Deck 1: Introducing Social Psychology

Question 1

Sociologists study the structure and function of

A) relationships.
B) societies.
C) groups.
D) cultures.

Answer 1

groups.

Question 2

Psychological science has revealed that much our of our thinking occurs

A) intuitively.
B) in our consciousness.
C) in our unconscious.
D) all of the above

Answer 2

all of the above

Question 3

Williams and colleagues (2001, 2002) investigated whether relating to others is a basic need. The results of their studies show that

A) feeling left out increases once desire to perform better on standardized tests.
B) feeling left out can have negative effects on how people feel about others.
C) feeling left out can have negative effects on how people feel about themselves.
D) None of the above.

Answer 3

feeling left out can have negative effects on how people feel about themselves.

Question 4

The examples cited in your text as phenomena of particular interest to social psychology are similar to each other because they all

A) deal with how people view and affect one another.
B) show the influence of personality on behaviour.
C) represent various forms of groups and organizations.
D) show the power of internal influences on human action.

Question 5

Among other issues, social psychology is the scientific study of

A) how people relate with others.
B) how people think about one another.
C) both A and B
D) social groups, organizations, and institutions.

Question 6

Which of the following is not one of the major themes in social psychology?

A) Social influences shape our behaviour.
B) Social intuitions are often incorrect but powerful.
C) Social behaviour is biologically rooted.
D) Relating to others is a basic need.

Question 7

Of the following studies, which is the most likely to be conducted by a social psychologist?

A) An experimenter watches to see whether hungry game players use a more aggressive strategy than players who are not hungry.
B) An interviewer does a case study of a physically disabled veteran.
C) An archival researcher examines records of divorce rates across cultures.
D) A test administrator measures the skills of an adolescent whose class performance has been poor.

Question 8

In a study by Mehl and Pennebaker (2003), students wore microcassette recorders and microphones, and were recorded for brief periods of time at regular intervals throughout their days. Their study revealed that

A) humans are solitary beings and do not engage in communication as much as we think.
B) individuals spend a great deal of time talking to others, but their conversations were often of little substance or meaning.
C) communication was unrelated to social needs as people talked to themselves as much as they talked to others.
D) relationships and communication are an integral part of being human.

Question 9

In studying racial attitudes, a social psychologist would be most interested in understanding

A) how individuals develop racial attitudes.
B) how the attitudes of one class are different from those of another.
C) age difference in racial prejudice.
D) the history of racial prejudice.

Question 10

The first social psychology text was published

A) in the early 1930s, when researchers examined the effects of deprivation on aggression and altruism.
B) in World War I, when psychologists conducted studies of social conflict and cooperation.
C) in World War II, when researchers performed studies of persuasion and soldier morale.
D) in the early 1900s, shortly after social psychology experiments began to be conducted.

Question 11

According to the divisions in social psychology and their corresponding themes, social influence is to ________________, whereas social relation is to _______________.

A) we construct our social reality; relating to others is a basic need.
B) dispositions shape behaviour; social behaviour is biologically based.
C) social influences shape behaviour; social intuitions are powerful.
D) social behaviour is biologically based; relating to others is a basic need.

Question 12

Which of the following questions is not likely to be addressed by social psychologists?

A) Are our social beliefs self-fulfilling?
B) In what ways do other people influence our attitudes and actions?
C) What situations trigger people to be helpful or greedy?
D) Is human development a continuous process or does it proceed through a series of stages?

Question 13

According to the text, which of the following processes is least likely to shape human behaviour?

A) Intuitions
B) Social influences
C) Personal attitudes and dispositions
D) The stars' configurations

Question 14

Cinderella's Prince had trouble recognizing her in her home as opposed to the ballroom where they met. This observation reflects

A) the power of the situation.
B) the importance of cognition.
C) the power of the person.
D) commonsense psychology.

Question 15

The first social psychology experiments were reported

A) just two centuries ago.
B) just a century ago.
C) just 75 years ago.
D) just after World War I.

Question 16

Base upon the results of their study, Leary and Baumeister (2000) argued that the basis of our self-esteem is the result of

A) how well we cope with rejection.
B) how frightening or intimidating we can make others feel.
C) how competent we are in our job.
D) how accepted we feel by others.

Question 17

Which of the following examples is a question a social psychologist would be most likely to study?

A) How have divorce rates changed over time?
B) What accounts for racial differences in intelligence?
C) In deciding how they will vote in an election, are individuals more influenced by one persuasive medium than by another?
D) In what ways do children learn differently than do adults?

Question 18

Sarah is taking a psychology class and has a particular view about human behaviour. She strongly believes that humans are bio-psycho-social organisms, and that biological processes are the roots of social behaviour. Sarah is most likely to endorse what type of perspective on human behaviour?

A) Sociological
B) Social psychology
C) Social neuroscience
D) Biological

Question 19

Which of the following least demonstrates how the power of the situation can influence behaviour?

A) A depressed man feels that his wife and family put too much pressure on him.
B) Public concerns about mental illness following high profile cases in the news.
C) Canadians coming together to support others after a natural disaster.
D) The atrocities committed during the Holocaust.

Question 20

Personality psychologists are more interested in _____, while social psychologists more likely focus on _____.

A) normal personality; disordered or abnormal behaviour
B) individual differences; our common humanity
C) situational influences; internal motivations
D) cognition; emotion

Question 21

A cross-cultural researcher finds that across the world most legislators are male. He concludes that political office in his own country should be closed to women. The researcher is most clearly guilty of

A) the naturalistic fallacy.
B) the hindsight bias.
C) illusory correlation.
D) false consensus effect.

Question 22

A researcher finds that university students wash their hands on the average of three times a day. She concludes that an educational program is necessary to encourage more frequent hand washing by those who wash their hands less than once a day. The researcher is probably guilty of

A) hindsight bias.
B) the "I knew it all along" phenomenon.
C) illusory correlation.
D) the naturalistic fallacy.

Question 23

Values can subtly influence science by guiding

A) scientists' assumptions and preconceptions.
B) the labels scientists use for their concepts.
C) scientists' thoughts about what ought to be.
D) All of the above

Question 24

We tend to take for granted the shared beliefs that European social psychologists call our _____, our most important but least debated convictions.

A) social representations
B) symbolic interactions
C) hindsights
D) naturalistic truths

Question 25

When people claimed to have easily foreseen research findings about World War II soldiers, researcher Paul Lazarsfeld concluded that

A) participants already knew the results beforehand.
B) people seemed surprised by their ability to foresee the results.
C) people foresaw the opposite results to what was actually found.
D) ex-soldiers more easily foresaw the results than other people.

Question 26

"One problem with common sense . . . is that we invoke it after we know the facts." This quote from your textbook describes

A) the naturalistic fallacy.
B) the hindsight bias.
C) illusory correlation.
D) the social representations bias.

Question 27

The hindsight bias contributes to the idea that

A) psychological experiments lack mundane realism.
B) social psychology is potentially dangerous.
C) the results of psychological experiments are mere common sense.
D) psychological experiments lack experimental realism.

Question 28

Common assumptions often go unchallenged among a group of scholars who share the same

A) area of interest.
B) method of inquiry.
C) level of intelligence.
D) culture.

Question 29

Which of the following statements is true?

A) Science is purely objective.
B) Different levels of explanation compete to provide a real understanding of human nature.
C) Scientific labels are value-free.
D) Humans tend to prejudge reality based on expectations.

Question 30

Contrary to popular opinion, scientists investigate nature

A) from a position of pure objectivity, with no personal motives or social agenda.
B) by interpreting it according to their own mental categories.
C) for its aesthetic value with little or no regard for the artificial value of objectivity.
D) with no preconceptions.

Question 31

"The way things are is the way they ought to be." This statement reflects the

A) hindsight bias.
B) social representation bias.
C) naturalistic fallacy.
D) correlation-causality bias.

Question 32

Jamir is a first year university student and living away from home for the first time. He is having some difficulties adjusting to university life due to some of the values that he holds. Which of the following is an example of a subtle way that Jamir's values influence his behaviour?

A) Jamir notices that other students sometimes appear to be scared of him, and believes this is because of his cultural background and erroneous assumptions about terrorism.
B) Jamir finds his peers very self-absorbed and "out for number one", whereas he was taught to respect others and do what was best for the collective group and not the individual.
C) Jamir interprets other students failures (e.g., getting poor grades) as a sign that they are not dedicated and have weak personalities.
D) Jamir participates in Canada Day celebrations, but finds that his sense of national pride is very different from people who have lived in Canada all their lives.

Question 33

Which of the following statements about values and social psychology is true?

A) Research trends are usually out of step with the social concerns of their times.
B) The fact that human thinking always involves interpretation is precisely why we need scientific analysis.
C) Research into how values form, change, and influence one another helps us identify which of them are right.
D) All of the given choices are true.

Question 34

Which of the following labels implies a judgment based on subjective values?

A) freedom fighter
B) terrorist
C) patriot
D) all of these choices

Question 35

Which of the following psychological terms reflects a disguised value judgment?

A) well-adjusted
B) mentally ill
C) self-actualized
D) all of these choices

Question 36

According to the text, _______________ tends to make people overconfident about their ability to predict something that, at the time it was unfolding, they had no idea how it will all turn out.

A) the fundamental attribution error
B) illusory correlation
C) the naturalistic fallacy
D) the hindsight bias

Question 37

How do values obviously enter the picture in social psychology?

A) Values influence researchers' choice of topics.
B) Values affect the types of people attracted to various disciplines.
C) Values are frequently the object of social psychological analysis.
D) All of the above

Question 38

Which of the following illustrates how hidden values might influence social psychology?

A) Choosing to study aggression in adolescents.
B) Choosing to study aggression in a laboratory.
C) Choosing to use university students as research subjects.
D) All of these choices.

Question 39

The critique that social psychology has assumed that people are competitive and individualistic, and that conformity is always bad, is likely to come from someone who believes that

A) social psychology is not a "real science".
B) social psychology cannot study objective truth.
C) social psychology is the study of what we know through common sense.
D) social psychology has been influenced by Western cultural worldviews.

Question 40

Two contradictory criticisms faced by social psychology are that its findings are obvious and that

A) its findings are complicated.
B) its findings are false.
C) its findings could be used to manipulate people.
D) its findings are contradictory.

Question 41

Which of the following is the best example of hindsight bias?

A) Being careful in a new relationship because you've been hurt in the past.
B) Being confident when placing a bet on a sporting event.
C) Changing your opinions on important issues as you get older.
D) Reading your horoscope at the end of the day and deciding it was accurate.

Question 42

A research hypothesis is a

A) theory.
B) testable prediction.
C) collection of empirical observations.
D) technique for analyzing data.

Question 43

Hypothesis is to theory, as __________ is to ___________.

A) exam; knowledge
B) car; driver
C) control; variable
D) science; research

Question 44

When theories are discarded, it is usually because they

A) have been falsified.
B) have been displaced by newer, better theories.
C) attempted to summarize too large a body of data.
D) generated too many testable hypotheses.

Question 45

The naturalistic fallacy involves "____________" reasoning, whereas the hindsight bias involves "_____________" reasoning.

A) common sense; after the fact
B) what ought to be; I knew it all along
C) after the fact; I knew it all along
D) what ought to be; what should have been

Question 46

When researcher Karl Teigen gave students the actual proverb "fear is stronger than love," most rated it as true. When he gave others the reverse form, "love is stronger than fear,"

A) most rated it as false.
B) most rated it as true.
C) half as many rated it as true.
D) only 1% rated it as true.

Question 47

An integrated set of principles that explain and predict observed events is called

A) a test.
B) a hypothesis.
C) a proof.
D) a theory.

Question 48

Which of the following techniques would be the most effective way of investigating the relationship between the social status and the level of education of Canadian citizens?

A) an experiment
B) a case study
C) a correlational study
D) participant observation

Question 49

Social psychologist Kurt Lewin aptly commented, "There is nothing so practical as a good _____."

A) experiment
B) theory
C) laboratory
D) guess

Question 50

Juanita is a social psychologist who is interested in studying aggressive behaviours in crowd settings. She observed this crowd behaviour when two people got stabbed in the aftermath of a playoff victory celebration for Edmonton Oilers fans that turned into a riot in 2006. She designs an experiment where she has defined her "crowd" as 30 people in a small classroom who are watching a hockey game. The way in which her experimental variable relates to the theoretical concept of "crowd" pertains to

A) how the variable is tested
B) what the hypothesis about crowds is.
C) how the variable is operationalized.
D) whether she can infer correlation or causation.

Question 51

Proverbs such as "absence makes the heart grow fonder" or "out of sight, out of mind" best illustrate that

A) social psychology is all just common sense.
B) individuals engage in the naturalistic fallacy and only see what fits with their ideas.
C) experiments often generate contradictory results that are difficult to explain.
D) the hindsight bias is used to make almost any result seem to make sense.

Question 52

The hindsight bias affects the way we view decision makers, making us more likely to

A) see their decisions as surprisingly insightful and correct.
B) blame them for making obviously bad choices.
C) forgive them for making understandable mistakes in crises.
D) admire them for handling well those choices we ourselves cannot make.

Question 53

The hindsight bias often makes people

A) underestimate their intellectual powers.
B) overconfident about the validity of their judgments and predictions.
C) surprised when research confirms common sense.
D) more likely to excuse others for their bad decisions.

Question 54

Amy reads a research article and feels like it didn't tell her anything she didn't already know. However, when asked to guess the results of another experiment before reading it, she cannot. Amy's experience illustrates the

A) hindsight bias.
B) foresight bias.
C) confirmation bias.
D) correspondence bias.

Question 55

A good theory will make clear predictions that

A) confirm or modify the theory.
B) generate new exploration.
C) suggest practical application.
D) all of these choices.

Question 56

Why do biologists refer to the "theory" of evolution instead of the "fact" of evolution?

A) Because evolution is not universally believed.
B) Because it is impossible to scientifically test evolutionary principles.
C) Because the theory of evolution summarizes a whole set of scientific facts.
D) Because only theories that have been proven true may be referred to as "facts".

Question 57

Hypotheses implied by a theory allow researchers to

A) learn about the theory.
B) test the theory.
C) confirm the theory.
D) disconfirm the theory.

Question 58

Research done in natural, real-life settings outside the laboratory is called

A) case study research.
B) field research.
C) correlational research.
D) experimental research.

Question 59

A closely watched game between the Wolverines and the Eagles goes into overtime, and ultimately the Eagles win by just one point. According to research on the hindsight bias, fans of ______ will probably say ______.

A) the Wolverines; the Eagles victory was a surprise.
B) the Eagles; the Eagles victory was a surprise.
C) both teams; they thought the Eagles would win.
D) both teams; they thought the Wolverines would win.

Question 60

Hindsight bias can explain why

A) you really passed an exam when you thought had failed it.
B) you knew the course material as the exam was being taken up in class.
C) you remembered the course material better after you had written the exam.
D) you only remembered the course material until you wrote the exam, then promptly forgot most of it.

Question 61

To achieve a representative sample of adult Canadians' views on gun registration, which of the following strategies should you pursue?

A) Survey the attitudes of 1,000 adults in Ontario and 1,000 adults in Alberta.
B) Survey the attitudes of 1,000 adults in each province and territory.
C) Place ads in all major newspapers asking Canadians to call and give their views.
D) Randomly select a large sample of adult Canadians to survey.

Question 62

The great disadvantage of correlational research is that

A) it does not allow us to examine factors like race and social status.
B) knowing that two variables change together does not allow us to predict one when we know the other.
C) it rules out consideration of confounding variables.
D) it does not specify cause and effect.

Question 63

Which of the following statements about correlational research is true?

A) It enables prediction of one variable given knowledge of the other.
B) It specifies the cause-effect relationship among variables.
C) It can only be carried out in controlled laboratory settings.
D) All of these choices.

Question 64

Advanced correlational techniques that reveal the sequence of events and suggest cause-effect relations are called

A) field correlations.
B) time-lagged correlations.
C) developmental correlations.
D) representative correlations.

Question 65

What can you conclude from knowing that a correlation exists between poor nutrition and lower grades in school children?

A) Hunger makes it difficult for children to concentrate in school.
B) Improving children's nutrition will improve their achievement in school.
C) As children's nourishment declines, so too do their grades.
D) All of these choices.

Question 66

A researcher is interested in learning whether young people whose fathers are absent from the home are more likely to engage in delinquent behaviour. She compares the arrest rates of boys whose fathers are absent with those of boys whose fathers are present in the home. This is an example of

A) a correlational study.
B) an experimental study.
C) a field experiment.
D) a self-report study.

Question 67

The great strength of correlational survey research is that it

A) brings important factors into the laboratory.
B) studies factors in real-world settings that cannot be manipulated in the laboratory.
C) establishes clear cause-effect connections among variables.
D) maintains high mundane realism and thus increases generalizability.

Question 68

Opinion polls and surveys

A) describe public opinion at the moment they are taken.
B) predict respondents' immediate behaviour.
C) predict respondents' long-range behaviour.
D) are too biased to be meaningful.

Question 69

Variable X is correlated with Variable Y. Which of the following could explain this correlation?

A) X causes Y.
B) Y causes X.
C) A third variable causes or influences both X and Y.
D) All of these choices.

Question 70

In a study of teenagers, Maruyama and colleagues concluded that self-esteem and achievement are positively correlated because

A) higher self-esteem boosts achievement.
B) achievement produces higher self-esteem.
C) both self-esteem and achievement are linked to underlying intelligence and family social status.
D) both self-esteem and achievement are linked to healthy physical and psychological adjustment.

Question 71

A researcher finds that higher social status is associated with greater health. What could explain this positive correlation?

A) Having a high social status leads to better health.
B) Being in good health allows one to achieve higher social status.
C) Other facts like family background may contribute to a greater likelihood of having good health and high status.
D) All of these choices.

Question 72

In selecting a random sample from a population, a researcher must

A) allow chance to determine the size of the sample.
B) sacrifice control by disregarding information about the population.
C) make sure every member of the population has an equal chance of being chosen for the sample.
D) select most sample members from the middle of any ordered listing.

Question 73

A naturally occurring relationship among variables is known as

A) a correlation.
B) a coefficient.
C) an attribution.
D) a causal link.

Question 74

Research has shown that tall grave markers (a status symbol) are

A) the cause of longevity.
B) unrelated to longevity.
C) positively correlated with longevity.
D) negatively correlated with longevity.

Question 75

In correlational research, knowing a person's high school grades may help you to _______ that person's likelihood of succeeding in university.

A) predict
B) control for
C) randomly select
D) improve

Question 76

You would like to know the relationship between the number of psychology courses people take and their interpersonal sensitivity. You survey college students to determine how much psychology they have taken and then have them complete a test of social sensitivity. Finally you plot the relationship. This is an example of

A) a laboratory experiment.
B) a field experiment.
C) a correlational study.
D) participant observation.

Question 77

Cause-effect relationships are studied using

A) experimental research methods.
B) correlational research methods.
C) field research methods.
D) survey research methods.

Question 78

Tara has noticed that when she feels better about herself (i.e., higher self-esteem), her friends and guys she is interested in dating tell her she looks more attractive. According to this example, self-esteem and perceived attractiveness show

A) a negative correlation.
B) a positive correlation.
C) a time-lagged correlation.
D) no correlation.

Question 79

In conducting your research, you make sure that every person in the population has an equal chance of participating in your survey. This procedure is known as

A) random sampling.
B) random assignment.
C) naturalistic observation.
D) equal sampling.

Question 80

Surveying about _____ will enable a survey researcher to be 95 percent confident of describing the entire population, with only a 3 percent margin of error.

A) 12,000 randomly assigned participants
B) 1,200 randomly selected participants
C) one-third of the total population
D) one-twelfth of the total population