Deck 1: Introduction to Adult Development

Question 1

explaining adult development, psychologists must ______.

A) explain both changes with age and continuities
B) focus primarily on explaining changes with age
C) focus primarily on explaining continuities with age
D) deal most centrally with individual differences in responses to life problems

Answer 1

A

Question 2

Which of the following is a common characteristic of U.S. adults who were young children during the Great Depression of the 1930s, according to Elder's research?

A) negative effects in adulthood
B) a large number of children
C) stable careers
D) late marriage

Answer 2

A

Question 3

U.S. culture, adults in their early 20s are expected to marry, start families, establish themselves in their jobs or careers, and settle into separate households; 45-year-olds are expected to be launching their children into independence, to be reaching the peak of their careers, and to be caring for their own aging parents. Such expectations illustrate which concept?

A) cohorts
B) generations
C) shared experiences
D) cross-sectional comparisons

Answer 3

C

Question 4

good standardized test has validity, which means_______.

A) it measures what it claims to measure
B) it measures results consistently
C) it provides a comparison of means
D) it provides a solid positive correlation

Question 5

According to the text, emerging adulthood begins in the age decade of _______.

A) the 20s
B) the 30s
C) the 40s
D) the 50s

Question 6

U.S. culture, adults in their early 20s are expected to marry, start families, establish themselves in jobs or careers, and settle themselves in separate households; 45-year-olds are expected to be launching their children into independence, to be reaching the peak of their careers, and to be caring for their own aging parents. Such expectations illustrate which concept?

A) cohorts
B) generations
C) shared experiences
D) cross-sectional comparisons

Question 7

Which of the following is a major argument in favor of cross-sectional research designs in the study of adulthood?

A) They allow researchers to collect information about age differences on some variable quite rapidly.
B) They allow researchers to answer questions about individual continuity over time.
C) They unconfound age and cohort.
D) They clarify the relationship between age and family life cycle.

Question 8

Which of the following groups would be described as a "cohort"?

A) all adults presently with middle-class jobs
B) all unemployed adults
C) all adults who exercise regularly
D) all adults born between 1970 and 1975

Question 9

Experiences linked to age and occurring with most adults are called _______.

A) tribalizations
B) normative age-graded influences
C) age periods
D) cohorts

Question 10

Which is NOT a major category of influence that helps to explain both the ways we tend to be alike and the ways we tend to be different in our adult journeys?

A) biologically influenced change
B) unique experiences
C) cultural-cohort effects
D) shared, age-graded change

Question 11

Which of the following timing/experience combinations would be likely to create the LEAST stress and disruption, according to the shared experience/social clock model?

A) the death of your father when you are 60 years old
B) retirement because of ill health at age 50
C) being fired from your job when you are 40 years old
D) becoming a parent for the first time when you are 16 years old

Question 12

a researcher interviews a group of 20-year-olds, a group of 40-year-olds, and a group of 60-year-olds about their gender role attitudes, this would be an example of which sort of research design?

A) cross-sectional
B) longitudinal
C) time-sequential
D) sequential

Question 13

Which of the following timing/experience combinations would be likely to create the LEAST stress and disruption, according to the shared experiential/social clock model?

A) the death of your father when you are 60 years old
B) retirement because of ill health at age 50
C) being fired from your job when you are 40 years old
D) becoming a parent for the first time when you are 16 years old

Question 14

Which shared developmental change is most likely to be universal?

A) retirement at age 65
B) negative ageism
C) reduced muscle mass in old age
D) young adults leaving home at age 18

Question 15

According to the theory about the impact of the social clock of adult life events, which of the following individual patterns is associated with the most upheaval or disruption or personal difficulty-at least for current cohorts?

A) having your parents both die when you are in your 20s
B) having a first child at age 30
C) receiving your last work promotion at age 40
D) retiring at age 65

Question 16

Which of the following research designs would be the least useful when using a sample population of a typical college freshman class to make comparisons of preretirement and postretirement exercise regimen on positive outlooks?

A) experimental design
B) quasi-experimental design
C) correlational design
D) surveys

Question 17

Biologically influenced changes in adulthood occur _______.

A) at the same age in all adults
B) at varied ages but in a similar sequence
C) at varied ages and in varied sequences
D) at the same age and in the same sequence

Question 18

the following research methods, select the one that studies the same subjects over a period of time, observing whether their responses remain the same or change in systematic ways?

A) sequential
B) experimental
C) cross-sectional
D) longitudinal

Question 19

Which of the following is an example of a potential shared, "age-graded" change in adulthood?

A) a loss of fitness (e.g., aerobic capacity) beginning in the 30s and 40s and continuing into old age
B) a decrease in the frequency of contact with siblings between middle age and old age
C) a lower average number of years of education among current 25-year-olds than among current 65-year-olds
D) a lesser susceptibility to disease among current 65-year-olds than among current 30-year-olds

Question 20

explaining adult development, psychologists must ______.

A) explain both changes with age and continuities
B) focus primarily on explaining changes with age
C) focus primarily on explaining continuities with age
D) deal most centrally with individual differences in responses to life problems

Question 21

every five years, I study the gender-role attitudes of the same group of individuals, this would be an example of what kind of research design?

A) cross-sectional
B) sequential
C) longitudinal
D) correlational

Question 22

which of the following cross-sectional research findings would you be MOST likely to suspect a "cohort effect" as the primary explanation?

A) lower bone density among 70-year-olds than among 35-year-olds
B) faster recall of lists of words by 20-year-olds than by 60-year-olds
C) higher percentage of blue-collar workers among 50-year-olds than among 30-year-olds
D) a lower rate of marital satisfaction among couples in their 30s than among couples in their 50s

Question 23

I want to know whether IQ scores tend to remain constant in individuals over the adult years, which of the following research designs should I use to study the question?

A) longitudinal
B) experimental
C) a survey questionnaire
D) qualitative

Question 24

is the term used to describe large social environments where development takes place?

A) cohorts
B) generations
C) cultures
D) age periods

Question 25

a researcher interviews a group of 20-year-olds, a group of 40-year-olds, and a group of 60-year-olds about their gender role attitudes at one point in time, this would be an example of which sort of research design?

A) cross-sectional
B) longitudinal
C) time-sequential
D) cross-sequential

Question 26

Which of the following groups would be described as a "cohort"?

A) all adults presently with middle-class jobs
B) all unemployed adults
C) all adults who exercise regularly
D) all adults born between 1970 and 1975

Question 27

researcher finds in a longitudinal study that her subjects are significantly more open to new experiences at age 50 than they were at 30. This change most likely reflects _______.

A) a cohort difference
B) the classic nature nurture dichotomy
C) a developmental change
D) attrition

Question 28

Which of the following is a major research technique used in "behavior genetics"?

A) comparisons of individuals from different ethnic groups
B) comparisons of identical and fraternal twins
C) comparisons of young and old subjects
D) comparisons of males and females

Question 29

I select one sample of 30-year-olds and follow them over a decade, interviewing or testing them repeatedly, this would be an example of what kind of research design?

A) cross-sectional
B) sequential
C) longitudinal
D) correlational

Question 30

Which of the following groups would be described as a "cohort"?

A) everyone who was once a preschooler with a working mother
B) everyone born during the Great Depression of the 1930s
C) everyone in whose mother was named Anna
D) everyone who lives in the western hemisphere

Question 31

Although Alex's biological mother used crack cocaine during her pregnancy, Alex was adopted at birth into a loving home with parents who did the best that they could to give her every opportunity possible. She ended up graduating from high school and is now beginning a culinary program at a local community college. Alex's scenario best exemplifies:

A) contextualism.
B) plasticity.
C) normative history-graded influences.
D) the multidisciplinary nature of development.

Question 32

of the most common instruments to gather data is a personal interview. Which of the following questions/statements might a researcher ask in a structured interview?

A) If you could have the perfect job, what would it be?
B) Describe a time when you communicated some unpleasant news or feelings to a friend. What happened?
C) Would your spouse describe you as a warm fuzzy or a cold prickly?
D) Think of a day when you had many things to do and describe how you scheduled your time.

Question 33

Which of the following is a common characteristic of U.S. adults who were young children during the Great Depression of the 1930's, according to Elder's research?

A) negative effects in adulthood
B) a large number of children
C) stable careers
D) late marriage

Question 34

After doing a large-scale cross-sectional study, a researcher finds that each successively older group does slightly less well on a test of memory for 10-digit telephone numbers. Which of the following is the best interpretation of this result?

A) A basic biological change underlies the observed steady reduction of memory skill.
B) The differences can be explained by gender of the participants.
C) The difference has nothing to do with practice of memory skills.
D) No interpretation can be made using this result.

Question 35

a researcher begins a study of a group of 20-year-olds and then a few years later continues the study on the same group, this would be an example of what type of research design?

A) cross-sectional
B) time-sequential
C) longitudinal
D) cohort-sequential

Question 36

Using a standard treadmill test, I observe that today's 30-year-olds are more aerobically fit than are today's 60-year-olds. Which of the following is the LEAST plausible explanation of this observation?

A) Fitness is more highly valued in today's society, so the younger cohort exercises more regularly than the older cohort does now or did when they were 30.
B) In U.S. society, jobs and lifestyles become more and more sedentary as adults get older. The observed difference thus reflects a genuine change with age, but not an inevitable one.
C) Inevitable physical changes associated with basic biological aging lie behind the observed difference.
D) It is more difficult to test the aerobic capacity of 60-year-olds, so the findings are probably misleading.

Question 37

Which of the following scenarios is MOST likely a nonnormative life event?

A) A couple in their 20s first marry then have a child.
B) A grandfather of two retires at age 65.
C) Two nursing home residents marry at ages 80 and 82.
D) A young woman graduates with a bachelor's degree at age 22.

Question 38

large-scale research project known as the Midlife in the United States (MIDUS) National Survey included questions pertaining to personal health that was sent out to 7000 participants between the ages of 25 and 74. This type of study in which data is gathered at one time from groups of participants who represent different age groups is an example of what general type of research design?

A) cross-sectional
B) longitudinal
C) sequential
D) panel

Question 39

Which of the following is a major argument AGAINST the use of cross-sectional research designs in studying adult development?

A) They require too much time to collect data.
B) They typically involve non-representative samples.
C) They confound age and cohort.
D) They do not allow comparisons of sub-groups, such as middle-class and working-class, or black and white.

Question 40

(conceptual-19). Some cross-sectional studies do not use age groups. Instead, they use stages in life. Which cross-sectional study would be the most suitable using stages in life?

A) comparing young couples without children to couples who have already had their first child to see the effects of parenthood on marriage
B) comparing answers to survey questions from men and women aged 35-44 years old
C) comparing a freshman and senior high school student grade point average and athletic ability
D) comparing twins' personality inventories every five years

Question 41

Suppose I am interested in knowing whether adults who are very introverted at age 20 are still highly introverted at age 50. Which of the following statistical analyses will I be most likely to use?

A) a comparison of average introversion scores for a sample of adults aged 20 and another sample aged 50
B) a comparison of average introversion scores at age 20 and age 50 for the same adults assessed longitudinally
C) an analysis of the average amount in introversion between any two measurements of the same people over time
D) a calculation of the correlation between scores on the key variable at two time points in a group of subjects studied longitudinally between age 20 and age 50

Question 42

What is a meta-analysis and why would a researcher choose to do it?

Question 43

Briefly describe two of the significant problems with longitudinal design.

Question 44

A researcher reports that adults in their forties have fewer close friends than do adults in their twenties. List briefly at least two (three if you can manage it) broad types of explanations for this finding.

Question 45

There is a significant positive correlation between IQ scores and academic performance (grades). Given this statistic, we can reasonably conclude that _______.

A) low IQ scores and low grades are not at all related
B) high IQ scores are a predictor of good grades
C) high IQ scores are the only established cause of high grades
D) low IQ scores are a result of neglectful parenting.

Question 46

I were to select a sample of 30-year-olds, another sample of 40-year-olds, and a third sample of 50-year-olds, test or interview them once, and then test or interview them again 10 years later, this would be an example of what kind of research design?

A) cross-sectional
B) sequential
C) longitudinal
D) correlational

Question 47

researcher selects a sample of 65-year-olds and interviews and tests them every two years for 14 years. Over these years, some of the subjects die or drop out of the study. This phenomenon is referred to as _______.

A) attrition
B) terminal drop
C) longitudinal loss
D) selective bias

Question 48

Compare the advantages and disadvantages of cross-sectional and longitudinal research designs.

Question 49

Which of the following scenarios best represents a cross-sectional research design?

A) A study examines individual political views across a life span. The researcher's hypothesis is that as individuals age, they become more conservative. The researcher randomly selects a sample from various age cohorts, to examine their political views on capital punishment, immigration, and federal spending.
B) A study examines individual political views across a life span. The researcher's hypothesis is that as individual's age, they become more conservative. The researcher randomly selects a sample from selected high school population and follows them for 50 years.
C) A study examines the relationship of individual political views and the amount of education they have completed. The researcher's hypothesis is that there is a positive relationship between education and liberal political views.
D) A study examines how individual political views change between 1981-1991 and 2001-2011.

Question 50

I want to know whether successive cohorts show the same pattern of decline in frequency of close friendships in their 30s, which research design should I use?

A) time-lag
B) sequential
C) longitudinal
D) cross-sectional

Question 51

Which of the following correlation coefficients shows the strongest relationship between the two variables entered into the correlation?

A) -.35
B) +.70
C) - 82
D) +.55

Question 52

Suppose a researcher, using a cross-sectional design, finds that the incidence of depression is highest among young adults and lowest among the elderly. Which of the following is a possible valid interpretation of this result?

A) It reflects a basic, shared biological change with age.
B) It reflects a shared, "age-graded" change resulting from common adult tasks and family life cycles.
C) It reflects cohort differences; current young adults experience more stress than the previous generation did.
D) any of the above.

Question 53

Suppose you wanted to know whether adults become more religious in their forties and fifties than they were at earlier adult ages. Briefly describe a study you would design to answer this question.

Question 54

Schwebel combined data from 30 studies to examine the link between optimism and health. This is an example of a(n):

A) meta-analysis
B) quasi-experimental design
C) experiment
D) survey SHORT ANSWER QUESTIONS

Question 55

sequential research design _______.

A) is more commonly used than cross-sectional designs because they take less time
B) includes two or more longitudinal comparisons taken at different times
C) is carried out at one point in time
D) includes one cohort studied over time

Question 56

Explain briefly why differences in the average level of education between older and younger adults might affect our interpretation of age differences in such variables as intellectual performance or work satisfaction.

Question 57

would be the very best research design to determine whether middle-aged adults are really more psychologically "mature" than young adults?

A) a longitudinal design, with a large representative sample studied from 20 to 45
B) a cross-sectional study in which a large, representative sample of adults of each age from 20 to 45 (e.g., 20-year-olds, 25-year-olds, etc.) is studied once
C) the same cross-sectional design as in b, but repeated at 10-year intervals
D) a sequential design in which each age interval is studied longitudinally in more than one cohort

Question 58

Three groups of males take a timed reaction test. All the males in Group 1 are aged 20. The males in Group 2 are all aged 40. The males in the last group (Group 3) are all aged 60. The statistic reported to describe the differences in reaction times between groups is each group's mean score. However, this mean score does NOT identify _______.

A) which group has the fastest reaction times
B) a trend for reaction times based on age
C) any individual's reaction time
D) the group that would include the best candidates for a job requiring excellent reaction times

Question 59

Describe and discuss at least two categories of shared, age-graded experiences that can shape adult development.

Question 60

There are at least three factors or processes that produce age-graded changes. Briefly list and describe them.

Question 61

Describe the major adult age strata present in U.S. culture, and describe the major expectations and responsibilities associated with each stratum.

Question 62

Design an experiment to test the proposition that older adults gain less (learn less in a given amount of time) from training in some new skill than do younger adults.

Question 63

Explain in what ways a person's social age will impact his or her activity level in public places if his or her chronological age is between 60-70 years old. Provide an example that illustrates this impact.

Question 64

What are the advantages of a sequential study compared to a cross-sectional study?

Question 65

Describe the difference between shared and non-shared events. Include examples of each.

Question 66

Evaluate the impact of stability and change during your developmental process. Explain, with at least one example each, how the concept of change and stability manifest in your life, and whether you envision a stable theme throughout your life.

Question 67

How can we tell the difference between a cohort effect and a genuine developmental pattern? What kind of evidence do we need to make the distinction?

Question 68

Give an example of a research question that you think would lend itself best to a qualitative approach. Explain why you might want to use this type of analysis rather than a quantitative analysis.

Question 69

Explore the concepts of individual difference in terms of stability and change, using either an example from your family or one that you make up from imagination, providing definitions in your own words and applied examples.

Question 70

Describe two different types of sequential research designs and give an example of each-either an example of an actual study, or one you make up.