Attention, Perception, Learning and Memory Questions and Answers

Answer: D

Semantic priming is used to study subliminal perception. A prime word flashed too briefly to be consciously seen can speed the recognition of a related target word, which shows that meaning was processed without awareness.

Signal detection ability is studied with detection tasks measuring sensitivity and criterion. Field dependence-independence is measured with embedded figures tests. Locus of control is measured by internal-external scales, so none of these uses priming.

Answer: C

The role of expectancies, learning, past experience and culture in shaping perception is explained by the top-down processing approach. Perception here is driven by knowledge and expectation in the perceiver, which guides interpretation of incoming sensory data.

Bottom-up processing starts from the stimulus features and builds up. The information processing approach is a general framework, and hierarchical processing refers to successive levels of analysis, so neither names the influence of expectation and experience.

Answer: B

Declarative memory is the memory that holds factual information, the things we can state or declare. It includes semantic memory (general knowledge) and episodic memory (personal events).

Semantic memory is only a part of the factual store, and episodic memory covers events one has lived through, so each is narrower. Procedural memory is for skills and habits, such as riding a bicycle, and is not factual knowledge.

Answer: A

The levels of processing model, of Craik and Lockhart, accepts that the more deeply information is processed, the more likely it is to be remembered. Deep processing of meaning leaves a stronger trace than shallow processing of appearance or sound.

The retrieval cues model stresses the role of cues at recall. The Atkinson and Shiffrin model is the multi-store model of sensory, short-term and long-term memory. The trace model is not a depth-of-processing account.

Answer: A

Both statements are true and R explains A. Many amputees feel their missing limb after surgery, which is phantom limb syndrome.

The reason says the internal image of the body's boundaries continues to function after parts are removed, so the brain's body representation still signals the limb. That is the accepted explanation, so R accounts for A, and the options that deny the link or call a statement false are wrong.

Answer: A

Both statements are true and R explains A. In the latent learning experiments of Tolman and Honzik, rats rewarded only from the eleventh day did as well as the always rewarded rats soon after reward began, so the learning had already happened.

R states that learning can stay dormant for a long time before it shows in behaviour, which explains why the late-rewarded group was not behind. The options that deny R or its link to A are wrong.

Answer: A

The correct matching is acquisition with the initial stage of learning in which a response is established (4), extinction with the diminishing of a conditioned response (3), spontaneous recovery with the reappearance of an extinguished response after a rest period (1) and generalization with the tendency of similar stimuli to evoke similar responses (2). The code is 4, 3, 1, 2.

The second code gives spontaneous recovery to generalization and the reverse, and the other two begin with the wrong items.

Answer: C

Working memory involves storage capacity and processing capacity.

Working memory is the system that holds information for a short time and, at the same time, works on it, for example when doing mental arithmetic or following a sentence. It therefore has both a limited store and a limited processing capacity.

Biographical and semantic information belong to long-term memory (personal and factual knowledge). Any option that pairs storage or processing with them mixes in long-term contents, so those options are wrong.

Answer: A

The correct code is 3 4 1 2.

Stimuli associated with stored information that help recall are retrieval cues (3). Better recall in the setting in which the material was learned is context dependent memory (4). When physical states act as retrieval cues, this is state dependent retrieval (1). Retrieval that succeeds to the extent that cues at recall match cues used at learning is the encoding specificity principle (2).

The other codes swap these pairs, for example giving the encoding specificity principle to the setting-based description, which is context dependence, so they fail.

Answer: C

Both variables matter, so the answer is Both (A) and (B).

Stroboscopic (apparent) movement is seen when two lights flashed one after another are perceived as one moving light. Its strength depends on the intensity of the flashes, the distance between the two lights, and the time interval between the flashes. Option (A) names the first factor and option (B) names the other two, and both are real determinants.

'Intensity only' or 'distance and time only' each leaves out a factor that is known to affect the effect, and 'neither' is plainly false.