Psychology Degree Principles of Psychology 3 — Questions and Answers
Question 1: Broca's area, critical for speech production, is located in which lobe of the brain?
- Temporal lobe
- Parietal lobe
- Occipital lobe
- Frontal lobe (Correct answer)
Correct answer: Frontal lobe
Broca's area is in the left frontal lobe and damage to it causes Broca's aphasia, characterized by halting, effortful speech.
Question 2: A therapist uses systematic desensitization to treat a client's phobia. This technique is rooted in which learning principle?
- Operant conditioning
- Observational learning
- Classical conditioning (Correct answer)
- Latent learning
Correct answer: Classical conditioning
Systematic desensitization pairs relaxation (a conditioned response) with feared stimuli to gradually counter-condition the anxiety response.
Question 3: Which statistical measure indicates the strength and direction of a linear relationship between two variables?
- Standard deviation
- Correlation coefficient (Correct answer)
- T-test statistic
- Chi-square value
Correct answer: Correlation coefficient
The correlation coefficient (r) ranges from -1 to +1, indicating both the direction and magnitude of a linear relationship between variables.
Question 4: According to Maslow's hierarchy, which need must typically be satisfied before a person focuses on belongingness needs?
- Self-actualization
- Esteem needs
- Safety needs (Correct answer)
- Cognitive needs
Correct answer: Safety needs
Maslow's hierarchy places physiological and safety needs below belongingness; safety must be satisfied before social/belonging needs become primary motivators.
Question 5: A child learns to fear dogs after being bitten. Later, the child also fears cats without being bitten. This best illustrates:
- Extinction
- Spontaneous recovery
- Stimulus generalization (Correct answer)
- Second-order conditioning
Correct answer: Stimulus generalization
Stimulus generalization occurs when a conditioned response transfers to stimuli similar to the original conditioned stimulus.
Question 6: Which neurotransmitter is primarily associated with reward, motivation, and is implicated in drug addiction pathways?
- Serotonin
- Acetylcholine
- Dopamine (Correct answer)
- GABA
Correct answer: Dopamine
Dopamine is released in the mesolimbic pathway (nucleus accumbens) during rewarding activities and is central to addiction reinforcement.
Question 7: The concept of 'self-fulfilling prophecy' in psychology refers to:
- Believing one can achieve goals through effort
- Expectations that cause behaviors that confirm those expectations (Correct answer)
- Predicting outcomes based on past experience
- Overestimating one's own abilities
Correct answer: Expectations that cause behaviors that confirm those expectations
A self-fulfilling prophecy occurs when an expectation influences behavior in ways that cause the expected outcome to come true.
Psychology Degree Principles of Psychology 3
Broca's area, critical for speech production, is located in which lobe of the brain?