AP Psychology Midterm Exam Review (Units 1-3)

Which of the following is the best definition of the science of psychology?

Scientific study of behavior and mental processes.

What are the main goals of psychology?

To observe, describe, explain, predict, and control behavior

Which of the following research methods are widely used by psychologists?

Surveys and experiments

In what way is the practice of psychology closely related to the practice of the natural sciences?

Its reliance on scientific research methodologies.

When was modern psychology born?

1800s, after the birth of modern science

William James rejected structuralism. What did he focus on instead?

How mental processes help organisms adapt to their environment.

In the early days of psychoanalysis, what did its practitioners believe to be the cause of behavior?

Unconscious motives and conflicts.

How did the school of behaviorism define psychology?

Scientific study of observable behavior.

How did Sigmund Freud differ from other early psychologists?

Freud gained his understanding of human behavior in consultations with patients.

Why do psychologists feel that it is necessary to perform psychological research on humans rather than only on animals?

Only experiments with humans can provide information on such uniquely human things as morality and values.

What are functionalists primarily concerned with?

How mental processes help organisms adapt to their environment.

How did Wilhelm Wundt break down consciousness?

Objective sensations and subjective feelings

There is a negative correlation between TV watching and grades. What can we properly conclude from this discovery?

We can conclude that this is an illusory correlation.

Why is the random assignment of participants to groups an important aspect of a properly designed experiments?

If the participants are randomly assigned, the researcher can assume that the people in each of the groups are pretty similar.

When a distribution of scores is skewed, the best representation of central tendency is the?

Median

A researcher wants to conduct an experiment to determine if eating cookie before class each day improves students' grades. He uses two psychology classes for the experiment, providing daily cookies to one and nothing to the other. At the end of the semester, the researcher compares the final grades of students in the two classes. What is the independent variable in the experiment?

The presence or absence of cookies.

Which of the following is a positive correlation?

As the study time decreases, students achieve lower grades.

A student is writing an article for her school newspaper about the school's new cell-phone policy, and she'd like to include survey results from a random sample of students in her article. Which of the following constitutes a random sample?

The writer pulls the names of five students from a hat that contains all student's names. She interviews the five selected students.

Monday morning quarterbacks rarely act surprised about the outcome of football games. Their tendency to believe they knew how the game would turn out is explained by?

Hindsight bias.

Let's say a psychology researcher is interested in TESTING whether a particular parenting technique would lead adolescents to feel more satisfied with their lives. What method should be used?

Experiment

Which of the following is one of the weaknesses of a descriptive research method?

Single cases may be misleading

An experiment is designed to test the effect of sugar on behavior, particularly ADHD. The sugar is the?

Independent Variable.

The placebo effect is well documented in research involving?

Organisms with nervous systems.

What do scientists need in order to support a theory?

Evidence

What is a method researchers use to gather information from many people about a particular subject?

Survey

Which of the following is a step involved in psychological research?

Conducting Surveys, Collecting and Analyzing data, and Drawing logical conclusions.

Which is one way that teachers ensure that a sample represents a target population?

selecting people at random from the target population

Which one of the following methods do scientists use to analyze the data they gather from their students?

correlation

What is the term for a predisposition to a certain point of view, despite what the facts may suggest.

bias

Which of the following best describes a case study?

in-depth investigaation

Why are scientists cautious about making generalizations from case studies?

Case studies cannot always be replicated

Observing the way people eat in restaurants in an example of

naturalistic observation

Which is an example of a negative correlation?

The greater the stress, the poorer the health

In the experimental method, how is the control group different than the experimental group?

The control group does not receive treatment

To accurately predict their outcome of a national election, what group should researchers survey?

random sample of voters

How is standard deviation determined?

Measuring the distance of every score to the mean.

What is an Hypothesis?

Educated guess

What is one reason that survey interviews and questionnaires may not be completely accurate?

Respondents may not give honest answers.

What score is most often used as the central tendency?

Mean

The division of psychology that deals primarily with "patterns of thinking" is?

Cognitive

Possible common errors of inquiry include all EXCEPT?

Induction

Overgeneralization, selective observation, made up information, and the defense of illogical reasoning all conspire to produce?

Premature closure of inquiry

What are the basic elements of the nervous system?

Neurons

Messages in a neuron travel from which component to which?

Dendrites to cell body

Synapses are located between what structures?

Axon of one neuron and dendrites of another.

What are the two main parts of the central nervous system?

Brain and spinal cord

What is an example of a neurotransmitter?

Dopamine

Researchers have linked a decrease in acetylcholine to which disease?

Alzheimer's

What so evolutionary psychologist believe about the limbic system?

It controls behaviors necessary for the survival of all mammals.

When you touch something with your LEFT hand, to what part of your brain is the information transmitted?

Right hemisphere

Broca's area and Wernicke's area are both key areas for what type of function?

Language

Which method of studying the brain records the electrical activity of the brain?

Electroencephalogram

Severe injury to the occipital lobe would most likely result in a deficit in?

Vision

The Hippocampus is the part of the?

Limbic system; is involved in learning and in forming new memories.

The nerve network that runs up the brainstem; plays an important role in controlling alertness and attention is the?

reticular formation

An individual experiences brain damage that produces a coma. Which part of the brain was probably damaged?

Reticular formation

Brain plasticity refers to the?

Ability of brain tissue to take on new functions

Which of the following is a task more likely to be accomplished by the right hemisphere of the brain?

Recognizing a friends face.

Breathing and heartbeat are controlled by?

Medulla

The angular gyrus

Transforms visual representations into an auditory code.

Dementia, particularly Alzheimer's disease is the result of arterial plaque attaching to the?

Hippocampus

A PET scan best allows researchers to determine?

The functions of various brain regions

FUN FACT:

All people with Alzheimer's have dementia but not all dementia people have alzheimer's.

The purpose of the adrenal glands is to produce hormones that?

Enable a person to cope with stressful situations.

Why are identical twins useful in studying the influences of heredity and environment?

Identical twins share 100 percent of their genes, so any differences must be environmental.

Which system regulates involuntary muscles and internal organs?

Autonomic System

What gland produces growth hormones?

Pituitary.

Taken to the EXTREME, the HEREDITY view may suggest what?

We cannot change anything about ourselves.

Which part of the endocrine system is located in the middle of the brain?

Pituitary gland

What is the basic function of the thalamus?

Serving as a relay station for sensory stimulation

Which system is activated when you are suddenly confronted by an angry, menacing PITBULL?

Sympathetic system.

Which lobe of the brain contains the sensory cortex?

Parietal