Cognitive psychology worksheet with answers

The "cognitive revolution" of the 1950s and 1960s shifted psychology's focus towards:

1. AOnly observable behaviour and reinforcement
2. BUnconscious sexual and aggressive drives
3. CIntrospection about raw sensations only
4. DInternal mental processes such as memory and thinking

Continuing to invest in a failing project because of the money already spent is called the:

1. AGambler's fallacy
2. BSunk cost fallacy
3. CAvailability heuristic
4. DFraming effect

A multiple-choice exam mainly tests which kind of retrieval?

1. ARelearning
2. BFree recall
3. CRecognition
4. DSerial recall

In Duncker's candle problem, participants must fix a candle to a wall using a box of tacks and matches. The solution is hard to find because people:

1. ASee the box only as a container, not as a shelf
2. BSpend too long trying to melt wax with the matches
3. CAssume the tacks are too short to hold the candle
4. DDo not realise the candle has to be lit first

People recall more words from a list of short words (e.g. "cat, sun") than from a list of long words. The usual explanation is that:

1. ALong words are processed more deeply and so crowd each other out
2. BShort words take less time to rehearse in the phonological loop
3. CLong words cause retroactive interference with earlier items
4. DShort words are held in iconic memory as well as acoustically

Repeating "the, the, the" aloud while learning a word list impairs recall because it:

1. AOverloads the visuospatial sketchpad
2. BBlocks rehearsal in the phonological loop
3. CErases information already in long-term memory
4. DPrevents the eyes from reading the words

The Stroop effect shows that:

1. APeople can name colours faster than they can read words
2. BReading words is so automatic that it interferes with naming the ink colour
3. CAttention can be divided without any cost
4. DColour perception depends only on the eyes

Participants practise retrieving some items from a studied category (e.g. "fruit – orange"). Later, unpractised items from the same category (e.g. "fruit – banana") are recalled worse than items from unpractised categories. This is:

1. ARetroactive interference from a new list
2. BThe testing effect
3. CDecay over time
4. DRetrieval-induced forgetting