week 13

Question 1

What is a category?

Answer 1

A set of entities that are equivalent in some way. Usually the items are similar to one another.

Question 2

What is a concept?

Answer 2

The mental representation of a category.

Question 3

What is typicality?

Answer 3

The difference in “goodness” of category members, ranging from the most typical (the prototype) to borderline members.

Question 4

What is an examplar?

Answer 4

An example in memory that is labeled as being in a particular category.

Question 5

Which term is probably the best synonym for the word “cognition” as it is used in a discussion of cognitive development?

Answer 5

Thinking

Question 6

Owen is writing a paper about how the attitudes, values, and beliefs of culture influence development in children. What would be the best title for his essay?

Answer 6

“Child development according to Lev Vygotsky”

Question 7

If you were taking part in a debate with another psychologist over the relative influences of nature and nurture on development, which position do you think you’d be most likely to take if you wanted to win the debate?

Answer 7

Nature and nurture interact to determine virtually every aspect of development.

Question 8

The correct order of Piaget’s proposed stages of cognitive development is:

Answer 8

sensorimotor, preoperational reasoning, concrete operational reasoning, formal operational reasoning

Question 9

What measure might a psychologist use to demonstrate that an infant does not know that his teddy bear still exists when it is removed from his field of vision?

Answer 9

an object permanence task

Question 10

Adam, who is 4 years old, watches his mother pour a half full glass of juice into a taller, thinner glass. Adam’s eyes go wide as he says, “Mommy, you made more juice, like magic!” Adam is clearly in Piaget’s ______stage and is failing to understand the concept of conservation.

Answer 10

preoperational

Question 11

With regard to the validity of Piaget’s theory of cognitive development, which criticism would be the most accurate?

Answer 11

Children’s cognitive development seems to be more continuous that Piaget proposed.

Question 12

Which part of the brain, important in planning and flexible problem solving, continues to develop throughout adolescence?

Answer 12

the prefrontal cortex

Question 13

Theory founded in large part by Lev Vygotsky that emphasizes how other people and the attitudes, values, and beliefs of the surrounding culture influence children’s development.

Answer 13

Sociocultural theories

Question 14

Period within Piagetian theory from birth to age 2 years, during which children come to represent the enduring reality of objects.

Answer 14

Sensorimotor stage

Question 15

Period within Piagetian theory from age 2 to 7 years, in which children can represent objects through drawing and language but cannot solve logical reasoning problems, such as the conservation problems.

Answer 15

Preoperational reasoning stage

Question 16

Theory that development occurs through a sequence of discontinuous stages: the sensorimotor, preoperational, concrete operational, and formal operational stages.

Answer 16

Piaget’s theory

Question 17

Awareness of the component sounds within words.

Answer 17

Phonemic awareness

Question 18

Theories that focus on describing the cognitive processes that underlie thinking at any one age and cognitive growth over time.

Answer 18

Information processing theories

Question 19

Piagetian stage starting at age 12 years and continuing for the rest of life, in which adolescents may gain the reasoning powers of educated adults.

Answer 19

Formal operations stage

Question 20

Piagetian stage between ages 7 and 12 when children can think logically about concrete situations but not engage in systematic scientific reasoning.

Answer 20

Concrete operations stage

Question 21

Children with ASD tend to show decreased attention to human faces by what age:

Answer 21

6-12 months

Question 22

A characteristic that reflects a genetic liability for disease and a more basic component of a complex clinical presentation.

Answer 22

Endophenotypes

Question 23

Measures the firing of groups of neurons in the cortex. As a person views or listens to specific types of information, neuronal activity creates small electrical currents that can be recorded from non-invasive sensors placed on the scalp.

Answer 23

Event-related potentials (ERP)

Question 24

Entails the use of powerful magnets to measure the levels of oxygen within the brain that vary with changes in neural activity. That is, as the neurons in specific brain regions “work harder” when performing a specific task, they require more oxygen.

Answer 24

Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI)

Question 25

The set of neuroanatomical structures that allows us to understand the actions and intentions of other people.

Answer 25

Social brain

Question 26

Nature vs. nurture says that…

Answer 26

EVERY aspect of development involves some combination of genetics/biology and environment

Question 27

Gradually improving/refining the same types of skills that were there to begin with?

Answer 27

Continuous

Question 28

New ways of understanding and responding to the world emerge at specific times?

Answer 28

Discontinuous