PSYC 001 Midterm Practice Exam

Metacognition is best described as:

thinking about and monitoring one's own thinking and learning

In a "count the vowels" activity, why might people remember words better on a second attempt?

A second attempt can involve greater attention, familiarity, and a more effective strategy

Which study plan best resembles an intense, focused study session?

Set a specific goal, remove distractions, work actively, and check what you learned

A student works for 25 minutes, takes a 5-minute break, and repeats the cycle. This most closely describes:

the Pomodoro Method

Which technique most directly requires retrieving information from memory?

Answering practice questions without notes

Why is spaced practice generally useful?

It distributes learning over time and creates repeated opportunities to retrieve information

Which behavior best demonstrates metacognitive monitoring?

Checking practice-test results to identify which concepts remain confusing

A study cycle is most effective when it is treated as:

a repeated process of preparing, engaging, reviewing, and adjusting study methods

Psychology is most accurately defined as the scientific study of:

behavior and mental processes

Which example best illustrates psychology?

Measuring how sleep duration relates to attention

The emergence of psychology drew together which broad influences?

Physiology, philosophy, and the scientific method

What most clearly distinguishes empirical psychology from an unsupported claim about human behavior?

The claim is supported by systematically collected and evaluated evidence

A researcher asks how rewards influence the frequency of a behavior. Which school of thought is most closely associated with this question?

Behaviorism

A researcher studies how unconscious conflicts may influence a person's actions. Which traditional school is most closely associated with this question?

Psychoanalytic

A researcher examines how memory, attention, and problem-solving operate. Which perspective is the best fit?

Cognitive

A researcher studies how brain activity relates to emotion. Which perspective is most directly represented?

Biological

Why might psychologists use an eclectic approach?

Combining perspectives can capture multiple interacting causes of a complex phenomenon

Which is the best example of applying psychology outside a clinical office?

Using learning principles to improve classroom instruction

Which is a common limitation of relying on personal intuition to explain behavior?

Intuition can be influenced by bias and may not be systematically tested

A researcher begins with a theory, develops a testable prediction, collects data, and evaluates the prediction. This illustrates:

the scientific method

Operationalization means:

defining how an abstract variable will be measured or manipulated

A researcher operationalizes stress as a participant's score on a validated questionnaire. The questionnaire score is:

an operational measure of stress

Which operationalization of "sleep quality" may be especially useful if the researcher wants objective sleep timing and duration?

A sleep diary or a validated wearable measure, with limitations acknowledged

Reliability refers primarily to whether a measure:

produces consistent results under comparable conditions

A scale consistently reports a person's weight as 5 kg too high. It is:

reliable but potentially invalid

A study uses a depression questionnaire but claims it directly measures intelligence. The most obvious concern is:

construct validity

A descriptive study is best suited to:

describing what is happening or documenting a case

A researcher measures students' sleep hours and exam scores without changing either variable. This is:

a correlational study

A researcher randomly assigns participants to receive either a study-skills workshop or a control condition, then compares outcomes. This is most likely:

an experiment

Why can correlation not, by itself, establish causation?

Directionality and third-variable explanations may account for the association

Random assignment primarily helps researchers:

distribute participant characteristics across conditions on average, strengthening causal inference

Random sampling primarily helps researchers:

make a sample more representative of the population from which it is drawn

A study measures a construct well but uses a biased, unrepresentative sample. Which validity concern is especially relevant?

External validity

A study's outcome may have been caused by a confounding variable rather than the intended manipulation. Which validity is most threatened?

Internal validity

Replication matters because it:

tests whether findings can be reproduced and helps reveal unreliable or context-dependent results

In the Belmont framework, respect for persons is most closely related to:

informed consent and respecting autonomy

Which action best reflects beneficence in human-subject research?

Minimizing risks and considering possible benefits

Which scenario most directly raises the Belmont principle of justice?

Research burdens fall on a group simply because it is easy to recruit, while benefits go elsewhere

A result has p < .05 under a study's chosen significance threshold. The most careful interpretation is:

The result meets the study's statistical-significance criterion under the model used

Which statistic describes the typical spread of scores around the mean?

Standard deviation

A news headline says a supplement "proves" it improves memory, but the article describes only a small correlational study and sells the supplement. What is the best response?

Check the original study, design, sample, conflicts of interest, limitations, and replication

The central nervous system consists of the:

brain and spinal cord

The peripheral nervous system primarily:

connects the central nervous system with the rest of the body

Which neuron component most commonly receives incoming signals from other neurons?

Dendrites

Which neuron component carries an action potential away from the cell body toward terminals?

Axon

Myelin generally helps neural signaling by:

speeding conduction along many axons

Neural communication is called electrochemical because it involves:

electrical changes within neurons and chemical signaling between cells at many synapses

An action potential is best described as:

a brief, all-or-none electrical event that travels along an axon

Excitatory and inhibitory inputs affect firing because they:

can increase or decrease the likelihood that the neuron reaches threshold

Damage to the occipital lobe would most directly be expected to affect:

visual processing

Damage to the frontal lobe may particularly affect:

planning, decision-making, and aspects of voluntary movement

Damage to the temporal lobe may affect:

auditory processing and aspects of memory or language

The parietal lobe is especially involved in:

integrating bodily sensation and spatial information

Which structure is particularly important for forming new explicit memories?

Hippocampus

Which structure is most directly involved in basic regulation of breathing and heart rate?

Medulla/brainstem

The amygdala is especially associated with:

processing emotional significance, including aspects of fear learning

The thalamus is often described as:

a major relay for many sensory signals to the cortex

Contralateral organization means that:

each cerebral hemisphere controls or processes many functions associated with the opposite side of the body

Lateralization refers to:

some functions being more strongly associated with one hemisphere than the other

Why can split-brain patients sometimes respond differently depending on which visual field receives information?

Information presented to one hemisphere may not be shared normally with the other after the corpus callosum is severed

Neural plasticity refers to the nervous system's ability to:

change its connections or functioning with experience, learning, or injury

A double dissociation occurs when:

damage to area A disrupts function X but spares Y, while damage to area B disrupts Y but spares X

Which brain-imaging method is especially known for strong temporal resolution when measuring electrical activity from the scalp?

EEG

Which technique commonly uses changes in blood oxygenation as an indirect indicator of brain activity?

fMRI

Sensation is best described as:

detecting physical energy through sensory receptors

Perception is best described as:

the brain's organization and interpretation of sensory information

Transduction is the process by which:

sensory receptors convert physical energy into neural signals

An absolute threshold is commonly defined as the minimum stimulus intensity detected:

about 50% of the time under specified conditions

A difference threshold concerns:

the smallest detectable difference between two stimuli

A person stops noticing the feeling of a watch on their wrist after wearing it for a while. This is an example of:

sensory adaptation

After moving into a room, someone gradually stops noticing its background smell. This illustrates:

sensory adaptation

Perceptual adaptation differs from sensory adaptation because perceptual adaptation emphasizes:

adjustments in how sensory information is interpreted after altered or unusual input

Bottom-up processing is driven primarily by:

incoming sensory information

Top-down processing is influenced strongly by:

expectations, context, prior knowledge, and goals

You read a smudged word correctly because the surrounding sentence makes the intended word obvious. This is an example of:

top-down processing

Which statement best explains why two species may perceive the same environment differently?

Their sensory systems may detect different ranges or features of physical energy

The visual transduction sequence begins when light is detected by:

photoreceptors in the retina

The visual "what" pathway is most associated with:

identifying and recognizing objects

The visual "where/how" pathway is most associated with:

spatial location and guiding visually guided action

A perceptual set is:

a readiness or expectation to perceive something in a particular way

A tree falling creates pressure waves in the air even if no one is nearby; whether it is "heard" depends on a listener's sensory system and experience. This best distinguishes:

physical sound from the perceptual experience of hearing

Which item is an empirical research article?

A paper written by researchers that reports methods, data, analyses, and results from a study

A media article reporting a study differs from the original empirical article because it usually:

summarizes or interprets the study for a broader audience

When vetting a scientific claim online, what is the best first move?

Trace the claim to the original research and check what the study actually tested

Which is a warning sign when evaluating a popular science claim?

The claim relies on one small study and promises a guaranteed result while selling a product

Why is it useful to check whether a finding has been replicated?

Replication provides evidence about whether a result is robust across repeated tests

Which statistic is a measure of central tendency?

Mean

Which career-development action can build relevant experience before obtaining a formal internship?

Volunteering, assisting with research, joining relevant projects, or building related skills

Which approach best tailors an application to a particular internship?

Connect specific experience and skills to the position's stated requirements

Which is a sensible use of a university Career Center?

Seek help with resumes, interviews, career exploration, job/internship searches, and professional development

An internship is best described as:

a structured opportunity to gain practical experience in a field or role