp dropoff. If we think of this as classical conditioning, the conditioned stimulus is ________, the unconditioned stimulus is ________, the conditioned response is ________, and the unconditioned response is _______.
sharp dropoff loud "boo!" sound fear response fear response
Phenylketonuria is a good example of a gene x environment interaction because:
someone with 2 PKU alleles will not suffer any ill effects if the person avoids foods with high concentrations of phenylanine
A postsynaptic potential is analogous to ______ because it is ______. An action potential is analogous to ________.
squeezing the trigger of a gun continuously variable a bullet firing from a gun
An infant who is reactive will exhibit _____ physiological responses to a loud sound and exhibit _____ behavior around unfamiliar people.
strong inhibited
Freud's theories were not very scientific because they were not:
testable
If an embryo starts out with one X chromosome and one Y chromosome, this will typically lead to the development of ______, which will in turn lead to increases in the level of _______. However, if something happens to prevent the increase in the level of this hormone, the person will likely end up developing the typical _____ pattern of external genitalia. This is an example of _____.
testes androgen female a developmental cascade
It takes a fair amount of time for an action potential to travel down a long axon, but the speed of transmission can be increased if ________. When an action potential reaches an axon terminal, it typically __________. In general, information flows from the ________.
the axon is coated in myelin leads to the release of neurotransmitter molecules into the synaptic cleft presynaptic cell to the postsynaptic cell
Researcher A conducts a study in which she surveys 50 college students and finds that students who report eating a high-protein breakfast have a substantially higher GPA than students who report that they eat a low-protein breakfast. She finds that this difference was statistically significant. A blogger hears about this finding and writes a blog saying that all students would get better grades if they started eating a high-protein breakfast. Which of the following statements are potential problems with this conclusion about what students should do?
the blog is drawing a conclusion about causation based on a mere correlation the result was based on self reports, and it's possible that the students' reports are not accurate although the effect might be true on average, it might not be true of all people even though the effect was statistically significant, there is still a chance it might be a fluke
In the phrase "associative long-term potentiation," the term associative means ______, the term long term means _______, and the term potentiation means ______.
the brain is learning an association between two things the potentiation will last for hours, weeks, months, or years neural responses are increased as a result of the learning
Two sonar operators, Janie and Jamie, have been training for a year on a battleship. The captain wants to determine which one is now better at determining whether a submarine is present or absent. The captain shows Janie and Jamie a sonar display in which the captain knows a submarine is present but in which the signal is weak. Janie reports that a submarine is present in the display, and Jamie reports that no submarine is present. From this test, who does the captain decide has better sensitivity for determining whether a submarine is present or absent?
the captain cannot know who has better sensitivity from a single trial, because we cannot separately assess sensitivity and threshold (bias) from a single trial
Researcher A conducts an experiment showing that increased dietary consumption of omega-3 fatty acids leads to increased vocabulary acquisition in 2-year-old children. Because 2-year-olds raised in high income families acquire vocabulary faster than 2-year-olds raised in low income families, Researcher B concludes that high income families must be consuming for omega-3 fatty acids than low income families. This conclusion would be an example of:
the converse error
Roediger & Karpicke (2006) found that studying for 7 minutes and then being tested for 7 minutes led to much better memory than studying for 14 minutes, but only when ______ and not when _______.
the final memory test occurred after a substantial delay the final memory test occurred right away
When terrorists take Americans hostage, they sometimes release videos of the hostages reading statements in which they say that the U.S. is terrible and that they support the goals of the hostages. It's pretty clear that the hostages are being forced to read these statements and don't actually believe them. However, many people watching the videos might nonetheless believe that the hostages at least partly believe what they are saying. Which psychological principle would explain why people watching the videos might draw this conclusion?
the fundamental attribution error
Which of the following would be evidence that someone has high intelligence?
the person can easily understand complex mathematical concepts the person can quickly learn new languages the person is good at diagnosing and fixing car problems
This picture shows two people who are approximately the same height in an "Ames Room". Why does the person on the left look much shorter than the person on the right?
the person on the left is actually farther away but appears to be at the same distance as the person on the right
In an operant conditioning experiment, the reinforcer is contingent on the operant response. This means that:
the reinforcer is presented only if the subject responds (but not necessarily every time the subject responds)
Most scientific journals use peer review. This means that:
the research is reviewed by other expert scientists to determine if it is sufficiently sound and novel to warrant publication
Researcher A conducts a study in which she tests 50 college students and finds that students who eat a healthy breakfast have a slightly higher GPA than students who don't eat a healthy breakfast. However, this effect was not statistically significant. This means that:
the researcher cannot conclude that this effect is present in the general population of college students
Match the terms and their definitions. hit miss correct rejection false alarm sensitivity threshold
the signal is present and the observer makes a "yes" response the signal is present and the observer makes a "no" response the signal is absent and the observer makes a "no" response the signal is absent and the observer makes a "yes" response the degree to which the observer's evidence for signal presence is stronger when the signal is present than when it is absent the minimum amount of evidence needed for an observer to make a "yes" response
Which of the following are true of the Bertrand and Mullainathan (2004) study of racial discrimination in employment?
the study contained an experimental manipulation and was not simply correlational applicants with names that sounded European-American were approx 50% more likely to be interviewed than applicants with names that sounded African-American
The principle of "encoding specificity" states that:
the way someone initially encodes a piece of information determines exactly what is stored in memory and how it can be retrieved
Cognitive psychologists use the term "information processing" to describe thinking because:
thinking often consists of taking mental representations of information and transforming them into new represenatations
Match the theory of emotion to the sequence of events specified by that theory for the example of almost hitting a bicyclist. common sense James-Lange theory Cannon-Bard theory Schachter-Singer Two-Factor
trigger event - feeling of fear - physiological arousal trigger event - physiological response - feeling of fear trigger event - simultaneous physiological arousal and feeling of fear trigger event - physiological arousal - cognitive appraisal - feeling of fear
The captain of a battleship instructs the sonar operator that the ship is in a hurry to reach the next port, so they don't have time to worry about possible submarines unless the sonar operator is very sure that a submarine is present. This means that the sonar operator should ______ , and this will increase the probability of _______.
use a higher-than-normal threshold a miss
According to the circumplex model of emotion, the two major dimensions of emotion are ______ and _______.
valence (whether the emotion is positive or negative) arousal (the degree of physiological activation)
Clever Hans was able to answer questions correctly by ________ . One piece of evidence for this is that he was unable to answer questions correctly if ______.
watching his owner's unconscious facial expressions his owner did not know the answer
Recall Solomon Asch's classic experiment on social conformity, in which the participant is in a group of people who are giving clearly incorrect responses in a line length judgment task. In these experiments, social psychologists would be mainly interested in ______ , whereas personality psychologists would be mainly interested in ______.
why most people at least occasionally go along with the rest of the group and give an incorrect response the differences between people who go along with the group and the people who don't
When preparing for an exam, it is not usually very useful to recopy your notes. However, there might be occasional cases where this would be useful. In which of the following cases, if any, would recopying your notes likely help you remember the relevant material for an exam?
you are preparing for an anatomy exam in which it is important to know what the anatomical structures look like, and your notes are mainly drawings of the structures
Which of the following would be examples of schemas?
your knowledge of the steps involved in registering for classes the interconnected concepts that represent your knowledge of coffee
