Unit VII Review in Unit VII Cognition

Miller’s “magical number seven, plus or minus two” refers to
1. the ideal number of times to rehearse information in the first encoding session.
2. the number of seconds information stays in short-term memory without rehearsal.
3. the capacity of short-term memory.
4. the number of seconds information stays in echoic storage.
5. the number of years most long-term memories last.
Long-term potentiation (LTP) is best described as follows:
1. It’s easier to recognize than to recall information.
2. Constructed memories have the potential to be either accurate or inaccurate.
3. These synaptic changes allow for more efficient transfer of information.
4. Implicit memories are processed by the cerebellum instead of by the hippocampus.
5. Information is transferred from working memory to long-term memory.
Which of the following is an example of an implicit memory?
1. What time you had lunch yesterday
2. The details of an assignment that is due tomorrow
3. Vividly recalling significant events, such as the death of a famous person.
4. The names of all U.S. state capitals
5. Recognizing names and pictures of your classmates many years after they have graduated
Which of the following statements concerning memory is true?
1. Hypnosis, when used as a component of therapy, usually improves the accuracy of memory.
2. One aspect of memory that is usually accurate is the source of the remembered information.
3. Children’s memories of abuse are more accurate than other childhood memories.
4. Memories we are more certain of are more likely to be accurate.
5. Memories are often a blend of correct and incorrect information.
The basketball players could remember the main points of their coach’s halftime talk, but not her exact words. This is because they encoded the information
1. semantically.
2. iconically.
3. implicitly.
4. shallowly.
5. automatically.
When someone provides his phone number to another person, he usually pauses after the area code and again after the next three numbers. This pattern underscores the importance of which memory principle?
1. Chunking
2. The serial position effect
3. Semantic encoding
4. Auditory encoding
5. Recognition
Research on the role of the amygdala in memory has found that
1. the amygdala help process memories of happy experiences.
2. the amygdala support Freud’s ideas about memory because they allow us to repress memories of trauma.
3. the amygdala produce long-term potentiation in the brain.
4. the amygdala help make sure we remember events that trigger strong emotional responses.
5. the amygdala are active when the retrieval of a long-term memory is primed.
Which of the following illustrates the serial position effect?
1. The only name Kensie remembers from the people she met at the party is Spencer, because she thought he was particularly good looking.
2. Kimia has trouble remembering information from the book’s first unit when she reviews for semester finals.
3. It’s easy for Brittney to remember that carbon’s atomic number is 6 because her birthday is on December 6.
4. Kyle was not able to remember the names of all of his new co-workers after one week on the job, but he could remember them after two weeks.
5. Alp is unable to remember the middle of a list of vocabulary words as well as he remembers the first or last words on the list.
By waiting until the last minute to study for an exam, you are using an unrecommended strategy called
1. imagery.
2. semantic memory.
3. distributed practice.
4. chunking.
5. massed practice.
You are more likely to remember happy memories when you are presently happy than when you are sad due to
1. mood congruence.
2. context effects.
3. state-dependency.
4. proactive interference.
5. retroactive interference.
Carl damaged his cerebellum in a car accident. As a result, he would have the most trouble remembering
1. his new physician’s name.
2. the time of his next doctor appointment.
3. how to ride his therapy bike.
4. his new license plate number.
5. the things his wife has asked him to get at the grocery store.
Which of the following is an example of source amnesia?
1. Iva can’t remember the details of a horrifying event because she has repressed them.
2. Mary has entirely forgotten about an incident in grade school until her friend reminds her of the event.
3. Michael can’t remember this year’s locker combination because he confuses it with last year’s combination.
4. Stephen misremembers a dream as something that really happened.
5. Anna, who is trying to lose weight, is unable to remember several of the between-meal snacks she had yesterday.
Hermann Ebbinghaus’ forgetting curve shows that
1. most forgetting occurs early on and then levels off.
2. we forget more rapidly as time passes.
3. forgetting is relatively constant over time.
4. forgetting is related to many factors, but time is not one of them.
5. we are more likely to forget items in the middle of a list than at the beginning or the end.
When asked to think of a “desk,” many students think of the desks in their classroom rather than a large desk used by an executive. This illustrates that their school desks have formed their ________ of a desk.
1. phoneme
2. heuristic
3. concept
4. telegraphic utterance
5. prototype
People are more concerned about a medical procedure when told it has a 10 percent death rate than they are when told it has a 90 percent survival rate. Which psychological concept explains this difference in concern?
1. Belief perseverance
2. Insight
3. Intuition
4. Framing
5. Confirmation bias
Which of the following illustrates a heuristic?
1. Calculating the area of a rectangle by multiplying the length times the width
2. Using three dramatic news reports of corporate fraud to estimate how often business fraud occurs
3. Looking in each room of your home to find your sleeping cat
4. Following a new recipe to bake a cake for your friend
5. Trying every key on your mom’s key ring until you find the one that unlocks the seldom-used storeroom in the basement
Mave got a new car with the license plate “MAVNUM1.” She is asked by the school parking clerk what her number is but can only remember her old one, “VANMOM1.” Her inability to remember her new plate is most likely due to
1. retroactive interference.
2. mood congruency.
3. proactive interference.
4. anterograde amnesia.
5. retrograde amnesia.
Scott gets soaked in the rainstorm because he does not think of using his backpack to shield himself from the rain. Which barrier to problem solving is evidenced here?
1. Fixation
2. Insight
3. Representativeness
4. Confirmation bias
5. Availability
A phoneme, such as the “c” in cows, is best described as a
1. unit of meaning in a language.
2. form of syntax.
3. stage of language development.
4. unit of sound in a language.
5. form of telegraphic speech.
Alice significantly underestimated how long it would take to write her term paper because of
1. belief perseverance.
2. framing.
3. intuition.
4. the availability heuristic.
5. overconfidence.
Which of the following is not one of Robert Sternberg’s components of creativity?
1. A venturesome personality
2. Imaginative thinking skills
3. A creative environment
4. Incubation
5. Intrinsic motivation
Which of the following demonstrates the representativeness heuristic?
1. Deciding that a new kid in school is a nerd because he looks like a nerd
2. Fearing air travel because of memories of seeing plane crashes in the news
3. Checking in every drawer to find some matches because matches are usually in drawers
4. Having the solution to a word problem pop into your head because you have just successfully solved a similar problem
5. Applying for jobs in several local grocery stores because your best friend just got a job in a grocery store
Benjamin Lee Whorf’s linguistic determinism hypothesis relates to what aspect of the power of language?
1. How thinking determines language
2. How language determines thinking
3. The idea of a universal grammar
4. The importance of critical periods in language development
5. The development of language in nonhuman animals
According to Noam Chomsky, language acquisition occurs most especially because of
1. exposure to language in early childhood.
2. instruction in grammar.
3. reinforcement for babbling and other early verbal behaviors.
4. imitation and drill.
5. linguistic determinism.

Free-Response Questions

Jacque learned to speak Italian when she was in the first grade and was able to speak, read, and write Italian fairly well by the fourth grade. She moved to a new school system that did not have Italian as a choice for World Languages, so she decided to take Spanish. Sometimes she found herself saying and writing words in Italian as she completed her Spanish assignments. Often, she remembered the vocabulary in Italian before she said the word in Spanish. Sometimes she felt like knowing Italian helped her learn Spanish, but sometimes she thought it just confused her! When Jacque was in her Spanish classroom, she felt more at ease with the Spanish language. When she went to a French restaurant, she was frustrated because the menu was unreadable to her.
Use an example to show how each concept is related to Jacque’s experiences.
- Working memory
- Explicit memory
- Effortful processing
- Context-dependent memory
- Proactive interference
Explain how these brain structures play a role in Jacque’s memory processing.
- Hippocampus
- Amygdala

Rubric for Free Response Question 1

1 point: Working memory—Possible example: Jacque has to focus on what the teacher is saying and recall the correct vocabulary word when she is asked a question. Page 329

1 point: Explicit memory—Possible example: Defining vocabulary words in any language relies on explicit memory. Page 330

1 point: Effortful processing—Possible example: When reading, Jacque has to pay attention to new words and sentence construction to understand what is being conveyed. Page 330

1 point: Context-dependent memory—Possible example: Jacque seems to be able to remember her Spanish best when in her Spanish classroom. Page 345

1 point: Proactive interference—Possible example: Jacque learned Italian before she learned Spanish, and so sometimes her prior knowledge of Italian makes it difficult for her to recall Spanish words. Page 354

1 point: The hippocampus—Possible example: Since the left hippocampus is important to storage and recall of verbal information—new terms, vocabulary, and so on—Jacque’s hippocampus must be very active during her language classes. Page 340

1 point: The amygdala—Possible example: When Jacque is stressed about mixing up her Spanish with Italian words, the stress may cause her to have trouble recalling the information because of hormones that are released. Her negative emotions, experienced in the French restaurant, may also be related to the amygdala. Page 341

Amelia, a high school junior, is enrolled in a public speaking course in school that requires the students to memorize several speeches they will give to the class.
Explain how the following items will help her in the course:
- Broca’s area
- Echoic memory
- Mnemonics
Explain how the following will hinder her in the course:
- Syntax
- Overconfidence

(5 points)

George, a senior in high school, was reminiscing with his friends about their first homecoming dance. He has many good memories of the dance, but is unable to remember the songs the band played in the middle of the dance.
Explain how each of the following psychological concepts terms could help George’s recollection or memory of his freshman-year homecoming dance.
- Flashbulb memory
- Mood-congruent memory
Explain how each of the following psychological concepts could hinder George’s recollection or memory of his freshman-year homecoming dance.
- Serial position effect
- Retroactive interference
- Misinformation effect

(5 points)