Deck 6: Sensation, Perception, and Action

Question 1

Nerves are stimulated during the process of _____, and the brain interprets this information in the process of _____.

A) sensation; perception
B) stimulation; selection
C) perception; sensation
D) selection; stimulation

Answer 1

A

Question 2

A wave of light proceeds through to the back of the eye where it encounters and stimulates a receptor neuron. What process has taken place?

A) Perception
B) Thinking
C) Cognition
D) Sensation

Answer 2

D

Question 3

If you turn on a floor fan, an infant will orient toward the sound. After a while, it will appear to lose interest in the spinning blades. The phenomenon underlying the loss of interest is known as

A) habituation.
B) generalization.
C) maturation.
D) discrimination.

Answer 3

A

Question 4

If an adult were cloned, a constructivist would predict that once born, the clone would

A) have to learn to perceive the world as meaningful.
B) awaken with a meaningful understanding of the world.
C) not be able to function.
D) think and perceive like an adult.

Question 5

Dr. Violet is interested in how young children perceive color. In her study, Dr. Violet simultaneously shows young children two blobs of different color and measures the amount of time they focus on each blob. Dr. Violet's technique is known as a(n) _____ task.

A) habituation
B) preferential looking
C) evoked potentials
D) operant conditioning

Question 6

Glinda jingles her keys in front of baby Elphaba's face, and she watches and smiles. Glinda continues to bring her keys up and jingle them in front of Elphaba because she appears to enjoy this game. After a while, though, Elphaba seems to lose interest in the game and no longer focuses on the keys when Glinda jingles them. This illustrates the process of

A) cross-modal perception.
B) constancy.
C) preferential looking.
D) habituation.

Question 7

A wave of sound proceeds through the auditory canal to the inner ear where receptor neurons on the basilar membrane are stimulated. The neurons send a message to the brain. When the brain receives the message, the result is a person thinking, "That sounds like my mom calling me for dinner." What has taken place?

A) Sensation and perception
B) Sensation but not perception
C) Perception but not sensation
D) Neither sensation nor perception

Question 8

Which of the following is the best example of a perceptual process?

A) Hearing a sound in the room
B) Detecting that a light has been turned on in a dark room
C) Sensing that someone has touched your arm
D) Realizing that the odor you smell is vanilla

Question 9

On a preferential looking task, a researcher measures

A) how fast an infant gets used to an object.
B) the brains response to the presentation of an object.
C) the length of time it takes for an infant to learn to choose the reinforced stimulus.
D) how long an infant views each of the objects presented.

Question 10

Today, most developmental psychologists believe that sensations begin

A) before birth and that early perceptions are coherent, not chaotic.
B) after birth and that early perceptions are coherent, not chaotic.
C) before birth and that early perceptions are chaotic, not coherent.
D) after birth and that early perceptions are chaotic, not coherent.

Question 11

Constructivists are likely to say that perceptions are

A) innate.
B) false.
C) built with sensory experience.
D) developed prior to sensations.

Question 12

Nativists believe that

A) humans have innate perceptual abilities.
B) all knowledge comes from experience.
C) infants come into the world unknowing and uncaring.
D) genes play no role in development.

Question 13

Perception is best defined as the interpretation of

A) memory.
B) sensory input.
C) unconscious thoughts.
D) an abstract idea.

Question 14

In an effort to study the acquisition of speech, Dr. Verball reinforces an infant every time it makes a sound. Given this description, Dr. Verball's research method would best be described as a(n) _____ task.

A) habituation
B) preferential hearing
C) evoked potentials
D) operant conditioning

Question 15

Peter believes that his newborn already detects a difference between when he walks away from her and when he walks toward her, and that she understands that these two actions will lead to different outcomes for her. Peter's beliefs are most similar to those of a(n)

A) empiricist.
B) psychoanalyst.
C) humanist.
D) nativist.

Question 16

If an adult were cloned, a nativist would predict that once born, the clone would

A) have to perceive the world as meaningful
B) awaken with a meaningful understanding of the world.
C) be unable to learn because it has the brain of an adult rather than an infant.
D) have a mind like a blank slate.

Question 17

Habituation is best defined as the process of "learning to be _____" with a stimulus.

A) smart
B) you
C) bored
D) free

Question 18

A(n) _____ task always involves attaching an electrode to a subject.

A) habituation
B) preferential looking
C) evoked potentials
D) operant conditioning

Question 19

Sensation refers to

A) interpretation of incoming sensory messages.
B) stimulation of nerve cells in the sense organs.
C) perceiving the surrounding environment.
D) innate processes of understanding the world.

Question 20

Who would be most likely to develop a theory hypothesizing that in order to interpret music, a person would have to hear many versions of the sound?

A) A nativist
B) A constructivist
C) A humanist
D) A Freudian

Question 21

Which child has acquired perceptual size constancy?

A) Raven, who looks out a window on a plane and realizes that people in the terminal look like ants but that they are actually much bigger.
B) Robin, who knows that she will get bigger when she is older
C) Jay, who can perceive the difference in size between a one-story building and a 10-story building
D) Loon, who uses Lego building blocks to create a tower that is taller than he is

Question 22

Three-month-old Jordan reacts as if he believes that the basketball he is playing with actually shrinks as it rolls away from him. This reaction would indicate that Jordan lacks

A) object permanence.
B) cross-modal perception.
C) attention.
D) size constancy.

Question 23

Within a minute after birth, a typical infant

A) sees colors and can track slow-moving objects.
B) sees colors but cannot track any moving objects.
C) can visually track slow-moving objects but sees only in black/white (no color vision).
D) cannot track any moving objects and sees only in black/white (no color vision).

Question 24

Visual acuity is defined as the ability to perceive

A) color.
B) movement.
C) detail.
D) depth.

Question 25

Human infants prefer "top-heavy" patterns, including human faces. What makes a human face top-heavy?

A) The large color contrast between the skin, teeth, and eyes
B) The contrast between the size of the mouth and nose
C) The eyes, hair, and upper part of the ear
D) The fact that mommy's head is significantly larger than another infant's head

Question 26

Which of the following is true regarding newborn infants' vision?

A) Infants do not have color vision until around six months of age.
B) Much of what young infants see is blurry.
C) Pattern complexity has no impact on infants' visual preferences.
D) Initial visual accommodation skills allow infants to focus clearly on far objects but not near objects.

Question 27

Martin Banks and colleagues suggest that _____ is the most important overall factor in determining what an infant will stare at the longest.

A) the degree of contours that the object has
B) whether the object is moving or not
C) how complex the object is in terms of colors and patterns
D) whether or not the infant can see it well

Question 28

In a normally developing human, mature color vision is achieved

A) near the end of the fetal stage.
B) within a day after birth.
C) about three to four months after birth.
D) around a child's first birthday.

Question 29

When describing her research, Dr. Rebhuhn says, "Basically, I take young infants and place them on a supported piece of clear glass several feet off the ground. Then I measure whether the kid seems scared or not." Dr. Rebhuhn's research sounds like it involves the use of a

A) habituation task.
B) strange situation paradigm.
C) longitudinal design.
D) visual cliff.

Question 30

The tendency to perceive an object as not growing when it approaches our eyes, or shrinking as it moves away, is _____ constancy.

A) location
B) size
C) brightness
D) form

Question 31

Which object would have the greatest amount of visual contour?

A) A series of black circles on a white background
B) A gray ship on the ocean
C) A pillow with pastel blobs of blue and yellow
D) A clear baby-bottle filled with breast milk

Question 32

The ability of an infant to perceive a meaningful facial form tends to occur

A) within a few minutes of birth.
B) about one week after birth.
C) around two to three months after birth.
D) between one and two years of age.

Question 33

Visual contour is specifically defined as the amount of _____ of a visual object.

A) curvature
B) light/dark transition
C) size
D) movement

Question 34

Visual accommodation involves the ability of the _____ of the eye to change shape and bring objects into focus.

A) retina
B) lens
C) iris
D) fovea

Question 35

Ester is in a swimming pool. Her nine-month-old son Williams is sitting on a blanket three feet from the edge of the pool. Ester coaxes her child to crawl to her. If the depth of the water is lower than the top lip of the pool, Williams is most likely to

A) crawl off the edge of the pool and fall into his mother's arms.
B) crawl to the edge of the pool and stop.
C) crawl away from his mother because her whole body isn't visible.
D) not do anything because of lack of location constancy.

Question 36

Testing infants of different ages with the visual cliff apparatus has found that

A) six- to seven-month-old infants perceive drop-offs but do not fear them.
B) two-month-old infants perceive drop-offs but do not fear them.
C) six-month-old infants show no response to the deep side of the cliff.
D) both two- and six-month-old infants will crawl across the shallow side of the cliff but will cry when enticed to crawl over the deep side of the cliff.

Question 37

Gibson and Walk's visual cliff experiment demonstrated that infants develop _____ before their first birthday.

A) depth perception
B) size constancy
C) location constancy
D) shape constancy

Question 38

If you want your two-week-old child to see you as clearly as possible, you should

A) have very bright light on your face.
B) move back and forth quickly so the child focuses on movement.
C) put your face within about eight inches of her eyes.
D) wear colorful makeup.

Question 39

When looking at faces, infants between age one and two months shift from

A) looking at the top of the face to looking at the bottom of the face.
B) looking at the bottom of the face to looking at the top of the face.
C) looking at the outer contour of the face to looking at the interiors of the face.
D) looking at the interiors of the face to looking at the outer contour of the face.

Question 40

Which of the following is LEAST likely to draw the visual attention of a young infant?

A) A moving object
B) A high contour object
C) A highly complex object
D) A face

Question 41

Which statement would indicate that Tory is an intuitive theorist?

A) Infants seem to perceive the world in a very adult-like manner.
B) Infants are like blank pieces of paper that need to be written on in order to change.
C) Infants have unconscious, survival-based reflexes.
D) Infants appear to think but do not know.

Question 42

Four month-old infants can best organize the world into distinct objects when the objects they are trying to make sense of are

A) stationary.
B) moving.
C) identical.
D) multicolored.

Question 43

Concerning the ability of newborns to hear, research has shown that they can discriminate

A) loudness and frequency, but not direction and duration.
B) only frequency and loudness.
C) frequency, loudness, duration, and direction.
D) only between loud and soft sounds.

Question 44

Six-month-old Barbie watches as two dolls are placed behind a screen. When the screen is removed, Barbie sees either two dolls (possible) or one doll (impossible). Which of the following reactions is the infant likely to show?

A) Barbie will not notice any difference between the possible and impossible outcomes, as evidenced by no difference in looking times at the two outcomes.
B) Barbie will look longer at the impossible outcome than the possible outcome.
C) Barbie will look longer at the possible outcome because it is familiar to her.
D) Barbie will not look at either outcome because they will have habituated to the original stimulus.

Question 45

The fact that newborns turn away from loud sounds indicates that they can

A) localize sound.
B) distinguish between phonemes.
C) perceive speech.
D) understand size constancy.

Question 46

Which is a criticism of cochlear implants?

A) Denies deaf children a chance to be part of the deaf community.
B) The transplanted cochlea is often rejected by the body.
C) Direct stimulation of the eardrum may cause permanent damage.
D) There is no evidence that they improve a child's hearing.

Question 47

Thirty-year-old Jiang has lived in China all his life and has only spoken in a common Chinese dialect. Jiang has an infant son named Woo. What linguistic advantage would Woo have over Jiang?

A) Woo would have a larger vocabulary.
B) Woo would be better able to distinguish between the "r" and "l" sounds.
C) Woo would be producing more grammatically correct sentences than Jiang.
D) Woo would have no linguistic advantages over his father.

Question 48

Four month-old infants appear to use object _____ to determine whether two side-by-side objects are separate.

A) size
B) hue
C) shape
D) shade

Question 49

Three-month-old infants can discriminate between phonemes. This means that they can discriminate between

A) basic speech sounds.
B) a doorbell and the bell on a telephone.
C) various familiar odors.
D) familiar and novel tastes.

Question 50

How should you react to a policy that supports the initial testing of hearing at age three and a half years?

A) Great idea.
B) Great idea, but since few hearing problems occur before this age, you are unlikely to identify any children with hearing problems.
C) Bad idea, because by that time those with significant hearing loss reach this age, they are at significant risk for life-long speech and language difficulties.
D) Bad idea, as accurate assessment of hearing is not possible until age five.

Question 51

The fact that two-month-olds can detect the difference between the sound "pa" and the sound "ba" indicates that they

A) can differentiate phonemes.
B) have cross-modal perception.
C) have semantic awareness.
D) possess visual accommodation.

Question 52

A _____ is a basic sound used in human speech.

A) cataract
B) dopamine
C) phoneme
D) surfactant

Question 53

The advantage of being born with the ability to categorize sounds phonetically is that it

A) prevents children from making phonetic errors in speaking.
B) biologically prepares a child to speak all human languages.
C) ensures that people speak the same language.
D) allows for ease of second language acquisition in later adulthood.

Question 54

Typically, newborns can

A) see and hear equally well.
B) see better than they hear.
C) hear better than they see.
D) neither see nor hear well.

Question 55

When describing her son's recent surgery, Sheri says, "They connected a microphone on the outside of his head. Then they surgically ran a wire into his inner ear." This description indicates that Sheri's son had

A) photo-refractive surgery.
B) a cochlear implant.
C) cataract surgery.
D) a magnetic resonance imaging.

Question 56

According to the intuitive theorist perspective, infants

A) have innate knowledge of the world and can reason about the world like adults do.
B) must construct their knowledge of the world from a blank slate.
C) learn what they need to know about the world by observing people around them.
D) may have some innate knowledge of the world, but do not yet have the capabilities to reason about the world.

Question 57

While sitting in her playpen, four-month-old Kiko watches her cat knock a lamp off a dresser. As the lamp begins to fall, Kiko seems to know that the lamp will drop straight to the floor. This knowledge appears to indicate that Kiko instinctively understands

A) Piagetian laws of object permanence.
B) Skinnerian laws of reinforcement.
C) Newtonian laws of object motion.
D) Freudian laws of ego formation.

Question 58

Research by Campos and colleagues indicates that in infancy, the fear of drop-offs is likely related to the experience of

A) walking.
B) being carried by moms.
C) falling.
D) playing pee-a-boo.

Question 59

Which of the following is the best example of the infant as an intuitive theorist?

A) Infants look away when an object disappears from view.
B) Infants get bored and look away when an object is repeatedly presented.
C) Infants show surprise when a ball that is dropped behind a screen is later shown to be suspended in the air.
D) Infants show surprise when a ball rolling down a hill is shown reaching the bottom of the hill.

Question 60

Cochlear implants work by providing direct stimulation to the

A) tympanic membrane.
B) auditory nerve.
C) oval window.
D) ossicles.

Question 61

Within days of their baby's birth, Ben and Jen are having an argument about their son. Jen claims that he recognizes her voice, but Ben says that this is impossible. Knowing the research in this area, you are able to tell them that

A) Ben is correct (voice recognition does not occur until around six months of age).
B) both could be correct, as babies can recognize only the first voice that they heard immediately following delivery (if this was Jen's voice, then she is correct; if it was not Jen's voice, then Ben is correct).
C) Jen is correct (maternal voice recognition is evident a few days after birth).
D) we do not know who is correct because infants this young cannot be accurately tested.

Question 62

What can we conclude regarding developmental changes in speech perception?

A) With age, we become more sensitive to sound discriminations that are relevant in our own language and less sensitive to sound discriminations that are irrelevant.
B) With age, we become more sensitive to all sound discriminations.
C) There are no detectable differences in sound discriminations with age.
D) With age, we become more sensitive to differences in consonant sounds and less sensitive to differences in vowel sounds.

Question 63

What was the key finding of the Cat in the Hat study on hearing?

A) Voice recognition is influenced by prenatal experience.
B) Infants prefer deeper male voices over higher-pitched female voices.
C) Newborns prefer rhyming phrases over non-rhyming phrases.
D) Reading to infants significantly increases their vocabulary size.

Question 64

Which is NOT one of the four basic taste perceptions?

A) Salty
B) Sour
C) Sweet
D) Fruity

Question 65

The senses of _____ both rely on detection of chemical molecules.

A) taste and smell
B) smell and vision
C) vision and hearing
D) hearing and taste

Question 66

Newborns look in the direction of a sound that they hear. They also try to grasp objects that they can see. This suggests that newborns

A) use the senses of sight, hearing, and touch, more than taste and smell.
B) use vision to coordinate all the senses.
C) cannot distinguish between their senses.
D) can integrate two or more senses.

Question 67

Cross-modal perception is the ability to

A) perceive three-dimensionality from a two-dimensional display.
B) perceive an object through two senses at the same time.
C) stop responding to a stimulus that is repeatedly presented.
D) recognize with one sense an object that was learned through another sense.

Question 68

Which statement is FALSE?

A) The sense of smell appears to develop by 28 weeks after conception.
B) Infants prefer the smell of human milk over formula even if they have only consumed formula.
C) Newborns tend to act favorably to the odor of ammonia.
D) Mothers can identify their baby solely by the baby's smell.

Question 69

If he were a typical baby, Apollo would show the most tactile sensitivity when he is stroked on his

A) face.
B) shoulder.
C) stomach.
D) feet.

Question 70

If a mother wanted to DECREASE the likelihood that her infant would grow into a picky eater later in life, she should

A) bottle feed.
B) give the infant a wide variety of foods.
C) give the infant a diet exclusively consisting of fruits and vegetables.
D) avoid eating spicy foods.

Question 71

Mennella and colleagues found that infants who were fed sour-tasting formula

A) were at risk for being obese by age two.
B) preferred the taste of sour items when they were preschoolers.
C) were at risk for being anorexic in their teens.
D) became very picky eaters as adults.

Question 72

Newborns will produce certain facial expressions depending on the taste of the liquid that they are offered. They smile when offered sugar water and frown when offered quinine. This demonstrates that newborns

A) prefer salty tastes to sour ones.
B) inherit their mother's taste preferences.
C) can discriminate between various tastes.
D) learn to avoid substances that might contain poison.

Question 73

One-month-old infants were given either a smooth pacifier or one with hard nubs on which to suck. Although they had not seen the pacifier while sucking on it, when given the opportunity to look, the infants stared longer at the type of pacifier that they had sucked on. This shows that they have

A) cross-modal perception.
B) dark adaptation.
C) inter-sensory sensation.
D) repression.

Question 74

Skin receptors allow a person to sense all of the following EXCEPT

A) pain.
B) heat.
C) pressure.
D) balance.

Question 75

Recent research has indicated that infants are more likely to survive heart surgery if they receive _____ during the operation.

A) deep anesthesia that keeps them unconscious
B) moderate levels of anesthesia that keeps them semiconscious
C) light levels of anesthesia that keeps them almost conscious
D) no anesthesia so that they are completely conscious

Question 76

Mom Billie and dad Bob are discussing the abilities of their two-month-old son Thorton. Billie claims that Thorton can recognize both of his parent's voices. Bob says that Thorton cannot recognize either voice. If Thorton is a typical two-month-old, then who is correct?

A) Billie
B) Bob
C) Neither, as Thorton can likely recognize Billie's voice but not Bob's voice
D) Neither, as Thorton can likely recognize Bob's voice but not Billie's voice

Question 77

The sense of smell is also referred to as the sense of

A) surfaction.
B) olfaction.
C) adaptation.
D) involution.

Question 78

Breast feeding an infant who is receiving a vaccination

A) leads the infant to produce more antibodies.
B) is ill advised as it promotes connecting pleasure with pain.
C) reduces the behavior signs that they are in pain.
D) has been banned by the American Academy of Pediatrics.

Question 79

What is the best explanation for young infants' ability to recognize their mother's voices shortly after birth?

A) An instinctive mother-baby bond
B) Postnatal linguistic experiences
C) Innate phonetic receptors
D) Prenatal exposure to mom's voice

Question 80

Premature infants who are _____ tend to gain weight faster than those not receiving this stimulation.

A) fed formula with quinine
B) kept in a warm environment
C) stroked over their entire body
D) hearing soothing music