Ciencias del comportamiento Flashcards
34.1.
A 7-year-old boy is shown two identical glasses of water. When
asked which glass has more water, he says they have the same
amount. The water in one glass is then poured into a taller, thinner
glass in front of him. When asked which glass has more water, he
says the taller glass. The water in the tall glass is poured back into
the original glass, and he says the amount of water in the two glasses
is the same. What cognitive development skill has the child not yet
achieved?
A. Inductive reasoning
B. Deductive reasoning
C. Reversibility
D. Conservation
E. Operational thought
34.1. D. Conservation
The child has not yet understood the concept of conservation, which is the
principle that an object maintains its overall size or volume even if the
shape or distribution changes. Reversibility is the understanding that some
things can be changed into another state, then back again, such as ice to
water. A child who has developed operational thought is able to see things
from the point of view of someone else. Deductive reasoning involves using
logic to go from the general to the specific, while inductive reasoning
moves in the opposite direction.
34.2.
A 6-month-old child is continuously amused when her father places
his hands in front of his face, then moves them to reveal his face.
This goes on for a full minute, after which the father is exasperated
with the child wanting to repeat the game. When he does the same
actions a month later, his daughter shows little interest. What is the
most likely explanation for the child’s change in reaction?
A. The child has become habituated to the game with her father but
would engage with her mother
B. The child is no longer able to pay attention to one stimulus for
that length of time
C. The child is now able to crawl away and seek novel stimulation
D. The child realizes her father is still there even when his hands are
closed
E. The child now experiences the game as frightening instead of
amusing
34.2. D. The child realizes her father is still there even when his
hands are closed
A child learns object permanence between 7 and 8 months old. Prior to
that time, a child does not understand that something still exists even
though she cannot see it. Once they develop object permanence, her father
revealing his face behind his hands is no longer a surprise, so the game
then has little meaning
34.3.
After several weeks of therapy, a patient and therapist discover the
patient’s core belief of “I’m a failure.” They are most likely engaging
in what psychotherapeutic modality?
A. Psychodynamic psychotherapy
B. Supportive therapy
C. Interpersonal therapy
D. Cognitive therapy
E. Dialectical behavior therapy
34.3. D. Cognitive therapy
One of the aims of cognitive therapy is to get to the patient’s core belief,
which is thought to be the ultimate driving force of thoughts, behaviors,
and emotions. Patients can talk about feelings of being a failure, but only in
cognitive therapy is it called the core belief and is a focus of treatment.
34.4.
Much like monkeys separated from their mothers and isolated at
birth, babies who were separated from their mothers and placed in a
hospital or other institution for prolonged periods of time eventually
demonstrated what behavioral response?
A. Anger
B. Hyperactivity
C. Acting out
D. Withdrawal
E. Anxiety
34.4. D. Withdrawal
Harry Harlow’s famous monkey experiment showed that when monkeys
were separated from their mother at birth, they became withdrawn, unable
to mate or relate to peers, and incapable of caring for their offspring.
Similarly, human babies become depressed and withdrawn when separated
from their mother, as was described by René Spitz when he studied
children who were hospitalized or institutionalized.
34.5.
A 60-year-old man starts a new oral medication for cancer
treatment that he is supposed to take every morning with food. On
the first morning, he takes the medication as he reads the
newspaper, and 5 minutes later starts to retch and vomit. This
occurs every day of the 30 days he is on the medication. As he walks
to the store one afternoon, he passes a newspaper stand and vomits.
The newspaper represents what element in classical (Pavlovian)
conditioning?
A. Conditioned response
B. Conditioned stimulus
C. Unconditioned response
D. Unconditioned stimulus
34.5. B. Conditioned stimulus
In classical conditioning, two stimuli, in this case the medication and the
newspaper, lead to the same response, vomiting. The natural
(unconditioned) stimulus is the medication, which causes the natural
(unconditioned) response, vomiting. Newspapers do not usually trigger
vomiting, and only do so in this man because it has been consistently
paired with the natural trigger prior to the unconditioned response. He has
become conditioned to the newspaper (the conditioned stimulus), which
now produces a response that does not usually occur, making vomiting
specifically to the newspaper
a conditioned response
34.6.
A 13-year-old girl presents with her mother to the outpatient clinic
for a routine physical examination. While alone with the doctor, she
talks about how her mother “nags me all the time about doing my
homework. I tell her I’m going to do it eventually, but she keeps
bothering me until I finally do it just to get her to be quiet.” The
child’s mother is training her daughter by what method of operant
conditioning?
A. Positive reinforcement
B. Negative reinforcement
C. Positive punishment
D. Negative punishment
34.6. B. Negative reinforcement
Reinforcement always increases a behavior, and punishment decreases it.
Positive is applying something and negative is taking it away. In this case,
the behavior of doing the homework is reinforced by taking something
negative (the nagging) away, so it is negative reinforcement. Positive
reinforcement would be giving her extra money or privileges for doing her
homework, which would also increase the likelihood of her daughter
getting it done. Conversely, positive punishment would be placing her on
restriction (applying something) for
not
doing her homework, in hopes of
reducing the behavior of
not
getting the work done. Negative punishment
would be taking away her cell phone (removing something) to reduce the
behavior of not doing her work
34.7.
A 17-year-old girl who was diagnosed with social anxiety disorder a
week ago comes to the outpatient clinic for therapy. She is afraid to
shake hands with others because she fears she will “catch a disease
from their germs.” She describes a racing pulse, sweaty palms,
feeling like she will vomit, and shortness of breath “when I even
think about touching someone else.” The therapist teaches her how
to engage in deep breathing, then has her imagine shaking hands
with someone else. As her anxiety builds, the therapist guides her
through the breathing techniques. This progresses to her watching
videos of people shaking hands, followed by shaking hands with
gloves on, to finally shaking hands without gloves, while pairing the
anxiety with deep breathing each time. What technique is being used
to decrease her anxiety?
A. Extinction
B. Preparedness
C. State-dependent learning
D. Reinstatement
E. Counterconditioning
34.7. E. Counterconditioning
In this example of counterconditioning through systematic desensitization,
the conditioned stimulus (shaking hands) is paired with a new stimulus
(deep breathing), whereas before, the conditioned stimulus was paired
with extreme anxiety. Extinction would involve unpairing the conditioned
stimulus and the unconditioned stimulus through a technique such as
exposure therapy. Preparedness is the concept that organisms have a
predisposition to associate certain stimuli with fear or anxiety.
Reinstatement occurs when the current context is associated again with the
unconditioned stimulus, leading to a return in fear or anxiety. Statedependent
learning is the concept that retention of information is best
when tested in the same state in which it was learned.
34.8.
Parents wish to increase the frequency of their 14-year-old son
cleaning his room and decide to use a reinforcer of allowing an extra
30 minutes of video game time before bed. Which reinforcement
schedule is most likely to result in the highest number of times he
cleans his room?
A. Rewarding him every seventh time he cleans the room
B. Rewarding him on average every seventh time, but varying the
number of times needed
C. Rewarding him once every 7 days
D. Rewarding him on average every 7 days, but varying the number
of days
34.8. B. Rewarding him on average every seventh time, but
varying the number of times needed
Variable ratio reinforcement schedules, in which the desired behavior is
reinforced after an average but unpredictable number of times, generate
the highest rate of behavior. In a fixed ratio schedule, the reinforcement
occurs after a certain number of times the behavior occurs, which leads to
increasing rates of behavior up until the reinforcer is delivered, followed by
a drop-off. In a fixed interval schedule, the reinforcer is delivered for the
first response after a certain length of time. This leads to the lowest rate of
desired behavior, as the deliverance of the reinforcer
is completely
predictable and only depends on the behavior being done once. In a
variable interval schedule, behaviors are reinforced after an average but
unpredictable length of time, leading to a higher behavior rate than on a
fixed interval schedule, but lower than on a ratio schedule.
34.9.
A 7-year-old boy tells his parents that he does not want to eat his
vegetables, but instead would rather have ice cream. They try to
convince him to eat the vegetables, but he refuses. Using the
Premack principle, how should the parents respond to get him to
engage in the desired behavior?
A. Make him stay at the table until he eats his vegetables
B. Stop saying anything about the situation and carry on with the
meal
C. Tell him he can have ice cream once he eats his vegetables
D. Tell him he cannot have ice cream today, but that he possibly can
tomorrow
E. Ask him to eat just half the amount of the vegetables
34.9. C. Tell him he can have ice cream once he eats his
vegetables
The Premack principle states that a person may engage in a less-preferred
behavior if it grants access to a more-preferred one. The child’s morepreferred
behavior is eating ice cream. To follow the principle, the parents
should tell him that engaging in the less-preferred behavior (eating his
vegetables) will result in getting ice cream.
34.10.
A 45-year-old man reports to his supervisor for his quarterly
performance review. Despite meeting his sales goals, he is yelled at
by his boss, who is known to be unusually harsh. He increases his
sales for the next quarter and experiences the same result by his
boss. The treatment by his boss continues for the next three
quarters. He feels demoralized, and his production drops to the
point that he no longer meets his goals. The man is then
transferred to a new boss. According to learned helplessness, how
will the man most likely perform prior to his next review?
A. He will sell just enough to meet the goal
B. He will sell more than he ever has
C. His sales will remain subpar
D. His sales will drop substantially
34.10. C. His sales will remain subpar
In the learned helplessness model, an individual repeatedly exposed to an
aversive stimulus with no way to avoid it will have difficulty learning
behaviors to escape the situation even when escape is possible. In this
situation, the new boss presumably would not deliver the aversive stimulus
of yelling if the man performs as expected. Because he has learned that his
actions are not connected to the deliverance of the negative stimulus, he is
much less likely to change his behavior to try to effect change. Therefore,
he will continue performing at a subpar level
34.11.
A 25-year-old man presents to the emergency department (ED)
one evening by emergency medical services (EMS) following an
accident in which the all-terrain vehicle he was riding flipped over.
He was thrown backward from the vehicle, landed on his head and
lost consciousness. He has no prior medical illnesses and is on no
medications. He is a graduate student at the local university. A
head CT in the ED shows a lesion in the medial portion of the
temporal lobe. When asked if he remembers the accident, he says
he does not. He is likely to have difficulty answering which of the
following memory questions?
A. “What is your birthdate?”
B. “Can you repeat these three words? Flag, ball, tree.”
C. “Who was the first president of the United States?”
D. “What did you have for lunch this afternoon?”
E. “What are you studying in school?”
34.11. D. “What did you have for lunch this afternoon?”
Damage to the medial portion of the temporal lobe can lead to anterograde
and retrograde amnesia. Retrograde deficits are often most severe for
information most recently learned. Immediate memory is usually
preserved, which is why he should be able to repeat three words. The most
recent nonimmediate information he is asked to recall is what he had for
lunch earlier in the day. The other questions involve memories that were
consolidated years ago. (1024)
34.12.
Two friends recount during a conversation where they were and
what they were doing on 9/11/2011 when they learned that the
Twin Towers fell in the United States. They were both in their 20s
at the time and recall the disbelief upon first hearing the news. One
of them states that she was driving to work, talking with her
mother on the phone about the next family vacation. The other
states that he was in his physiology class, listening to his professor
talk about the heart. Besides the hippocampus, what brain
structure is activated in the production of the memories of this
event as compared to memories of routine events?
A. Amygdala
B. Dentate gyrus
C. Subiculum
D. Parahippocampal cortex
E. Entorhinal cortex
34.12. A. Amygdala
The hippocampus, dentate gyrus, subiculum, parahippocampal cortices,
and entorhinal cortices are all normally crucial for any memory. However,
memories for emotional or arousing events include the activation of the
amygdala
34.13.
Amnesia due to Korsakoff syndrome results from alcoholic
damage and thiamine deficiency to the frontal lobe and what other
region of the brain?
A. Telencephalon
B. Diencephalon
C. Metencephalon
D. Mesencephalon
E. Myelencephalon
34.13. B. Diencephalon
The diencephalon, which consists of the thalamus, hypothalamus,
epithalamus, and subthalamus is damaged in Korsakoff syndrome. The
frontal lobe damage seen in Korsakoff syndrome produces problems with
cognition as well as memory retrieval and evaluation. The diencephalon
damage adds problems with being able to remember items of one type after
switching categories of information to be recalled, as well as the ability to
hold verbal and visual information in mind and sustaining mental control.
34.14.
A person with severe amnesia would be expected to be able to
remember which of the following?
A. The name of their spouse
B. How to get from their house to their favorite store
C. The melody of their favorite song
D. How to ride a bicycle
E. What they did last New Year’s Eve
34.14. D. How to ride a bicycle
Amnesia affects only declarative (explicit), not procedural (implicit)
memory. Declarative memory is divided into episodic (specific events in a
person’s history) and semantic memory (recall of facts and concepts).
Procedural memory involves being able to carry out muscle actions without
much conscious thought, such as with riding a bicycle
34.15.
A 40-year-old female with amnesia is shown a picture of a woman
in a bright red dress holding an umbrella on a rainy day. Also in
the scene is a lake with ducks and a boat in the distance. The next
day, she is asked to read out loud a set of words as quickly as
possible. The set includes the words “duck,” “umbrella,” and
“dress.” A patient without amnesia would read words represented
in the picture more quickly than neutral words, and remember
being shown the picture. How will this patient most likely
perform?
Quicker reading speed Remember picture
A. Yes No
B. Yes Yes
C. No Yes
D. No No
34.15. A. Quicker reading speed, not remembering the picture
The patient is participating in an experiment to measure the effect of
priming, which is the facilitation of the ability to detect or identify a
particular stimulus based on a specific recent experience. Studies have
shown that the effect of this type of priming remains intact in participants
with amnesia, as demonstrated by increased reading speed of words
represented in the priming picture. However, as expected, the participant
would not remember being shown the picture
