Piazza questions

Question 1

What is psychology?

Answer 1

Psychology is the study of how the mind and brain function and interact with other parts of the body to produce behaviour.

Question 2

What is the critical difference between biological and cognitive psychology?

Answer 2

Biological psychology focuses on physical reactions that take place in the body triggering both physical and mental responses. This works in tandem with cognitive psychology which focuses more on perception, memory, and knowledge to create physical reactions to a stimulant. Both have the same goal: to explain behaviour and the mind.

Question 3

Is psychology a science or an art?

Answer 3

Both. Psychology uses scientific methods (theories, discussion) to explain behaviours. However, the research we develop through psychology will change because the human mind will continue to evolve; this is less scientific where I believe things are much more immutable.

Question 4

Imagine you heard the following on the news: ‘Researchers have determined that women who swear more have more facial hair’.The female anchor turns to her male colleague and says “My goodness, I’ll have to watch my language! I don’t want to grow a beard!”

Does the comment reflect a valid understanding of what the research showed?

Answer 4

The comment is a misunderstanding of the research as a causation can not be drawn between the two factors just because a correlation exists.

Question 5

What is the difference between performance and competence?

Answer 5

Performance is how you are doing at that time, based on observation and can fluctuate. Competence is your potential, what you do consistently.

Question 6

What kind of errors are likely to be made if we fail to be critical when applying the labels performance and competence?

Answer 6

A generalization error is possible. Someones competence may be underestimated due to one bad performance.

Question 7

According to operant conditioning – the theory which explains voluntary behaviour, what operant conditioning type am I using when I delete Piazza notes that ought to be in the chat or on the Q&A forum?

Answer 7

negative reinforcement

Question 8

Briefly explain how variation comes about, according to Darwin’s theory of natural selection, and how do variations propagate through a population?

Answer 8

Variation is a result of certain genetic traits being more or less favourable in the ever changing environment. If a trait is more favourable it will propagate through a population due to higher survival rates of those individuals (natural selection).

Question 9

How might you be able to test whether a child has or does not yet have a theory of mind (does or does not yet understand that what is in her mind is not the same as what is in my mind)?

Answer 9

Many examples exist: 1. someone asking a kid over the phone what they are doing and them replying “i’m playing this” indicates they’re lacking theory of mind.
2. showing a kid how a magic trick works and then performing it in front of an audience and asking the kid whether the audience knows how the trick works. The kid will reply yes if they lack theory of mind.

Question 10

Identify and briefly describe two different specs which were to be addressed by the new science – by psychology?

Answer 10

First, focus less on the Science of Matter and more on the Science of the mind.

Question 11

What are structuralism and introspection, and how are they related?

Answer 11

structuralism is the belief that consciousness can be broken into basic parts. introspection requires looking into oneself to study consciousness. structuralism is studied using introspection.

Question 12

How would you define reliability in the following sentence: Introspection is not reliable.

Answer 12

reliability is the degree to which a measurement is repeatable. it is probably fairly low in methods like introspection.

Question 13

Identify some problems with introspection.

Answer 13

reliability, the conscious mind doesn’t comprise the whole brain, can’t address unconscious mind,

Question 14

What is gestaltism?

Answer 14

gestaltism is looking at the mind as a whole, not just the sum of it’s parts. (perception)

Question 15

What is the primary difference between gestaltism and structuralism?

Answer 15

structuralism ties all conscious experience to basic elements/building blocks. gestaltism sees the mind as more than these parts and their sums

Question 16

What is functionalism?

Answer 16

the study of the function of the mind and how it is tied to behaviours.

Question 17

If the mind is a black box, how would behaviourists and cognitivists view it?

Answer 17

behaviourists chose to study the effects the black box had on its surroundings, not thinking it could be opened. cognitivists believed the black box should be opened and studied.

Question 18

What do cognitivists believe?

Answer 18

Cognitivists are interested in the human mind’s capability to process information. They try to understand knowledge structures and processes.

Question 19

How are cognitivism and cognitive neuroscience different?

Answer 19

cognitivism focuses on the human mind, mental processes, and resulting behaviours. cognitive neuroscience is more specific in its study of mental and biological physiological mechanisms.

Question 20

What is the modern, overall objective of psychology?

Answer 20

The objective of psychology today is the scientific study of cognitive and behavioural functions in humans, and how mental processes and behaviours are linked to neural and biological activities.

Question 21

What schools of psychology place greater value on nature vs. nurture?

Answer 21

nature: functionalism, structuralism,
nurture: behaviourism, gestaltism, cognitivism

Question 22

What is knowledge structure?

Answer 22

an arrangement of information on a particular topic. defined by facts, assumptions, and their relationship

Question 23

What are the 3/5 ways of knowing?

Answer 23

science way of knowing, empiricism (observable), rationalism (reasoning)

Question 24

What is authoritarianism?

Answer 24

knowledge acquired from authorities (eg. church, parents, school) it is built on trust we develop with authorities and where most of our knowledge comes from.

Question 25

Explain where biases come from.

Answer 25

Bias form unconsciously from the world in which we live and do what we do (from nurture, and experience).

Question 26

What kind of a statement is “coronavirus will simply go away?”

Answer 26

overconfidence bias

Question 27

What is placebo effect?

Answer 27

positive response of a subject to a product because they believe in the product. the product itself is not actually responsible for how the subject feels.

Question 28

What type of questions can be answered by the scientific method?

Answer 28

Questions that are falsifiable can be proven by the scientific method. This means there must be an opportunity for your hypothesis to be proven wrong.

Question 29

What are the hypotheses for a study on a drug said to improve student performance?

Answer 29

H0 states that the drug will have no effect on student test scores.

H1 states that the drug will have an effect on student test scores(this could be either an increase or decrease).

Question 30

How are study methods ordered?

Answer 30

In order of the trend: from observation of data to analysis of data.

Question 31

Why is there a strong preference for non-directional hypotheses?

Answer 31

less chance of confirmation bias.

Question 32

pick THE ONE study strategies that is commonly used in psychology (e.g., case study, naturalistic observation study, etc), and make the case that it would be effective against influences due to expectations. explain why you picked it, why you believe it would prevent or minimize influences due to participant expectations.

Answer 32

I would pick the naturalistic observation study. Because you are aiming to observe behaviour in its natural environment, you are much less likely to alter the environment. As a result, the subject is less likely to be aware that you are studying them and less likely to act differently because of supposed expectations.

Question 33

Based on what you read in Chapter 2, describe another method that is commonly used by researcher to get around participants’ expectation. Name the method and briefly describe it.

Answer 33

behaviours that are not under one’s voluntary control, such as measuring pupil dilations or heart rate. Researchers can attempt to deal with participant expectations by ensuring that the participant is unaware of what’s really being studied

Question 34

what is the scientific method (SM)?

Answer 34

the scientific method is an approach used to produce valid and reliable results.

Question 35

How do noise variables affect the outcome – the data – in an experiment?

Answer 35

Noise variables are random effects that occur due to the unique lifestyle of each participant and they affect the data by providing dispersion and spread to the data and allowing it to be more generalizable to a larger population.

Question 36

How are noise and confounding variables the same – compared to the IV? 2. What is the difference between noise and confounds in how they affect the DV?

Answer 36

1. Both noise and confounding variables affect the DV in a way that the researcher isn’t intending to study, while the IV is what the researcher is intentionally manipulating and attempting to figure out its relationship with the DV.
2. Noise variables affect the DV randomly in a way that can’t be accounted for between conditions, while confounds systematically affect the DV and provide an alternative explanation for change(s) in the DV.