Cognitive Final

Which of the following perspectives was most likely to emphasize the importance of a precise operational definition?

The behaviorists’ research with animals

If a study has high ecological validity, then the most likely conclusion is that

the results could be applied in real-world situations

Researchers in artificial intelligence emphasize that

both the human brain and the computer can compare symbols and make choices, based on that comparison

On a dichotic listening task,

people notice little about the message that they are supposed to ignore

You need saccadic eye movements when you are reading this sentence in order to

move your eye so that the next words are registered in the fovea

Imagine that you are listening to a friend complaining about a course assignment, but you are simultaneously trying to read the newspaper. This is an example of

divided attention

What is the best information about short-term memory in the Atkinson–Shiffrin model?

Items in your short-term memory are often lost within 30 seconds

Amy recently saw a Broadway musical. As she listens to the soundtrack in her car a few days later, she forms clear visual images of the scenes from the show. The part of the brain that is most activated while she does this is the

right cerebral hemisphere, especially the frontal and parietal lobes

We discussed the research on release from proactive interference in working memory. One study used five different categories of words, such as fruits and occupations. The results of this study indicated that

material in working memory can be stored in terms of meaning

In the working-memory model, which of the following cognitive activities would the central executive be most likely to perform?

Deciding which items on a list should be remembered and which should be forgotten

Eyewitness testimony is most likely accurate accurate when

the witnesses do not experience social pressure

The encoding-specificity principle suggests that

we recall something better if we are in the same context in which we originally learned the material

What provides the best understanding of the concept called elaboration?

Elaboration means that you think about how an item is related to other concepts

According to the gestalt psychology approach to visual perception,

we tend to see well-organized patterns, rather than random-looking stimuli

Chapter 2 discusses a concept in object recognition called the “viewer-centered approach.” What provides the most accurate description of this approach?

This is a modification of the recognition-by-components approach, to explain how we perceive an object from an unusual angle

You have no difficulty distinguishing between the letters O and W, but it takes longer to distinguish between the letters O and Q. Which theory of object recognition does this support?

Feature-analysis theory

Nishimura and colleagues used magnetoencephalography techniques to investigate individual differences in mental imagery. They found that, when asked to visualize famous landmarks,

visualizers showed more activity in the occipital regions, whereas verbalizers showed more activity in the frontal cortical areas

Suppose that you are drawing a map, from memory, of the streets and buildings in a city you know well. If you were to show a bias in your recall of the buildings, you would be likely to

place buildings with similar functions near each other

Chapter 7 discussed topics related to imagery and cognitive maps. What provides the most accurate information about the situated cognition approach?

Our knowledge depends partly on information in our current environment

According to the discussion of the parallel distributed processing approach to memory, the term default assignment means that

we can figure out missing information about someone or something, based on information about similar people or things

Suppose that you want to bring your car to a garage for repairs. This procedure requires you to call for an appointment, drive to the appropriate location, leave your keys, and arrange for a time when you will return for your car. Cognitive psychologists call this sequence of actions

a script

The prototype approach to semantic memory works especially well in which of the following conditions?

When applied to a group of items that have no single characteristic in common

According to the discussion of categories, the basic level of reference has special status. This means that

basic-level names are used more often and they are more informative than the superordinate-level names

What is the best summary of teaching metacomprehension skills?

Educators are now developing programs to teach metacomprehension skills to students before they reach high school

Part of Chapter 9 discusses a comparison between reading and listening to spoken language. When you read, you are

more likely to encounter error-free language

Suppose that a friend asks you, “Is it true that the left hemisphere of the brain handles all language processing tasks?” Your response should be,

Sort of, because the left hemisphere typically handles a majority of language processing for most people, but the right hemisphere is important in interpreting abstract information

Psychologists have conducted more research on language comprehension than on language production. What is the best explanation for this discrepancy?

Researchers find it easier to conduct research on language comprehension, because they can easily vary the material that participants hear or see

Chapter 10 examined a study by Flege and his colleagues (1999), concerning the pronunciation skills of people who had emigrated from Korea to the United States. According to this research,

People who had come to the United States during childhood were least likely to speak English with an accent

Imagine that an elementary teacher has two classes, one monolingual and the other bilingual—though their other characteristics are similar. The bilingual class is more likely to

have a better understanding of the structure of their first language

Lori types her notes on her laptop during her professor’s lectures, but she also checks her email and monitors Facebook at the same time. Although Lori insists that she’s a good multitasker, Steve informs her that she would remember the material better if she closed her email and browser during class. Steve’s good advice is based on knowledge of

divided attention

Elaine memorized the lakes of the Great Lakes by using the word HOMES (Huron, Ontario, Michigan, Erie, Superior). Elaine has used the

first-letter technique

How is the tip-of-the-tongue experience relevant to metacognition?

When people report a tip-of-the-tongue state, they accurately assess that they are close to identifying the missing word

According to research on the tip-of-the-tongue phenomenon,

you can typically provide a similar-sounding word, which matches the target word reasonably closely

One way that functional fixedness and mental set are similar to each other is that

Both show that we rely too heavily on a strategy that is typically useful

Suppose that several high school algebra teachers are trying to encourage their students to use analogies more appropriately when they try to solve word problems. The teachers should instruct students

to sort a number of problems into categories, based on structural similarities

According to the discussion of visual imagery during problem solving,

visual images can be nontraditional, so they are sometimes more helpful than symbols and other methods of representing a problem

A major problem with using the analogy approach to problem solving is that

people pay too little attention to structural features

According to our discussion in Chapter 12, the belief-bias effect

is likely to operate for people who have difficulty thinking flexibly

Suppose that a student named John is asked to judge how many students are enrolled in his introductory biology class. He replies, “about 100….well, maybe between about 90 and 110.” Based on the discussion of confidence intervals, you predict that

John probably relied too heavily on the initial anchor of 100 students

Studies on the belief-bias effect conclude that

people often select answers that are “common sense” rather than logically correct