History, Approaches, and Methods: practice

Question 1Select one

Most textbooks date the beginning of psychology as a separate science to 1879. What happened that year?

Question 2Select one

In 1900, a researcher plays a tuning fork and asks trained observers to report the basic sensations and feelings that make up their experience of the tone. This goal and method best fit which early school of psychology?

Question 3Select one

Influenced by Charles Darwin, which early American psychologist argued that psychology should study how the mind helps an organism adapt to its environment?

Question 4Select one

Which psychologist completed all the requirements for a Harvard doctorate but was refused the degree because she was a woman, and later became the first woman president of the American Psychological Association?

Question 5Select one

Early in the 1900s, a group of German psychologists pointed out that two lights flashed one after the other are seen as a single moving light. They concluded that experience must be studied as organized wholes rather than as separate elements. This group founded which school?

Question 6Select one

A psychologist explains a client's sudden angry outbursts as the result of unresolved childhood conflicts and unconscious impulses that break through into behavior. Which approach is the psychologist using?

Question 7Select one

A counselor emphasizes a client's free will, capacity for personal growth and drive to reach his full potential. Which approach does this reflect?

Question 8Select one

A health psychologist explains a patient's chronic back pain by examining her inflamed spinal tissue, her habit of imagining the worst about the pain, and the loss of support she suffered after a divorce. Which approach is this?

Question 9Select one

A cognitive psychologist studying test anxiety would most likely focus on which of the following?

Question 10Select one

A psychologist taking a behavioral approach would most likely explain a four-year-old's frequent tantrums in terms of

Question 11Select one

A research team compares rates of schizophrenia in identical and fraternal twins and measures dopamine activity in the brains of people with the disorder. Their work best reflects which approach?

A study of caffeine and memory

A psychologist wanted to know whether caffeine improves memory for word lists. She recruited 80 college students and used a random number generator to place each student in one of two groups. One group drank coffee containing 200 milligrams of caffeine; the other group drank decaffeinated coffee that looked and tasted the same.

Neither the students nor the research assistant who scored the tests knew which drink each student had received. Thirty minutes later, every student studied a list of 40 words for 2 minutes and then wrote down as many as possible. The caffeine group recalled an average of 17 words, and the decaffeinated group recalled an average of 14 words.

Question 12Select one

In this study, the independent variable is

Question 13Select one

Why did the psychologist use a random number generator to decide which group each student joined?

Question 14Select one

Question 15Select one

Question 16Select one

Across 300 school districts, the number of library books per student is positively correlated with average reading scores. Which is the most likely third variable that could explain both?

Question 17Select one

A neuropsychologist spends two years testing and interviewing one patient who lost the ability to recognize familiar faces after a stroke. This research method is

Question 18Select one

A researcher sits on a bench in a public playground and records how often parents praise their toddlers, without speaking to anyone or changing anything. This method is

Question 19Select one

A researcher studying aggression in children decides to count the number of times each child hits, kicks or pushes another child during a 30-minute recess. This counting rule is an example of

Question 20Select one

Question 21Select one

A social psychologist tells participants that a study is about taste preferences when it is really about conformity. Under the APA ethics code, what must she do once each person's participation ends?

Question 22Select one

At a university, which group reviews proposed studies with human participants before they begin, to check that risks are minimal and participants are protected?