PSY 120 Final Exam Study Guide Questions With Complete Solutions

Psychology is best defined as the scientific study of correct answer: The behavior of individuals and their mental processes The subject matter of psychology largely consists of correct answer: Observable behavior of humans and other species of animals The first task in psychology is to make accurate observations about behavior. This means that psychologists must first ______ behavior. correct answer: Describe Different explanations of behavior are usually judged by how correct answer: Well they can make accurate and comprehensive predictions Two students are discussing their teacher's inability to remember student names. One attributes the inability to a poor memory, but the other believes it is due to a lack of motivation. Researchers would judge which of the two explanations is best by correct answer: Determining how well each explanation predicts behavior in new situations Western psychology traces its origin to correct answer: Classical Greek philosophy In 1908, Herman Ebbinghaus wrote that "psychology has a long past, but only a short history." Which statement best captures the idea that Ebiinghaus was expressing? correct answer: Questions about human nature have existed for a long time, but only recently have the methods necessary to answer have been developed In 1879, in Leipzig, Germany correct answer: The first formal laboratory devoted to experimental psychology was founded It would be accurate to state that William James was interested in the ____ of the mind, and Edward Titchener was interested in the ___ of the mind correct answer: Functions; Contents Psychologists who tae the behaviorist approach seek to correct answer: Understand how environmental stimuli control behavior A psychologist believes that instincts, drives, and conflicts act as one fuel for behavior; when tension has been reduced sufficiently, behavior stops. This view is most consistent with that of the ____ perspective. correct answer: Psychodynamic The humanistic perspective in psychology gives greater weight and importance to correct answer: The capacity of humans to make choices According to the humanistic perspective, the main task for humans is to correct answer: Strive for positive development The central emphasis of the cognitive approach is on correct answer: Human thought and knowledge The ____ perspective looks for the causes of behavior in the functioning of genes, the brain, the nervous system, and the endocrine system correct answer: Biological Organisms that are better suited to their environments are more likely to pass on their genes, the brain, the nervous system, and the endocrine system correct answer: Charles Darwin's theory of evolution Eating disorders, such as anorexia or bulimia, do not seem to be as common in third-world countries as they are in technologically advanced countries. Focusing on reasons for the difference in the incidence of these illnesses around the world is most directly within the province of the ___ perspective correct answer: Sociocultural A classmate comes to you because he is concerned that his best friend is experiencing personal problems. You should suggest to your classmate that his friend may benefit by talking to a (n) ____ psychologist correct answer: Counseling "If an athlete imagines having a good performance, then that athlete is more likely to be successful in an event." This statement is a description of correct answer: A hypothesis A psychologist has generated a hypothesis. Now, correct answer: Research is needed to verify the if-then link There is a joke among scientist about a researcher who tells others that he belongs to a secret scientific society, where no one but the researcher will ever know about the studies members are doing. This joke is humorous because it violates the principal of correct answer: Public Verifiability An observer bias is correct answer: An error due to personal motives and expectations Which of the following is most likely to be an assumption of individuals conducting psychological research? correct answer: Behavior follows discoverable, lawful patterns If a researcher defines variables or conditions in terms of the specific procedures used to determine their presence, he or she is using a(n) ____ definition correct answer: Operational When carrying out an experiment, the factor that the researcher manipulates is known as the ____ variable; the researcher measures the ____ variable correct answer: Independent; Dependent A psychologist believes that music affects a person's mood. He has some participants listen to waltzes and others listen to military marches, and then measures each participant's mood with a paper-and-pencil test. What are the independent and dependent variables? correct answer: The type of music is the independent variable and the participant's mood is the dependent variable The main reason that psychological researchers use the experimental method is to correct answer: Make claims concerning causality A researcher theorizes that people are likely to perspire more when telling embarrassing stories than when telling funny stories. Volunteers are asked to record a memory of an embarrassing or a funny incident and their perspiration is measured. On some days, but not others, the lab where the recordings are done is very hot. Based on this information, the researcher should be concerned most about correct answer: The presence of a confounding variable Imagine that you have been hired to assist in an experiment investigating the verbal abilities of boys and girls. In preparing for the experiment, you read a research study that found higher verbs abilities in girls than boys. If this information about gender leads you somehow to communicate to the girls in the experiment that they should do better than the boys, we say that the _____ effect is operating correct answer: Expectancy A placebo effect occurs when correct answer: Participants change their behavior because of their belief that a treatment has an effect In the context of conducting psychological research, control procedures are intended to correct answer: Hold constant variables and conditions other than those related to the hypothesis When psychological researchers are ready to put their hypothesis to the test, they rely on correct answer: The scientific method Research designs often include a control condition correct answer: To serve as a baseline against which the experimental effect is evaluated When neither research participants nor research assistants are aware of which participants receive which treatment, researchers have employed a correct answer: Double-blind control technique Which of the following illustrates the use of a within-subjects design correct answer: Participants are given a spelling test, asked to meditate for ten minutes, and then given another spelling test When planning a study, you determine that of the one hundred participants, fifty will have to be randomly assigned to the experimental condition and the other fifty to the control condition. The type of experimental design you are using is known as a _____ design. correct answer: Between-subjects As an assignment for your experimental psychology class you have been asked to conduct a study that will yield a causal relationship between the independent and dependent variables. To complete this assignment, you must use the _____ method correct answer: Experimental To save time, you assign the first fifty people who sign up to participate in your study to the experimental condition and the next fifty to the control condition. The interpretations you could draw from the study will be severely limited because correct answer: You failed to use random assignment to conditions Sample is to population as correct answer: Part is to whole Imagine that your instructor asks you to determine whether there is a relationship between musical ability and mathematical ability. The type of design best suited to this task would be a(n) correct answer: Correlation study Which correlation coefficient must be a mistake? correct answer: +1.4 After you present your excuse for missing class, your instructor tells you that she has found that the more classes students miss, the lower their test grades tend to be. This relationship illustrates a(n) correct answer: Negative correlation You read in a health magazine that the more people that drink and smoke, the greater the number of emotional problems they have. This relationship illustrates correct answer: A positive correlation A researcher computes a correlation coefficient and determines that it is zero. This finding indicates that correct answer: There is no relationship between the variables One of the most important functions of correlation methods is that their use allows researchers to correct answer: Make predictions about one variable based on information from another variable A seafood distributor hires a researcher to determine whether eating oysters makes one more passionate. The researcher collects data that show that the people who eat the most oysters have the most active love lives. What can be concluded from this research? correct answer: People with active love lives consume more oysters A researcher who is trying to develop a test of musical aptitude is overheard to say, "I want to make sure that the test that I am developing gives similar results tome after time." In the language of psychological measurement, this researcher is determined to develop a test that has high correct answer: Reliability You are about to take your first test in an introductory to psychology class. Much to your surprise, the instructor hands you a test that contains ten analytical geometry problems. You would probably be able to argue that the test is not correct answer: Valid Are researchers obligated to respect the rights of research participants? If so, how is this ensured? correct answer: Yes, special committees oversee every research proposal At the end of a research study, participants must be provided with as much information about the study as possible and any emotional or psychological problems must be addressed. This process is formally known as correct answer: Debriefing Nature is to nature as heredity is to correct answer: Environment According to the theory of natural selection, correct answer: Organisms that are well adapted to their environment will produce more offspring In evolutionary terms, an individual's success is measured by the correct answer: Number of offspring an individual produces As you enter a crowded room, you catch a glimpse of your friend's dark hair and slime frame. What you are noticing most directly are aspects of your friend's correct answer: Phenotype In the vocabulary of evolutionary theory, you have inherited _____ from your parents. correct answer: A genotype While surfing the web, you stop at an anthropology website. There, you learn that natural selection favored two major adaptations in the evolution of the human species; correct answer: Bipedalism and Encephalization Gregory Mendel is best known for his research on correct answer: Garden peas In the human male, the sex chromosomes normally consist of a(n) _____ pair; in the human female they consist of a(n) _____ pair correct answer: XY;XX Which cell part and description is matched correctly? correct answer: Soma; contains the nucleus and cytoplasm that sustains its life The children in a classroom are playing the role of different parts of a neuron and arranging themselves in the order that information follows as it passes along the neuron. Beginning with incoming signals, the correct order is correct answer: Dendrites, Soma, Axon, Terminal buttons At one end of the neuron are swollen, bulblike structures called _____, which make it possible for the neuron to stimulate nearby glands, muscles, or other neurons correct answer: Terminal buttons The primary function of ____ is to carry messages away from the central nervous system towards the muscles and glands correct answer: Motor neurons In loose terms, the "decision" as to whether a neuron will produce a response or not depends upon the correct answer: Excitatory and inhibitory inputs it receives In the context of the action potential, all of the following are consequences of the all-or-none law EXCEPT that correct answer: The size of the action potential varies as a function of the intensity of stimulation On the neuron, neurotransmitters are stored in correct answer: Synaptic vesicles The image of a key fitting into a keyhole is most useful in understanding how correct answer: Neurotransmitters bind to receptor molecules You come across a magazine article on endorphins. It doesn't surprise you that it is subtitled "the keys to paradise," because correct answer: Of their pleasure-pain controlling properties Broca's area in the brain is most closely associated with correct answer: Language The ___ shows where different types of activity are occurring in the brain and involves the use of a safe radioactive substance that is given to participants correct answer: PET Scan Which technique uses special radio receivers to detect information from resonating atoms in order to assess brain activity correct answer: MRI The nervous system is subdivided into two major divisions. What are they? correct answer: Central and Peripheral All the neurons of the brain and spinal cord make up the _____ nervous system correct answer: Central You remember as a child seeing an insect buzzing on a flower and trying to catch the insect. You may also remember the pain and your hand automatically jerking away. Although you didn't know it at the time, your reflexive withdrawal was controlled by your correct answer: Spinal cord One way to conceptualize the relationship among the elements of the nervous system is to use a hierarchal organization. Using this kind of scheme, the correct answer: Peripheral nervous system can be divided into the somatic and autonomic nervous systems In the middle of the night, you hear two loud thumps outside your bedroom door. Your _____ nervous system increases your heart rate and sends blood away from internal organs to your muscles, preparing you for "fight or flight." When you learn it is just your roommate coming in late, your _____ nervous system slows down your heart rate and calms you down. correct answer: Sympathetic;Parasympathetic In the brain, the _____ and its surface layer, the _____, integrates sensory information, coordinates your movements, and facilitates abstract thinking and reasoning. correct answer: Cerebrum;Cerebral Cortex All of the following are located in the brain stem EXCEPT the correct answer: Hypothalamus The limbic system includes the correct answer: hypothalamus, hippocampus, amygdala Involvement of the brain is not necessary for a person to correct answer: Pull his or her hand from a hot stove The cerebrum is divided into two almost symmetrical halves, called the ____, which are connected by a mass of fibers called the _____ correct answer: Cerebral hemispheres; Corpus callosum All you know about someone is that she is a "split-brain" patient. You can conclude that she correct answer: Has had her corpus callous severed In the brain, the ____ serves as a relay station between the endocrine system and the central nervous system correct answer: Hypothalamus A friend has decided she would like to participate in a psychophysics study, but when she goes to the bulletin board that lists experiments, she can't figure out which research title probably relates to psychophysics. She asks for your help. Can you select the appropriate study for her? correct answer: The effect of light intensity on the experience of brightness A man has trouble hearing and is being tested for a hearing aid. He is presented with tones of various intensities and is asked to indicate whenever he detects a sound. The procedure is most similar to that used by researchers who are studying correct answer: Absolute thresholds Eve had forgotten that she had put on earrings until Adam said that he liked them. Eve's lack of awareness was probably due to correct answer: Sensory adaptation You try a new potato chip and it tastes great, so you encourage a friend to try it. He tastes a new chip, then an old style chip, and finally says that as far as he is concerned, all potato chips taste the same. The behavior of your friend is most similar to what might occur in a study of correct answer: Difference thresholds A difference threshold is operationally defined as the correct answer: Point at which two stimuli are recognized as different half of the time Which of the following examples is most like the sensory process of transduction correct answer: The use of solar panels to run washing machines An elderly man jokes that his arms have gotten too short to be able to read the morning newspaper without his glasses. In reality, his vision problem is most likely due to correct answer: The inability of the lens to thicken properly Rods operate best in ____; cones operate best in ____ correct answer: Near darkness;Bright light The fovea is on the retina of the eye; it is the place where correct answer: Vision is sharpest