Learning and Memory
Chapter Exam Questions
Course Introduction
This course explores the fundamental principles and mechanisms underlying learning and memory in humans and animals. Students will examine key theories, experimental approaches, and neurobiological substrates that support how information is acquired, retained, and retrieved. Topics include classical and operant conditioning, types of memory systems (such as short-term, working, and long-term memory), the cognitive processes involved in encoding and retrieval, as well as neural circuitry and molecular mechanisms. The course also discusses how learning and memory processes impact behavior and are affected by development, aging, and various disorders.
Recommended Textbook
Learning and Memory 2nd Edition by
Mark A. Gluck
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12 Chapters
1304 Verified Questions
1304 Flashcards
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Chapter 1: The Psychology of Learning and Memory
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116 Verified Questions
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Sample Questions
Q1) B.F.Skinner discovered that when animals are given intermittent reinforcements,they:
A)respond less than when they are rewarded on every trial.
B)do not respond at all.
C)respond for the first few trials but then stop responding.
D)respond at least as well as when they are rewarded on every trial.
Answer: D
Q2) Cancer patients can develop an aversion to foods they eat right before undergoing chemotherapy.Although the foods themselves do not initially cause feelings of illness,pairing them with chemotherapy,which does cause patients to feel sick,leads to the foods becoming associated with these same feelings.This is an example of:
A)classical conditioning.
B)instrumental conditioning.
C)the law of effect.
D)extinction.
Answer: A
Q3) Explain why Edward Tolman was considered a neo-behaviorist.
Answer: Grading criteria: He believed in the importance of both internal representations and rigorous experimental control.
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Chapter 2: The Neuroscience of Learning and Memory
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Sample Questions
Q1) Comparative brain anatomy refers to the examination of the similarities and differences among the:
A)brains of people of different ages.
B)cerebral hemispheres.
C)different lobes of the cerebral cortex.
D)brains of different organisms.
Answer: D
Q2) If you put your hand on a hot stove,you will automatically pull it away before realizing what you've done.This is an example of a(n):
A)reflexive behavior.
B)voluntary behavior.
C)learned behavior.
D)intentional behavior.
Answer: A
Q3) Which neurotransmitter increases attention and concentration?
A)serotonin
B)epinephrine
C)histamine
D)glycine
Answer: B
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Chapter 3: Habituation, Sensitization, and Familiarization:
Learning About Repeated Events
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Sample Questions
Q1) If an animal is born deaf,in what ways might you expect its cortex in adulthood to differ from that of an animal with normal hearing?
Answer: Grading criteria: The normal-hearing animals should have different cortical regions each tuned to different sensory modalities (hearing,vision,etc. )In deaf animals,areas that would normally be tuned for hearing should be smaller;areas tuned to other senses may be larger;and cells in what are normally the "hearing" area may respond to other sensory modalities.
Q2) Describe one study in which cortical changes were observed following mere exposure to stimuli.
Answer: Grading criteria: Studies include fMRI and MEG changes measured during 2-point threshold changes.
Q3) How do rats' place cells respond when a maze is rotated? What does this tell us about how rats navigate?
Answer: Grading criteria: A place cell that responds when the animal is in one arm of a maze will respond best when the visual cues from that arm are present (when the animal is in an arm that looks the same),regardless of the rotation of the maze.Place cells respond based on the location of visual landmarks rather than absolute location.
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Chapter 4: Classical Conditioning: Learning to Predict
Important Events
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Sample Questions
Q1) The difference between whether an animal expects the US and whether the US actually occurs is known as:
A)homeostasis.
B)a prediction error.
C)an error-correction rule.
D)latent inhibition.
Q2) If we pair a tone with a shock,a rat can learn that the tone predicts the shock.If we then pair a tone and light with a shock,we find that the rat gives a:
A)CR only to the tone.
B)CR only to the light.
C)UR only to the tone.
D)CR only to the tone and light together.
Q3) Explain how a child might develop a conditioned taste aversion to pizza.Be sure to identify the CS,US,CR,and UR.
Q4) Removing the ______ abolishes conditioned responses.
A)pontine nuclei
B)cerebellar cortex
C)interpositus nucleus
D)inferior olive
Page 6
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Chapter 5: Operant Conditioning: Learning the Outcome of Behaviors
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Sample Questions
Q1) Swatting a dog with a newspaper would be _______ of the behavior of chewing up your favorite socks.
A)positive reinforcement
B)positive punishment
C)negative reinforcement
D)negative punishment
Q2) If a little boy can hear his mother moving around in the kitchen downstairs in the morning,he can be fairly certain that it is time to get up and have his breakfast.The discriminative stimulus in this example is:
A)breakfast.
B)the sounds of the mother moving around.
C)the little boy.
D)the kitchen.
Q3) Parents who decide to use punishment on a misbehaving child should:
A)spank the child,as spanking is the only effective punisher.
B)make sure that the punishment involves giving the child lots of attention.
C)not use spanking because it has been shown to be completely ineffective.
D)also reinforce good behavior.
Q4) Explain how operant conditioning is different from classical conditioning.
Q5) Discuss the evidence suggesting that dopamine is involved in reinforcement.
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Chapter 6: Generalization and Discrimination Learning
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Sample Questions
Q1) Explain how stereotyping is related to the concept of generalization.
Q2) Which of the following is true regarding the primary sensory cortices?
A)There is a specific cortical region dedicated to processing information from each sensory modality.
B)Each region of the cortex responds preferentially to a particular type of stimulus.
C)Neighboring cortical regions respond to similar stimuli.
D)All of the answers are true.
Q3) Howard can tell from the way his baby cries whether she is hungry,needs changing,is sick,or is tired.This is an example of:
A)generalization.
B)discrimination.
C)sensory preconditioning.
D)negative patterning.
Q4) The hippocampal region seems to be important for:
A)learning a stimulus-response association.
B)determining what information is allowed to enter memory.
C)maintaining a topographic map of sensory stimuli.
D)encouraging cortical remapping to enhance the response to a stimulus.
Q5) Describe an example of generalization in your everyday life.
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Chapter 7: Episodic and Semantic Memory: Memory for
Facts and Events
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Sample Questions
Q1) The famous patient known as H.M.:
A)continued to have severe and frequent epileptic seizures after his surgery.
B)suffered from severe anterograde amnesia.
C)lost several IQ points.
D)was able to recognize only those researchers who have been working with him for many years.
Q2) In a 1972 study,Bransford and Johnson read an abstract passage aloud to participants,who then had to recall as much information as possible.Some participants were also shown a picture that was described by the passage,either before or after they heard the passage read.The results of this study demonstrated that memory is better when the information:
A)can be interpreted in the context of things one already knows.
B)is presented multiple times.
C)is presented as a verbal description rather than as a picture.
D)is presented as a picture rather than as a verbal description.
Q3) Retrograde amnesia involves:
A)forgetting one's identity.
B)difficulty learning new material after sustaining a head injury.
C)the loss of memories for events that occurred before a head injury.
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D)problems remembering one's childhood but no trouble remembering recent events.
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Chapter 8: Skill Memory: Learning by Doing
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Sample Questions
Q1) People with apraxia:
A)have a genetic disorder.
B)have trouble performing perceptual-motor skills,but not cognitive skills.
C)have usually suffered a head injury or a stroke.
D)do not usually understand the instructions they are given.
Q2) Which of the following is true?
A)Playing violent action video games can increase visual attention abilities.
B)Playing any kind of video games can increase visual attention abilities.
C)The effects of playing video games are apparent after just 10 minutes of practice.
D)The effects of playing video games are restricted to the games themselves and do not carry over to other tasks.
Q3) The restricted applicability of some learned skills to specific situations is known as:
A)implicit learning.
B)skill decay.
C)a motor program.
D)transfer specificity.
Q4) Draw a graph that demonstrates the power law of learning for the task of learning to tie your shoes.
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Chapter 9: Working Memory and Cognitive Control
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Sample Questions
Q1) Charles must study for two exams and write a term paper.He needs to decide how to distribute his work during the day,including how much time to spend studying each subject,when to work on the term paper,how much he needs to accomplish before taking a break,and so forth.The task his central executive is MOST concerned with in this example is:
A)controlled updating of short-term memory buffers.
B)setting goals and planning.
C)task switching.
D)stimulus selection and response inhibition.
Q2) Which of the following is a task used to study stimulus selection and response inhibition in working memory?
A)an N-back task
B)the Tower of Hanoi
C)the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test
D)the Stroop task
Q3) Your text describes four cognitive functions that involve the central executive.Provide an example of an everyday task demonstrating each of these functions,and explain how each example involves the central executive.
Q4) Describe what limits your ability to hold information in your short-term memory.
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Chapter 10: Emotional Influences on Learning and Memory
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Sample Questions
Q1) What is the phenomenon in which exposure to an uncontrollable punisher reduces the chance that an organism will try to make an avoidance response?
A)conditioned emotional response
B)learned helplessness
C)conditioned avoidance
D)perseveration
Q2) Hannah successfully solved several problems in her math class.She was then given some very difficult problems that she could not solve.The research on learned helplessness suggests that if Hannah is then given some easier problems to try to solve,she will:
A)try to solve the problems.
B)look at the problems but not bother to try solving them.
C)avoid looking at the problems altogether.
D)ask the teacher for help before trying to solve the problems.
Q3) Suppose you have just learned that you lost your job,and you are feeling very angry at your boss.Discuss the role of the frontal lobes in your experience and expression of anger in this example.
Q4) Describe the three phenomena that make up an emotion.Give an example of each of these for the emotion of anger.
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Chapter 11: Social Learning and Memory: Observing, Interacting,
and Reenacting
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Sample Questions
Q1) Describe how one can study the existence of mirror neurons in humans.
Q2) People with frontal-lobe damage who exhibit deficits in the ability to imitate:
A)can still imitate an action when instructed to do so.
B)can still imitate an action when they observe someone performing the action.
C)may have problems with inhibiting imitation.
D)usually show deficits in executive-control functions.
Q3) The third phase of song learning in songbirds involves:
A)memorizing songs.
B)practicing songs.
C)comparing their own songs to memories of songs they have heard in the past. D)learning when it is appropriate to sing.
Q4) Describe Bandura's studies of modeling.What were the main findings of his research?
Q5) When copying involves generating stimuli that can be directly compared with the originally observed stimuli,it is called:
A)true imitation.
B)stimulus matching.
C)emulation.
D)perspective taking.
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Q6) Why is it difficult to predict how observations will affect future behavior?
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Chapter 12: Development and Aging: Learning and Memory
Across the Lifespan
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Sample Questions
Q1) Studies of the effects of sex hormones in adults have shown that:
A)testosterone improves rats' ability to find the platform in a water maze.
B)women tested at points in their menstrual cycle when estrogen is high outperform women tested when their estrogen is low.
C)recall of words is worse in women than in male-to-female transsexuals undergoing estrogen therapy.
D)testosterone may promote learning on tasks requiring recall of specific verbal information.
Q2) Which of the following is true regarding the genetic basis of learning?
A)Researchers have discovered most of the genes that appear to be involved in learning.
B)Genes must be activated before they affect learning.
C)Most genes act independently of each other.
D)Genes appear to play only a small role in learning.
Q3) In an emotional memory test,elderly adults remembered:
A)more negative than positive images.
B)more positive than negative images.
C)more of all kinds of images than young adults did.
D)the same number of all kinds of images as young adults did.
Page 15
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