Age Psych Unit 3 test Flashcards
What is science?
A systematic approach to observing, measuring, and testing how things work.
What do social sciences study?
How people think, behave, and interact with one another.
What does qualitative research involve?
collecting and analyzing non-numerical data (e.g., text, video, or audio) to understand concepts, opinions, or experiences.
What type of qualitative research aligns with the ascension of Plato’s arch?
Inductive qualitative research.
Name one approach used in inductive qualitative analysis.
IQA: analyzing data without predetermined categories or theories.
Reflexive thematic analysis.
emphasizes the researcher’s subjectivity in interpreting data
Name another approach used in inductive qualitative analysis.
Grounded theory
What type of qualitative research is associated with just past the midpoint of Plato’s arch?
Deductive qualitative research.
Name one approach used in deductive qualitative analysis.
Critical discourse analysis.
Name another approach used in deductive qualitative analysis.
Template organizing approach.
What does “r” represent in a simple correlational design?
The strength of a linear relationship between two variables.
What is the range of “r” in correlational designs?
From an absolute value of 0 to 1.
What does a negative “r” indicate in a correlational design?
An inverse relationship between two variables.
What is an experimental design?
A controlled test of a hypothesis where the researcher manipulates one variable to discover its effect on another.
What is the best way to prove the existence of a cause-effect relationship?
Experimental design.
Name one way to improve experimental trials.
Have a control group.
Name another way to improve experimental trials.
Employ random assignment.
What is a trial called when random assignment is used?
Randomized controlled trial (RCT).
What is a placebo control used for in experiments?
To improve experimental trials by simulating the treatment without actual effects.
What is the key feature of a single-blind experiment?
Participants do not know which group they are in.
What is the key feature of a double-blind experiment?
Neither the participants nor the researchers know which group the participants are in.
What is a quasi-experimental study?
research method that examines cause-and-effect relationships without random assignment
name 2 examples of the quasi-experimental study
The nun study and loma linda
Name 3 types of effect that can influence results in developmental studies.
Age, time of measurment and cohort effects.
What is the purpose of designing developmental studies carefully?
To understand what is influencing the results.
What do cross-sectional studies measure?
A trait across a number of age groups or categories at the same time.
Name 2 vulnerabilities of cross-sectional studies.
Cohort effects and selective survival.
Give an example of a cross-sectional study measurement?
Hours of exercise per week among different age groups.
What do longitudinal studies measure?
The same variable(s) in the same individuals at different ages.
What is selective attrition in longitudinal studies?
When participants who drop out are not representative of the original sample.
What is terminal decline?
The gradual loss of cognitive abilities as individuals approach death.
What is a practice effect in longitudinal studies?
Improved performance on tests due to familiarity with the test rather than actual change.
What is one limitation of cross-sectional studies compared to longitudinal studies?
They reflect age differences rather than changes.
What challenge arises with participant selection in cross-sectional studies?
Selective survival of more able participants.
What is an issue with age ranges in cross-sectional studies?
Deciding on appropriate age ranges and how to divide the sample.
What is a challenge when comparing measures across age groups?
Finding comparable measures for older and younger adults.
What do sequential studies combine?
Cross-sectional and longitudinal designs.
Name one key feature of sequential studies.
Enrolling a group of people at different ages and following them over time.
Name one advantage of sequential studies.
They allow the study of change over time.
The Seattle Longitudinal Study of Aging involved more than ______ individuals from 1956 to 1998 in six testing cycles.
5,000.
The Seattle Longitudinal Study used the ______ test to systematically examine age, cohort, and time of measurement effects.
Primary Mental Abilities Test (PMAT).
The Seattle Longitudinal Study divided ______ participants into 10 age intervals of five years each.
500
People tend to show improvement in some primary abilities until their ______ or ______.
40s; 50s.
Scores in primary intellectual abilities stabilize until the mid-______ and early ______.
50s; 60s.
By the late ______, consistent declines in primary intellectual abilities are observed.
60s.
______ meaning shows the least amount of change in primary intellectual abilities through age 74.
Verbal.
______ ability shows the earliest and greatest drops in primary intellectual abilities.
Numeric.
Statistical significance refers to the chance of obtaining the same result with another ______ from the population.
Sample.
Statistical significance does not refer to the ______ of the result.
Size
A larger ______ size is associated with the reliability of the result.
Sample
______ refers to how trustworthy the results are over time.
Reliability
An example of reliability is ______ reliability, which checks if results are stable over time.
Test-retest.
______ refers to whether a questionnaire measures what it proposes to measure.
Validity
______ validity assesses whether results predict a future event, like how the MCAT predicts aptitude for medical school.
Predictive
The ______ Code of Ethics for Psychologists provides ethical guidance for all psychologists in Canada.
Canadian
The Canadian Code of Ethics for Psychologists is arranged in a hierarchy of ______ ethical principles
4
What are the 4 principles in the Canadian Code of Ethics?
Respect, responsible caring, integrity and responsibility to society
The Tri-Council Policy Statement (TCPS2) outlines three core principles: respect for ______, concern for ______, and ______.
Persons; welfare; justice.
Decisions must be based on all relevant ______ and should not be pressured.
Information
If a person does not have ______ to make a decision, a substitute decision-maker should be involved.
Capacity
Even if a person lacks capacity, they should be included in the decision-making process to the fullest ______ possible.
extent
If ______ is used in a study, it must be disclosed at the earliest possible opportunity during the debriefing process.
deception
Processing speed refers to the amount of time it takes to analyze information from the senses, formulate decisions, and prepare a __________.
response
The __________ hypothesis proposes that the loss of speed in the nervous system is the main cause of poorer information processing.
general slowing
Sustained attention refers to fixing attention for an __________ period of time.
extended
__________ memory is well-preserved in older adulthood and involves learning new sequences, though this process may take longer.
Procedural
__________ theory suggests that older adults recruit alternative neural circuits to make up for losses suffered elsewhere in the brain.
Scaffolding
The age-complexity hypothesis states that age differences increase as tasks become more __________.
complex
Older adults perform __________ than younger adults on lab-based sustained attention tasks.
worse
Semantic memory begins to decline slowly at age __________.
65
Inhibitory control __________ with age.
declines
Older adults show __________ accuracy on source memory tasks compared to younger adults.
reduced
True or False: Dividing attention leads to worse performance on all tasks at any age, but older adults perform better than younger adults when task demands increase.
Answer: False — performance is compromised as task demands increase for older adults.
True or False: Autobiographical memory is characterized by a reminiscence bump, where people recall more memories from ages 10-30 later in life.
true
True or False: Cognitive reserve factors, such as multilingualism and university education, help reduce cognitive decline.
true
True or False: Procedural memory and semantic memory both show rapid decline starting at age 50.
False — semantic memory begins to decline slowly at age 65, and procedural memory is well-preserved
True or False: Executive functioning, which involves planning and decision-making, can be maintained through activities like exercise, social games, and video games.
true
Divided attention refers to the ability to coordinate information from __________ sources.
multiple
Visual search tasks involve locating a specific target among a set of __________.
distractors
The __________ Test is a well-known example of inhibitory control, requiring participants to read color names aloud while ignoring the color seen.
stroop
Working memory keeps information temporarily available and active in __________.
consciousness
The __________ Network is a brain circuit active during rest and includes the hippocampus, parts of the prefrontal cortex, and the parietal and temporal lobes.
default
The __________ bump is the tendency to recall disproportionately more memories from ages 10-30 later in life.
reminiscence
__________ memory, which involves remembering events that did not occur, is more likely in older adults when source memory is compromised.
false
The best ways to support memory include regulating your attentional system, eating fish or vegetables, and maintaining the __________ system that supports the brain.
vascular
Factors like multilingualism and university education contribute to __________ reserve, which helps lessen cognitive decline.
cognitive
Executive functioning involves higher-order skills needed to make __________, plan, and allocate mental resources to tasks.
decisions
True or False: Attentional switching, the ability to shift focus as demanded by a situation, improves with age.
False — it declines with age
True or False: Sustained attention can be improved for older adults through practice and task predictability.
true
T/F Younger and older adults show equal performance on conjunction visual search tasks, regardless of task difficulty.
False — older adults perform worse as task demands increase.
T/F Semantic memory increases from ages 35-55, then levels off before beginning to decline slowly at age 65.
True
T/F Prospective memory tasks that are time-based are harder for older adults, but this difficulty is less apparent in naturalistic settings.
true
T/F Scaffolding theory explains that older adults use alternative neural circuits to compensate for age-related brain changes.
true
__________ attention refers to focusing on a portion of an experience while ignoring other features of that experience.
Selective
As tasks become more complex, the __________ hypothesis suggests that older adults’ processing resources are stretched, leading to greater age differences in performance.
age-complexity
__________ memory is the ability to recall events from one’s life and shows a retention function that preserves memories from the last 20-30 years.
Autobiographical
The __________ theory explains how older adults use alternative neural circuits to compensate for brain function losses in working memory tasks.
Scaffolding
__________ memory, which includes skills like riding a bike or typing, remains well-preserved in older adults.
Procedural
False memory is more likely to occur when __________ memory, the ability to remember where or how information was acquired, is compromised.
source
The __________ hypothesis proposes that the slowing of the nervous system is the main cause of poorer information processing with age.
general slowing
__________ memory refers to temporarily holding and manipulating information and declines most noticeably after young adulthood.
working
Older adults perform worse on __________ memory tasks that require recalling specific events, compared to tasks that involve recognizing previously learned information.
episodic
True or False: Divided attention improves in older adults when tasks become more complex.
False — it declines as task demands increase.
True or False: Sustained attention, or the ability to maintain focus for an extended period, tends to decline in older adulthood.
true
True or False: Semantic memory begins to decline sharply after age 55.
False — it starts to decline slowly at age 65.
True or False: The default network in the brain becomes more active during working memory tasks in older adults.
False — it shows decreased activation during working memory tasks.
True or False: Procedural memory declines significantly in older adulthood, particularly for learning new sequences.
False — it is well-preserved, though learning new sequences may take longer.
True or False: Older adults are generally less accurate than younger adults on tasks involving time-based prospective memory.
true
True or False: The reminiscence bump refers to the tendency to recall more memories from ages 10-30 later in life.
true
Autobiographical memory for medical information tends to be better preserved than memory for foods consumed.
true
True or False: Executive functioning, which involves decision-making and planning, shows evidence of decline with age.
true
True or False: Playing video games can improve attentional capacities and reaction times in older adults.
true
According to Lewis Thurstone’s theory of intelligence, one of the seven primary mental abilities is ____________, which refers to the ability to think flexibly and draw inferences in novel situations.
Fluid Intelligence
True or False:
Crystallized intelligence improves steadily from the teenage years to the early 60s, while fluid intelligence declines steadily from the teenage years to the early 60s.
true
In the Seattle Longitudinal Study, performance on tests of ____________ intelligence improves steadily from the teenage years to the early 60s, while performance on tests of ____________ intelligence declines steadily.
Crystallized, Fluid
True or False:
In Piaget’s theory, the Preoperational Period (ages 2-6) is characterized by children relying on concrete operations such as addition and subtraction.
Answer: False
Postformal thought is characterized by a recognition that truth is not absolute and that solutions must be ____________, with emotion and subjective factors intertwined with thinking.
Realistic
In the Berlin Wisdom Paradigm, wisdom includes a rich base of factual knowledge, but it does not emphasize life-span contextualism or value relativism.
false
What do absolutists believe in terms of problem-solving?
Absolutists believe there is only one correct solution to a problem.
Relativists view problems as having how many sides?
Relativists believe there are many sides to an issue, and the right answer depends on the circumstances.
What is characteristic of dialectical thinkers?
Dialectical thinkers see merits in different viewpoints and can synthesize them into a workable solution.
What cognitive milestone is associated with the formal operations period in Piaget’s theory?
The cognitive milestone of the formal operations period is the ability for abstract reasoning and hypothetical-deductive thinking.
In Piaget’s theory, what is assimilation?
Assimilation is the use of currently available information to make sense of incoming information—”adding to your repertoire.”
What does accommodation mean in Piaget’s theory?
Accommodation is changing one’s thought to make a better approximation of the world of experience—”learning to think differently about it.
In Piaget’s sensorimotor period (0-2 years), what is cognition primarily reliant on?
Cognition in the sensorimotor period is reliant on sensory perception and motor processes.
What do children in the preoperational period (2-6 years) use for understanding the world?
In the pre-operational period, children use foundational symbols like words and numbers but are still “tricked” by conservation tasks.
During the concrete operations period (6-11 years), what mathematical skills do children develop?
Children in the concrete operations period can perform symbolic mathematical operations (add, subtract, multiply) with concrete objects and later internalize them to become more abstract
What reasoning abilities emerge during the formal operations period (age 12+)?
abstract reasoning, generate hypotheses, test them, and make inferences based on past observations.
Personality traits that are consistent across different contexts are known as ________.
dispositional traits
The Five-Factor Model of Personality organizes traits into five dimensions: Openness to Experience, Conscientiousness, Extraversion, Agreeableness, and ________.
neuroticism
One of the facets of Openness to Experience includes being open to differences in ________.
values
A conscientious person is likely to show the ________ trait, which refers to being thorough and diligent in work.
scrupulous
Extraversion is divided into two groups of traits: interpersonal traits and ________ traits.
temperamental
Agreeableness is the opposite of ________.
antagonism
Longitudinal studies show that as people age, ________ increases, while neuroticism decreases.
conscientiousness/agreeableness
The Correspondence Principle suggests that personality affects life events, and these events, in turn, affect ________.
personality
Erikson’s eight stages of psychosocial development begin with ________ versus mistrust.
trust
In Erikson’s stage of generativity versus stagnation, the main question is: “What can I contribute to ________?
the lives of others
According to Logan, Erikson’s eight stages represent a ________ that repeats throughout life.
cycle
Kotre argues that generativity consists of five types, including biological and parental, technical, and ________.
cultural
The Adult Attachment Theory states that older adults are less likely to experience ________ attachment.
anxious
In Possible Selves Theory, people strive for their hoped-for selves while attempting to avoid their ________ selves.
feared
McAdams’s Life-story Model suggests that a coherent life story reconciles opposite aspects of oneself and integrates these within one’s ________.
sociocultural context
According to McAdams, middle-aged adults often incorporate themes of ________ and redemption into their life narratives.
struggle
Culture exerts the strongest impact on the ________ and timing of characteristic adaptations.
content
The concept of ________ correction refers to reevaluating one’s roles and goals to make necessary changes in mid-life.
midlife
T/F The Big Five traits show no stability and change significantly across a person’s lifespan.
false
t/f Erikson was the first theorist to propose a lifespan approach to personality development.
true
t/f According to Van Geert, one rule of development is that outward orientation gradually replaces inward orientation.
false
t/f Generativity refers solely to parental contributions and has no connection to cultural or communal aspects.
false
t/f Research strongly supports the idea that most people experience a dramatic midlife crisis during middle age.
false
t/f McAdams’s Life-story Model emphasizes that life narratives become more coherent as people age.
true
t/f The phrase “having vs. doing” refers to the difference between dispositional traits and characteristic adaptations.
true
t/f Possible selves are the motivational views of oneself that do not change across the lifespan.
false
True or False: Agreeableness is defined by traits such as being skeptical, mistrustful, and callous.
False. Those traits describe antagonism, which is the opposite of agreeableness.
Fill in the blank: Don Hamachek described Erikson’s stages as a _________ of possibilities, where few people exclusively belong to one stage.
continuum
Fill in the blank: According to Hogan, personality traits like “getting along” and “getting ahead” reflect dimensions that are _________ determined.
evolutionairy
True or False: Emotion-focused coping involves attempting to change the situation itself.
False. Emotion-focused coping involves changing how one appraises the situation, not the situation itself.
Which of the following is NOT one of the seven essential features of a life story in McAdams’s model?
a) Narrative tone
b) Nuclear episodes
c) Cultural traditions
d) Ideological setting
c) Cultural traditions
True or False: Life transition theories accurately represent the common experiences of individuals at specific ages.
False. These theories often overestimate the commonalities of experiences at particular ages.
Fill in the blank: Culture has a _______ influence on life stories but a _______ effect on the phenotypic expression of traits.
profound; modest
True or False: Older adults tend to have fewer attachment figures but from a broader variety of areas.
True.
What is mental health?
Self-perceived emotional, mental, and social wellbeing
what is Psychiatric disorder?
A set of symptoms that persist over a long period of time and are disruptive to their work/school life, personal life, and/or intrapersonal well-being.
What is the DSM-V?
diagnostic manual used by mental health providers with diagnostic privileges
Includes diagnostic criteria for major forms of psychological disorder
In terms of substance abuse and depression who is affected more: Older adults or 15 - 24 yrs.
Older adults have lower rates of mental illness & substance abuse
What is lifetime prevalence?
proportion of a population that at some point in their life have experienced the disorder
If at any point a person has experienced financial crisis how much does the risk of mental illness go up by?
3x
If at any point a person has experienced illness/injury/seperation … how much does the risk of mental illness go up by?
2 (doubles)
What is mdd
Extremely sad mood lasting 2 weeks. Problems: appetite, sleep, attention, sense of self and guilt
What is caregivers out of isolation in regards to depression?
Decrease the prevalence of risk factors (anxiety depression and isolation)
Why is depression in older adults not as easily diagnosed?
older adults only show mild symptoms, physicians don’t spend enough time with them
what are the medical conditions associated with psych disorders in older adults?
metabolic syndrome, hypertension and impairments in cognitive functioning
Where rating is suicide for cause of death in canada?
9th
What age are ppl more likely to commit?
45-49 OR 50-54
What is Bipolar disorder in older adults?
One or more manic episodes May or may not have depressive episode
What do anxiety disorders look like in older adults?
Go to great lengths to avoid anxiety-provoking situations
Are Older adults at particular risk for abuse of prescription drugs?
yes
What are the risks of alcohol dependance in older adults?
diabetes, high blood pressure, heart failure, osteoporosis and mood disorders
What should be accounted for when assessing older adults?
sensory, motor, and cognitive limitations
What does an assessment for mental illness in older adults?
Mental exam, clinical interview, symptom measure and functional abilities
