Psychology of Thinking and Problem Solving Exam Solutions
Course Introduction
This course explores the cognitive processes underlying human thought and problem solving. Students will examine how people perceive, represent, and manipulate information to reason, make decisions, and solve problems in everyday life and specialized contexts. Key topics include attention, memory, concept formation, creativity, and the influence of biases and heuristics. The course integrates classic theories and contemporary research, fostering critical analysis of how individuals approach complex tasks, overcome obstacles, and develop effective solutions. Through lectures, discussions, and practical exercises, students will gain a deeper understanding of the psychological mechanisms that drive thinking and problem-solving behaviors.
Recommended Textbook
Cognitive Psychology Connecting Mind Research and Everyday Experience 5th Edition by E. Bruce
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13 Chapters
767 Verified Questions
767 Flashcards
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Chapter 1: Introduction to Cognitive Psychology
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62 Verified Questions
62 Flashcards
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Sample Questions
Q1) Colin Cherry's experiment in which participants listen to two messages simultaneously, one in each ear, found all but which of the following?
A) People can focus on one message and ignore the other one.
B) People can focus on the message they were repeating.
C) People take in very little information about the ignored message.
D) People who are deaf process auditory information on a nonconscious level.
Answer: D
Q2) Explain how Donders's and Ebbinghaus's pioneering methods, though very different from each other, allowed for behavior to determine a property of the mind.
Answer: Donders measured the reaction time which would mean that he measured the time taken by someone to react to a stimulus. He compared simple and choice reaction time in terms of their reaction. Ebbinghaus on the other hand measured how quickly information is lost over time. He measured the time taken to memorise some nonsense syllables and then how long it took for him to relearn them after a delay. Both the studies helped in understanding the property of mind which refers to the general properties such as, the ability to think, remember, understand and execute.
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Chapter 2: Cognitive Neuroscience
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57 Verified Questions
57 Flashcards
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Sample Questions
Q1) Edgar Adrian studied the relationship between nerve firing and sensory experience by measuring how the firing of a neuron from a receptor in the skin changed as he applied more pressure to the skin. He found that
A) the shape and height of the action potential increased as he increased the pressure.
B) the shape and height of the action potential decreased as he increased the pressure.
C) the rate of nerve firing increased as he increased the pressure.
D) the rate of nerve firing decreased as he increased the pressure.
Answer: C
Q2) Which part of the nervous system picks up information from the outside environment?
A) Dendrites
B) Axons
C) Synapses
D) Receptors
Answer: D
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Chapter 3: Perception
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55 Verified Questions
55 Flashcards
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Sample Questions
Q1) The fact that trees are more likely to be vertical or horizontal than slanted is an example of ____.
A) semantic regularity
B) physical regularity
C) perceptual regularity
D) orientation regularity
Answer: B
Q2) The Gestalt psychologists believe that _____.
A) we use data about the environment to determine what is out there
B) perception is affected by experience, but built-in principles can override experience
C) top-down processing is central to perception
D) experience has no effect on perception, only sensation
Answer: B
Q3) Which of the following word strings all refer to the same pathway?
A) what, action, dorsal
B) where, ventral, perception
C) dorsal, where, action
D) perception, dorsal, what
Answer: C
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Page 5
Chapter 4: Attention
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58 Flashcards
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Sample Questions
Q1) Which of the following is the process by which features such as color, form motion, and location are combined to create our perception of a coherent object?
A) Change blindness
B) Change detection
C) Illusory conjunctions
D) Binding
Q2) A bottom-up process is involved in fixating on an area of a scene that
A) has high stimulus salience.
B) fits with the observer's interests.
C) is familiar.
D) carries meaning for the observer.
Q3) The notion that faster responding occurs when enhancement spreads within an object is called
A) high-load detraction.
B) divided attention.
C) location-based potentiation.
D) same-object advantage.
Q4) Define selective attention, divided attention, and attentional capture. Give an example of each to support your thinking.
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Chapter 5: Short-Term and Working Memory
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57 Verified Questions
57 Flashcards
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Sample Questions
Q1) When light from a flashlight is moved quickly back and forth on a wall in a darkened room, it can appear to observers that there is a trail of light moving across the wall, even though physically the light is only in one place at any given time. This experience is an effect of memory that occurs because of
A) a visual delay effect.
B) echoic memory.
C) persistence of vision.
D) top-down processing.
Q2) Research suggests that the capacity of short-term memory is
A) somewhat small, holding only about seven items at one time.
B) quite large, holding a large number of items simultaneously.
C) equivalent to sensory memory, holding about a hundred items at one time.
D) larger than the capacity of long-term memory among young people.
Q3) Rehearsal is important for transferring information from
A) sensory memory to long-term memory.
B) sensory memory to short-term memory.
C) long-term memory to sensory memory.
D) short-term memory to long-term memory.
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Chapter 6: Long-Term Memory: Structure
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Sample Questions
Q1) Explain how our episodic memories are linked to the future. Give an example that illustrates the adaptive role of memory in this context.
Q2) Believing that a particular statement is true simply because you have seen the statement in previous instances is known as the ________ effect.
A) conditioning
B) primacy
C) recency
D) propaganda
Q3) Memory enhancement due to repetition priming is a result of the test stimulus being A) the same as or resembling the priming stimulus.
B) different from the priming stimulus.
C) similar in meaning to the priming stimulus.
D) different in meaning from the priming stimulus.
Q4) Explain the difference between "knowing" and "remembering" from Tulving's perspective. Give an example of each to support your thinking.
Q5) Describe the concept of semanticization of remote memories. Give examples across time to support your thinking.
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Chapter 7: Long-Term Memory: Encoding, Retrieval, and Consolidation
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57 Flashcards
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Sample Questions
Q1) Which example below best demonstrates state-dependent learning?
A) Last night, at the grocery store, DeShaun ran into a psychology professor he took a class with three semesters ago. He recognized her right away.
B) Even though Walt hasn't been to the beach cottage his parents owned since he was a child, he still has many fond memories of time spent there as a family.
C) Although Emily doesn't very often think about her first love, Steve, she can't help getting caught up in happy memories when "their song" (the first song they danced to) plays on the radio.
D) Carmen always suffers test anxiety in her classes. To combat this, she tries to relax when she studies. She thinks it's best to study while lying in bed, reading by candlelight with soft music playing.
Q2) Explain the concepts of encoding specificity, state-dependent learning, and transfer-appropriate processing. Give an example of each to support your thinking.
Q3) Compare and contrast the concepts of fluency and familiarity, and explain their role in the context of studying and learning. Give examples of each to support your thinking.
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Chapter 8: Everyday Memory and Memory Errors
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60 Verified Questions
60 Flashcards
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Sample Questions
Q1) The experiment for which people were asked to make fame judgments for both famous and non-famous names (and for which Sebastian Weissdorf was one of the names to be remembered) illustrated the effect of __________ on memory.
A) repeated rehearsal of distinctive names
B) source misattributions
C) encoding specificity
D) schemas
Q2) After witnessing a bank robbery downtown, Javier completed a cognitive interview at the police station. What term would Javier likely use to describe his interview experience?
A) Structured
B) Autobiographical
C) Suggestible
D) Multidimensional
Q3) Provide an example of when you experienced the Proustian effect. What was your response to the experience?
Q4) Define the illusory truth effect. What are some potential dangers or risks associated with this phenomenon? Give an example to support your thinking.
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Chapter 9: Conceptual Knowledge
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Sample Questions
Q1) Explain how personal knowledge impacts the basic level of categorization under Rosch's approach. Give examples comparing two individuals' knowledge of a concept to support your thinking.
Q2) Based on the information your textbook provided about different category types, jumping from ___________ categories results in the largest gain in information.
A) superordinate level to basic level
B) basic level to subordinate level
C) subordinate level to basic level
D) basic level to superordinate level
Q3) The connectionist network has learned the correct pattern for a concept when
A) the connection weights add up to exactly +1.00.
B) the output pattern matches the initial input pattern and this symmetry becomes "locked" into the system.
C) the error signals are reduced to nearly none and the correct properties are assigned.
D) the output unit response is greater than zero and the input signal has to compensate.
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Chapter 10: Visual Imagery
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54 Verified Questions
54 Flashcards
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Sample Questions
Q1) As described in your text, the pegword technique relies on all of the following EXCEPT
A) associations.
B) propositions.
C) rhymes.
D) visualizations.
Q2) What is the consensus on neural overlap in perception and imagery? Provide descriptions of at least two research efforts to support your answer.
Q3) According to the concept of topographical mapping, which of the following stimuli encountered on a beach trip will activate the farthest forward in the visual cortex?
A) A yellow kite in the sky
B) A white sailboat on the horizon
C) A pink beachball on your towel
D) A green popsicle in your hand
Q4) Describe the conceptual peg hypothesis. Explain the paired-associate learning task, and provide examples of stimuli that had high recall in the task.
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Chapter 11: Language
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Sample Questions
Q1) Boxing champion George Foreman recently described his family vacations with the statement, "At our ranch in Marshall, Texas, there are lots of ponds and I take the kids out and we fish. And then of course, we grill them." That a reader understands "them" appropriately (George grills fish, not his kids!) is the result of a(n) ____________________ inference.
A) narrative
B) instrument
C) analogic
D) anaphoric
Q2) Brain imaging studies reveal that semantics and syntax are associated with which two lobes of the cerebral cortex?
A) The parietal and occipital lobes
B) The frontal and temporal lobes
C) The temporal and parietal lobes
D) The frontal and parietal lobes
Q3) Identify the types of meaning dominance in language. Give examples of each to support your thinking.
Q4) Explain how language and music are both similar and different.
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Chapter 12: Problem Solving
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64 Verified Questions
64 Flashcards
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Sample Questions
Q1) The text's discussion of the research on in vivo problem solving highlighted that _________________ play(s) an important role in solving scientific problems.
A) analogies
B) insight
C) flexibility
D) subgoals
Q2) The elements of the problem space include all of the following EXCEPT
A) initial state.
B) operators.
C) goal state.
D) intermediate states.
Q3) Describe the three steps involved in analogical problem solving. Which step is the most difficult to achieve, and what is the evidence that this is the most difficult step?
Q4) Which term best describes the process of brainstorming?
A) Compound
B) Divergent
C) Preinventive
D) Mindful
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Chapter 13: Judgment, Decisions, and Reasoning
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65 Verified Questions
65 Flashcards
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Sample Questions
Q1) Rosa is in a convenience store considering which soda to buy. She recalls a commercial for BigFizz she saw on TV last night. BigFizz is running a promotion where you look under the bottle cap, and one in five bottles has a voucher for a free soda. If Rosa decides to purchase a BigFizz based on this promotion, which is framed in terms of _________________ , she will use a _________________ strategy.
A) losses; risk-taking
B) gains; risk-taking
C) losses; risk-aversion
D) gains; risk-aversion
Q2) The application of a(n) _________________ makes it easier to solve the "drinking beer" version of the Wason problem.
A) conjunction rule
B) permission schema
C) atmosphere effect
D) availability heuristic
Q3) Explain the difference between validity and truth in deductive reasoning. Provide examples of each concept to support your thinking.
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