Week 1 - Introduction Flashcards
Which plays a key role in research on the physiology of cognition?
a. analytic introspection
b. functional magnetic resonance imaging
c. operant conditioning
d. cognitive mapping
b. functional magnetic resonance imaging
As Latoya sat down to take her final exam in European History, what did she draw upon to answer the 100 questions?
a. episodic memory
b. procedural memory
c. sensory memory
d. long-term memory
d. long-term memory
___ founded behaviorism which ___ the study of inner mental processes.
a. John Watson; rejected
b. John Watson; accepted
c. William James; rejected
d. William James; accepted
a. John Watson; rejected
While George takes the bus home, he is thinking about how to resolve a difficult issue at work. This is an example of the mind ___.
a. as a problem solver
b. as a key to memory
c. as a source of normal functions
d. as a tool of creativity
a. as a problem solver
In an experiment, a rat can choose between hitting a blue button (which provides a snack) or a yellow button (which provides a shock). In each round of the experiment, the buttons may or may not switch colors. This experiment combines elements of which two researchers?
a. Miller and Donders
b. Donders and Skinner
c. Watson and Ebbinghaus
d. Tolman and Watson
b. Donders and Skinner
Which of the following terms best reflects the concept of cognition?
a. behaviors
b. processes
c. ideas
d. memories
b. processes
The United Negro College fund organization once used the marketing slogan “A mind is a terrible thing to waste.” Conceptually, the organization was stating that the human mind is _________.
a. inefficient
b. valuable
c. functional
d. intelligent
B. Valuable
The predominant theme of the information-processing approach holds that the operation of the mind occurs ___.
a. only through observed behaviors
b. via unconscious processes
c. through reinforcement
d. in a number of stages
d. in a number of stages
The periodic table that identifies iron as having the symbol FE and an atomic number of 26 is conceptually similar to which of the following?
a. Tolman’s cognitive mapping
b. Miller’s “seven items” concept
c. Ebbinghaus’s two-day savings curve
d. Wundt’s structural sensations
d. Wundt’s structural sensations
The decline in shopping at brick-and-mortar stores and the explosion of online shopping can be considered a shift in _____.
a. semantics
b. paradigms
c. cognitive maps
d. sensations
b. paradigms
The use of positron emission tomography enables psychological research to get down to the level of _____.
a. filters
b. sensations
c. memories
d. neurons
d. neurons
Who is likely to be most active in cycling information through their short-term memory?
a. an accountant
b. an actor
c. a chef
d. a nurse
b. an actor
Cedric is participating in a university research study inspired by the work of Stephen Palmer. The study is likely focused on measuring Cedric’s level of _____.
a. short-term rehearsal
b. contextual knowledge
c. cognitive mapping
d. artificial intelligence
b. contextual knowledge
In a classic paper from the 1950s, George Miller argued that the information-processing capacity of the mind is ___.
a. unlimited
b. limited to about 7 items
c. limited to about 32 items
d. impossible to measure
b. limited to about 7 items
Which of the following researchers would most likely subscribe to the adage that “seeing is believing”?
a. Watson
b. Tolman
c. McCarthy
d. Broadbent
a. Watson
Being able to hear a friend talk to you while at a noisy party reflects concepts studied by which of the following?
a. Cherry and Watson
b. Tolman and James
c. James and Cherry
d. Broadbent and Tolman
c. James and Cherry
Which of the following correctly pairs a researcher with a core concept of their work?
a. Watson—sensation
b. Broadbent—imaging
c. Tulving—cognitive maps
d. James—attention
d. James—attention
Which of the following are conceptually similar?
a. Ebbinghaus’s savings curve and Atkinson and Shiffrin’s short-term memory
b. Atkinson and Shiffrin’s short-term memory and Broadbent’s flow diagram filter
c. Tulving’s procedural memory and Tolman’s cognitive map
d. Broadbent’s flow diagram filter and Skinner’s operant conditioning
b. Atkinson and Shiffrin’s short-term memory and Broadbent’s flow diagram filter
Joe and Meg are doing a study in psychology. Joe is asked to push a button as soon as he sees a red light, whereas Meg is asked to push a red button if she sees a red light and a green button if she sees a green light. From the information, who appear(s) to be involved in a task measuring choice reaction time?
a. only Joe
b. only Meg
c. neither Joe nor Meg
d. both Joe and Meg
b. only Meg
An animal might learn how to navigate a maze through the use of ___.
a. the savings curve
b. analytic introspection
c. a cognitive map
d. artificial intelligence
c. a cognitive map
Which of the following would best fit Watson’s approach to psychological research?
a. having people run a maze then draw it
b. watching people react to a scary movie
c. scanning the brains of people doing math
d. listening to people describe an experience
b. watching people react to a scary movie
In Broadbent’s flow diagram of attention, messages first enter a(n) ___.
a. paradigm
b. filter
c. detector
d. cognitive map
b. filter
If you are thinking about experiences about a previous vacation, then you are most likely making use of ___ memories.
a. sensory
b. procedural
c. semantic
d. episodic
d. episodic
Which of the following has become one of the dominant approaches in contemporary psychology?
a. analytic introspection
b. information processing
c. psychoanalysis
d. structuralism
b. information processing
You studied a lot of information to ace this quiz. According to Ebbinghaus, when will the rate at which you begin to forget the information begin to level off?
a. 4 hours
b. 18 hours
c. 2 days
d. 7 days
c. 2 days
Which one of these early pioneers in cognitive psychology was the first to undertake quantitative measurements of mental processes?
a. Donders
b. Ebbinghaus
c. James
d. Wundt
b. Ebbinghaus
Nick has perfected the skill of tuning out his mother’s lectures about cleaning his room while still being able to text his friends and listen to music. What concept is Nick displaying?
a. Kuhn’s paradigm shift
b. Broadbent’s filter
c. Tolman’s cognitive map
d. Tulving’s procedural memory
b. Broadbent’s filter
Noam Chomsky argued that language development was primarily determined by ___.
a. reinforcement
b. imitation
c. biological processes
d. cultural differences
C. Biological Processes
According to Miller, which of the following would be the shortest password that a person would have difficulty remembering?
a. 73A8
b. 5KBN37
c. 4LP91DMG
d. 8C3FT65L51
c. 4LP91DMG
Celia loved to knit when she was a young girl, but she hadn’t done it in years. So she was excited when she joined a group making blankets for homeless kids and started knitting like she had just done it yesterday. What did Celia access to start knitting again?
a. episodic memory
b. sensory memory
c. semantic memory
d. procedural memory
d. procedural memory
The ______ creates and controls mental functions such as perception, attention, memory, emotions, language, deciding, thinking, and reasoning
mind
The _____ is a system that creates representations of the world so that we can act within it to achieve our goals.
mind
Mental processes or________ such as perception, attention, and memory, which is what the mind creates.
cognition
_____________ is the study of mental processes, which includes determining the characteristics and properties of the mind and how it operates (term first coined in 1967).
Cognitive psychology
_____________ did one of the first experiments that today would be called a cognitive psychology experiment.
Franciscus Donders
Reacting to the presence or absence of a single stimulus (as opposed to having to choose between a number of stimuli before making a response)
simple reaction time
Time to respond to one of two or more stimuli. For example, in the Donders experiment, subjects had to make one response to one stimulus and a different response to another stimulus
choice reaction time
Mental responses cannot be measured directly, but must be inferred from behavior. True/False
True
__________ founded the first laboratory of scientific psychology at the University of Leipzig in Germany.
Wilhelm Wundt
An approach to psychology that explained perception as the adding up of small elementary units called sensations.
structuralism
basic elements of experience _________
sensations
_________ a technique in which trained participants described their experiences and thought processes in response to stimuli.
analytic introspection,
Measure used by Ebbinghaus to determine the magnitude of memory left from initial learning? Higher _________ indicate greater memory.
savings
memory (forgetting) rapidly for the first ______ after the initial learning and then levels off.
2 days
Best known for the nature of attention and observations based not on the results of experiments but on observations about the operation of his own mind.
William James
The approach to psychology founded by John Watson which states that observable behavior provides the only valid data for psychology?
behaviorism
Behaviourist believe that consciousness and unobservable mental processes are not considered worthy of study by psychologists. True/False
True
A procedure in which pairing a neutral stimulus with a stimulus that elicits a response causes the neutral stimulus to elicit that response.
classical conditioning
Watson’s famous experiment with noise and rat
Little Albert
Type of conditioning championed by B. F. Skinner, which focuses on how behavior is strengthened by presentation of positive reinforcers, such as food or social approval, or withdrawal of negative reinforcers, such as a shock or social rejection.
operant conditioning
Like Watson, Skinner was not interested in what was happening in the mind, but focused solely on determining how behavior was controlled by stimuli. True/False
True
Mental conception of a spatial layout first coined by Edward Chace Tolman (rat maze experiment)
cognitive map
Chomsky saw language development as being determined not by imitation or reinforcement, but by an inborn biological program that holds across cultures. Chomsky’s idea that language is a product of the way the mind is constructed, rather than a result of reinforcement. True/False
true
A system of ideas, which guide thinking in a particular field (Kuhn).
paradigm
A shift in thinking from one paradigm to another.
paradigm shift
The approach to psychology, developed beginning in the 1950s, in which the mind is described as processing information through a sequence of stages.
information-processing approach
According to the information-processing approach, the operation of the mind can be described as occurring in a number of stages. True/False
True
Donald Broadbent (1958), proposed the first flow diagram of the mind. True/False
True
The ability of a computer to perform tasks usually associated with human intelligence.
artificial intelligence
Newell and Simon created the program called the _______ ________ that involved principles of logic.
logic theorist
Atkinson and Shiffrin’s (1968) model of ______ happens in three stages.
memory
___________ memory holds incoming information for a fraction of a second and then passes most of this information to ______ _______ memory, which has limited capacity and holds information for seconds (like an address you are trying to remember until you can write it down).
Sensory
short-term
______ ______memory, a high-capacity system that can hold information for long periods of time (like your memory of what you did last weekend, or the capitals of states).
long-term
Remembering something involves bringing it back into from long-term to short-term memory. True/False
True
3 stages of long term memory (Tulvig)
Episodic
Semantic
Procedural
_________ memory is memory for events in your life (like what you did last weekend)
Episodic
__________ memory is memory for facts (such as the capitals of the states)
Semantic
___________ memory is memory for physical actions (such as how to ride a bike or play the piano).
Procedural
The study of the behavioral effects of brain damage in humans.
Neuropsychology
Techniques used to measure electrical responses of the nervous system (activity of single neurons).
Electrophysiology
