Psychology 101 FINAL EXAM (exam 1)

Your uncle tells you about an interesting magazine article explaining that humans only use 10% of their brains. As a psychologist, your response should be:

"Well, research actually shows that almost all of the brain is continually active."

Which of the following correlations has the strongest predictive value?

-0.75

A hypothesis is

A testable prediction about the relationship between variables

Of the following, who is best described as a structuralist

Edward Titchener

What is a mainstream psychologist most likely to think about Sigmund Freud?

Freudian theory is untestable and not grounded science

Which of the following perspectives argues that human behavior develops in certain ways because it serves a useful purpose?

Functionalism

A recent study found that married people are less likely to have personality disorders than unmarried people. The news reporter covering the study advised people to get married to improve their personalities. You know this recommendation is to warranted because

It is possible that personality disorders keep people from marrying

On which of the following points would Plato and Descartes likely have agreed?

Knowledge does not rely on our fallible sense

___________ taught at Wellesley College for more than 30 years and was the first woman president of the American Psychological Association

Mary Whiton Calkins

Which statement about neurotransmitters is accurate?

Neurotransmitters bind to receptors on the membrane of the postsynaptic neuron

Which accurately reflects the path of information flow that takes place when child jerks his hand away from a hot pan?

Sensory neurons----->spinal interneurons----->motor neurons

Which of the following statements best differentiates structuralism from functionalism

Structuralism asked what happens when an organism does something, while functionalism asked how and why

Which of the following is true about the strength of a correlation?

The closer a correlation is to 0.00, the weaker the relationship

You accept a job selling high-end knives door-to-door on commission because you were informed that company employees, on average, earn $60,000 a year. After three months of making less than $1,000 a month, you learn that most other salespeople are making less than $20,000 a year. If the company has 20 sales people, two managers and one president, how can the company's claim still be correct?

The mean of all salaries is $60,000 because the managers and president earn huge salaries

Which statement about vesicles is accurate?

They empty neurotransmitters into the synaptic cleft

Which of these events occurs first during an action potential?

Voltage gates sodium (Na+) channels open

A research team is investigating the impact of stereotypes on performance. In one group, women read an article about why the structure of men's brains make them better at math. In the second group, women read an article saying there are no biological differences in the mathematical abilities of men and women. Then all women in the study take a challenging math test. Researchers time the rest and score the number of items women answered correctly. In this study, which of the following is the independent variable?

Which article the women read

_________ is often credited with establishing the first psychological laboratory, thus establishing psychology as an experimental science.

Wilhelm Wundt

________ was an early proponent of functionalism

William James

A meta-analysis is

a combination of results from many related studies

Which neurotransmitter would you be most likely to find in the synaptic cleft between a motor neuron and a muscle?

acetylcholine

Myelinated axons are useful because they

allow action potentials to travel more quickly

Neurons are most likely to fire when they

are depolarized

John Watson, Ivan Pavlov, and B.F Skinner would have agreed that psychology is the study of

behavior

The Jennifer-John study examining bias against female applicants for a science job suggests that

both men and women are biased against female applicants

A neuron's refractory phrase is defined as the

brief period during and immediately after an action potential when a neuron cannot produce another action potential

Excitatory synapses

bring neurons closer to the firing threshold

To better understand aggressive behavior toward strangers, a psychologist gathers all available information about a man who threatened random people in a mall with an automatic weapon. This is an example of

case study research

Neurotransmitters influence the polarization of a neuron by

causing receptor channels to open, allowing charged sodium ions to flow into the neuron

Which of the following research methods would be most appropriate for exploring whether childhood emotional abuse predicts higher levels of adult depression?

correlation studies

Giving a person a drug very similar in molecular shape to GABA would likely result in

decreased neural activity

In an experiment, the variable that is expected to differ across the experimental and control groups is the _________ variable

dependent

In a depression-treatment study, neither the participants not the researcher know who is taking medication and who is taking a sugar pill. This is an example of a

double-blind trial

Debi just ran a marathon in less than four hours and felt no pain during the run. Her lack of pain was most likely due to

endorphins

Research has shown that social exclusion actives the same brain regions as physical pain. A researcher wants to test the hypothesis that over-the-counter pain relievers will also reduce the pain of social exclusion. She gives half of her participants ibuprofen and half a placebo, then has them play a game in which other players ignore them. Participants who take the ibuprofen are the _________ and participants who take the placebo are the_________

experimental group; control group

A research team wants to know if sugar consumption is related to hyperactivity. Researchers give fifty children cupcakes made with real sugar and another fifty children cupcakes make with zero-calorie sugar substitutes. They then observe each child individually to asses his or her level of activity after eating the cupcakes. This is an example of

experimental research

Parents who agree with John Locke's notion of tabula rasa would most likely

expose their children to a rich variety of sensory experiences

Psychologists Kenneth and Mamie Phipps Clark found that doll tests

exposed internalized racism in African-American children, particularly among children attending segregated schools

Inhibitory synapses

hyper polarize neurons

In an experiment, the variable manipulated by the researcher is the _______ variable

independent

The primary type of a neuron in neural networks is a

interneuron

In a psychology experiment, subjects listen to a variety of tones presented at different frequencies and then reflect on the experience, describing what they heard as precisely as possible. These individuals would have been using a process called

introspection

The three main functional types of neurons are

motor, sensory, and interneurons

A women with a disease that has damages her dopamine receptors is most likely to experience

movement abnormalities

A manager at a science museum wants to identify the most popular exhibits, so once every hour for six weeks she has volunteers count the number of people standing in front of each exhibit. This is an example of

naturalistic observation

Otto Loewi electrically stimulated a nerve in a frog heart. He then applied fluid surrounded that heart to a second heart. In this experiment, he found evidence that

neurons communicate chemically

The study of the nervous system is called

neuroscience

A patient has a dangerously low heart rate and is having difficulty breathing. The neurotransmitter that would be most helpful to him is

norepinephrine

White matter refers to

parts of the brain filled with myelinated axons

To learn more about the gaming habits of teenage boys, a professor randomly selected fifty boys from various high schools for a video game study. In this study, "all teenage boys" make up the

population

Reliability refers to wether you measurement tool ________ and validity to whether it_________

produces repeatable results; measures what it is supposed to measure

Ethical principals require researchers to

provide information about potential risks to participants before they begin a study

In Plato's cave allegory, a prisoner was temporarily unchained and allowed to see the fire at the mouth of the cave. When he returned to the chains, the other prisoners

refused to believe him

Psychologist Margaret Flow Washburn is best known for her work on the

relationships between human and animal behaviors

A measure of conscientiousness produces very similar scores yachter a person repeats the exercise, but it doesn't predict whether a person is dependable in everyday life. This measure appears to be

reliable but not valid

Compared to experimental research, survey research is limited because it

relies more on the honesty and accurate memories of participants

The voltage difference across a neuron's membrane

remains constant

The Tuskegee syphilis study is famous because

researchers failed to inform participants that they had a treatable disease

If heavy snowfall in Alaska has a correlation of -0.78 with the consumption of ice cream and a correlation of +0.78 with the sale of boots, you can predict that for a snowy January in Alaska, the store will

sell more boots and ice cream sales will be lower

Results from a recent experiment are consistent with a researcher's expectation that exposing people to unfamiliar groups reduces prejudice. This means that the researcher

should retain her hypothesis for now

Dopamine is most directly involved in

signaling pleasure

The idea that children are born with no knowledge or "content" whatsoever and are "filled" by life experiences is called

tabula rasa

Scientists use laboratory experiments primarily to

test cause-and-effect relationships

Action potential travel at speeds

that differ from one neuron to another

Psychology is best defined as the study of

the mind and behavior

In an experiment treating spider phobia, half of the participants get 8 hours of cognitive behavioral treatment. The other half get 8 hours of attention from a therapist but no active treatment. Both groups report a statistically significant reduction in their fear of spiders. This is evidence that

the placebo effect can be significant

According to the ancient Greek philosopher Plato

we cannot necessarily rely on our senses to learn the truth

Research has shown that social exclusion activates the same brain regions as physical pain. A researcher wants to treat the hypothesis that over-the-counter pain relievers will also reduce the pain of social exclusion. She gives half of her participants ibuprofen and half a placebo, has them play a game in which other players ignore them, and then measures their level of distress. In this study _________ is the variable and _________ is the dependent variable.

wether people take the ibuprofen, distress