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Research Methods Practice Final Exam--Multiple Choice--Spring 2008

Multiple Choice
Identify the letter of the choice that best completes the statement or answers the question.
 

 1. 
When colleges use high school grades and SAT or ACT scores to determine whether to admit a student, they are using the tests scores as a measure of the likelihood of student success in college.  This is related to which goal of science?
a.
control
b.
description
c.
explanation
d.
prediction
 

 2. 
If a person believes in a theory and maintains that he or she will never alter a belief, no matter how much research contradicts a theory, then that person is not interested in what characteristic of science?
a.
objective
b.
data-driven
c.
public
d.
predictability
 

 3. 
One problem with trying to understand behavior by using the a priori method of knowing is that
a.
just because people share a common set of beliefs, it doesn’t mean that they are right.
b.
our experiences might be idiosyncratic and might not extend to others.
c.
people don’t base their behaviors or thoughts on a set of logical principles.
d.
scientific knowledge of behavior has its own set of limitations.
 

 4. 
The research by Hugo Münsterberg on the question of whether women should sit on juries
a.
reflected cultural values in that he did not bother to ask whether men should sit on juries.
b.
reflects the fact that research on controversial topics can be free of personal feelings of the investigator.
c.
settled the issue about women on juries by eliminating subjectivity in the choice of research questions asked.
d.
revealed the fact that we can’t get good information about controversial research topics.
 

 5. 
Researchers at the University of Cincinnati wanted to investigate how much radiation military personnel could be exposed to and still function.  In order to study the effects of
a.
gave food with radioactive substances to developmentally disabled children.
b.
withheld treatment from patients who had been accidentally exposed to radiation.
c.
exposed psychiatric patients to radiation without informed consent.
d.
subjected cancer patients to whole-body radiation without informed consent.
 

 6. 
The ethical principles developed by the American Psychological Association contain guidelines for achieving the highest ideals of psychology.  These principles are called
a.
aspirational goals.
b.
ethical standards.
c.
enforceable rules.
d.
principles of beneficence.
 

 7. 
When participants in Stanley Milgram’s obedience studies left the research session, they had been told that they had been deceived about the nature of the study.  Because the participants might have experienced potentially serious distress after the study, Milgram arranged for visits with a psychiatrist.  This process was called
a.
dehoaxing
b.
densensitization
c.
compensatory followup
d.
informed consent
 

 8. 
Research with people is assessed to make sure it doesn’t violate ethical guidelines.  The evaluation is performed by
a.
the American Psychological Association.
b.
the American Psychiatric Association.
c.
an Institutional Review Board in the college or university where the research is done.
d.
the investigator’s research team.
 

 9. 
Studies about participants’ reactions to being deceived in research have revealed that
a.
most participants are offended when they learned that they have been lied to.
b.
deception leads participants to be skeptical or suspicious about psychological research.
c.
participants regard the science and practice of psychology positively, even after learning that they have been deceived.
d.
they agree that ethical guidelines should prohibit deception in psychological research.
 

 10. 
One of the ethical issues associated with internet research involves
a.
reaching a diverse set of participants.
b.
making sure that participants can leave a web site and return to it later to complete the study.
c.
the fact that different web browsers can display a given web page in very different ways.
d.
making sure that data transmitted over the web are not intercepted in such a way that confidentiality and anonymity are violated.
 

 11. 
When researchers misrepresent the use of equipment in a study, they are using
a.
a cover story.
b.
simple deception.
c.
technical deception.
d.
role deception.
 

 12. 
In the past several decades, the dominant theoretical approach that has generated research ideas has been
a.
behavioral.
b.
cognitive.
c.
neuroscientific.
d.
psychoanalytic.
 

 13. 
If previous research generated results about which you were skeptical.  You might set up a related test to see if a similar, but different, experimental treatment led to the same outcome.  A study to assess your speculation would use which of McGuire’s (1983) approaches to generating research ideas.
a.
studying spontaneously occurring events.
b.
studying the validity of everyday beliefs and when they break down.
c.
evaluating formal if-then statements.
d.
using previous research as a stepping stone to new ideas.
 

 14. 
A disadvantage of research on the internet compared to laboratory research is that
a.
there are more likely to be errors in data collection on the internet than in traditional laboratory studies.
b.
the nature of the sample of participants is so narrow and specific that it is hard to interpret the results.
c.
it is impossible to guarantee that informed consent and debriefing occur.
d.
the results of internet-based research are very different from research in laboratories, so interpretations are difficult.
 

 15. 
When a researcher repeats an earlier experiment but includes some novel elements, this process is called
a.
assessment of validity.
b.
replication with extension.
c.
conceptual replication.
d.
construct validity.
 

 16. 
If you wanted to know the number and nature of participants in a research study written in APA style, you would refer to which section?
a.
abstract.
b.
introduction.
c.
method.
d.
results.
 

 17. 
Researchers have found that if you study for a total amount of time but distribute it over short test sessions, you remember better than if you study the total amount of time in a long session.  In this research, the approach to studying (many short sessions versus a single long session) is the
a.
independent variable
b.
dependent variable
c.
control variable
d.
random variable
 

 18. 
  If a psychologist wanted to study public behaviors in a group without intervening in the group or even letting others know that they were being observed, the most likely approach would be
a.
observational research
b.
correlational research
c.
experimental research
d.
longitudinal research
 

 19. 
Research whose main purpose is to generate self-reports of attitudes from a large number of participants is likely to involve
a.
survey research
b.
longitudinal research
c.
case studies
d.
qualitative research
 

 20. 
Among the following types of published research, which use the most diverse types of participants?
a.
experimental studies
b.
nonexperimental, applied studies
c.
longitudinal studies
d.
quasi-experimental studies
 

 21. 
If a researcher created a list of the people in a population of interest and randomly selected them to participate in a study, that researcher would be using
a.
quota sampling
b.
purposive sampling
c.
convenience sampling
d.
probability sampling
 

 22. 
Suppose your research population was located in small groups in numerous remote locations. You could identify all groups and then randomly select which groups you would investigate.  This technique describes
a.
stratified random sampling
b.
quota sampling
c.
cluster sampling
d.
convenience sampling
 

 23. 
Nonsampling error leads to
a.
probability sampling
b.
quasi-experiments
c.
problems with generalization of results
d.
stratification of participants in the sample
 

 24. 
Suppose a researcher measures a behavior in a research sample, then repeats data collection to see if the results are the same.  If the data provided by each person is very similar on the two occasions, the measurement shows
a.
reliability
b.
validity
c.
generalizability
d.
low nonsampling error
 

 25. 
If the score on a driving test gives a good indication of the number of accidents a driver experienced, that score would show
a.
predictive validity
b.
construct validity
c.
convergent validity
d.
operational validity
 

 26. 
Sometimes psychologists choose non-experimental methods in their research because
a.
experimental approaches have been criticized as involving too much control over variables.
b.
psychologists are seldom concerned with issues of cause and effect in behavior.
c.
non-experimental research shows higher levels of internal validity.
d.
the experimental approach may involve a problem with ethics.
 

 27. 
If the three criteria for establishing causation are not met, we are in a state of
a.
experimental realism.
b.
demand characteristics.
c.
causal ambiguity
d.
divergent validity.
 

 28. 
The logic of an experiment is that when one group that experiences an experimental manipulation and another group does not, any differences in subsequent behavior are due to the independent variable.  This conclusion is true when
a.
both groups are comparable at the beginning of the study.
b.
the control group and the placebo group experience the same manipulation.
c.
the study is double-blind, but not single blind.
d.
demand characteristics are present in both groups.
 

 29. 
Variables that affect participants in one group in a given way but that affect participants in a second group differently or not at all are known as
a.
confounds.
b.
demand characteristics.
c.
dependent variables.
d.
control variables.
 

 30. 
When people think others are going to judge their behaviors, those people begin to experience
a.
placebo effects.
b.
causal ambiguity.
c.
internal validation.
d.
evaluation apprehension.
 

 31. 
Construct validity refers to how well
a.
your operational definitions relate to the underlying concepts you are trying to measure.
b.
your measurements agree with the measurements of others.
c.
your statistical tests help you answer your research questions.
d.
your measurements correlate with one another.
 

 32. 
If measurements of emotional intelligence correlate highly with other documented personality traits but they shouldnt, the measurement of the emotional intelligence shows
a.
low divergent validity.
b.
high construct validity.
c.
causal ambiguity.
d.
lack of experimental realism.
 

 33. 
When you can logically conclude that your independent variable is causal with respect to the dependent variable, you are implying that your measurements are showing
a.
external validity.
b.
construct validity.
c.
convergent validity.
d.
internal validity.
 

 34. 
Philip Zimbardo conducted a study in which students acted as prison guards and wound up acting brutally toward the students in the role of inmates.  The fact that the prison guards adopted the role that they thought was appropriate indicates that the study showed
a.
mundane realism.
b.
causal ambiguity.
c.
experimenter effects.
d.
experimental realism.
 

 35. 
A group of psychologists studying humor reaction studied participants’ enjoyment of jokes by recording how many times the participants grinned, smiled, and laughed. These measurements of grinning, smiling, and laughing to represent enjoyment involve
a.
manipulated variables
b.
main effects of humor enjoyment
c.
logistic analysis.
d.
an operational definition of laughter
 

 36. 
If a study was set up to see if psychology majors differed from biology majors in political attitudes, participants could not be randomly assigned to groups because they came to the study as psychology or biology majors.  Such a research design would be
a.
experimental.
b.
ex post facto.
c.
operational.
d.
quasi-experimental
 

 37. 
Researchers Schul and Goren (1997) discovered that strong evidence led to higher judgments of guilt in mock trials than did weak evidence.  The independent variable in this study was a
a.
measured variable
b.
situational variable
c.
subject variable
d.
quantitative variable
 

 38. 
A study conducted by the National Institute of Mental Health revealed that when participants received a message about safe sex practices in a discussion format, they changed their sexual practices.  In this study, the independent variable was
 
a.
a subject variable
b.
a situational variable
c.
an instructional variable
d.
a measured variable
 

 39. 
A comparison of the rates of injury of female athletes compared to male athletes involves an independent variable that is
a.
a subject variable
b.
a manipulated variable
c.
a situational variable
d.
a task variable
 

 40. 
When two independent variables produce effects when combined that would not be present if each independent variables was manipulated in a separate study, we say that there is
a.
no main effect.
b.
only a measured variable.
c.
an interaction.
d.
a planned comparison
 

 41. 
The Student’s t-test is typically used
a.
in comparing two groups to see if their means differ
b.
when analyzing the results of a factorial design.
c.
as a followup to designs using logistic regression.
d.
in place of the correlation coefficient
 

 42. 
When you use a repeated measures design in your research, one advantage is that the same participants can be in the treatment and the control conditions.  This advantage
a.
is particularly helpful when you are dealing with a large population.
b.
leads to reduced measurement error.
c.
is reduced if you are using natural pairs.
d.
can overcome problems in matching pairs.
 

 43. 
When treatments in a repeated measures design lead to different effects depending on the order of treatments, you need to worry about
a.
nonequivalent control groups.
b.
static groups.
c.
sequence effects.
d.
statistical regression.
 

 44. 
When early behavior in a research project affects later behavior in an experiment, there is a problem with
a.
counterbalancing.
b.
baseline effects.
c.
pairing effects.
d.
transfer effects.
 

 45. 
Quasi-experimental designs cannot be used to draw causal conclusions because
a.
quasi-experiments do not use measured variables.
b.
measurements in quasi-experiments are not accurate enough.
c.
quasi-experiments use partial only counterbalancing.
d.
pre-existing differences among groups could be the cause of differences between groups.
 

 46. 
Changes in people over short time periods during a study involve which threat to internal validity?
a.
Selection.
b.
Statistical regression.
c.
Maturation.     
d.
History.
 

 47. 
The threat to internal validity called statistical regression involves the fact that
a.
peoples scores on repeated tests are not likely to be identical on each testing.
b.
changes in the nature of the testing situation lead to different scores.
c.
scores in time series designs tend to rise over time.
d.
the random error that produces low or high scores in initial testing is not likely to recur on later testing.
 

 48. 
Suppose researchers wanted to increase the likelihood that they could spot a history threat to internal validity in a study that involved baseline measurements of the dependent variable, a treatment, then more measurements of the dependent variable.  The researcher could add a control group.  This new design would be a
a.
replicated interrupted time series design.
b.
static-group comparison design.
c.
nonequivalent control group design.
d.
time series design.
 

 49. 
A group of researchers studied a smoking cessation program on TV by tracking smoking before a the program and then at several points over the next year.  This design involvedd.     
a.
a static-group comparison design.
b.
an interrupted time series design.
c.
a nonequivalent control group design.
d.
a one-group pretest-posttest design.
 

 50. 
On the United States census that everybody has to complete, people identify their racial/ethnic status by selecting from among options provided on the form.  This type of a question is
a.
a closed ended question.
b.
almost always responded to accurately.
c.
part of the sampling frame.
d.
used because respondents are from a self-selected sample.
 

 51. 
When people try to recall memories from the distant past, they often mistakenly believe that those events occurred more recently than they really did.  This phenomenon is called
a.
optimizing.
b.
satisficing.
c.
telescoping.
d.
temporary availability.
 

 52. 
Research has revealed that we can reduce social desirability bias by
a.
telling respondents that we will be able to detect false responses on their part.
b.
avoiding forced choice responses and creating open-ended questions instead.
c.
educating respondents about social desirability bias.
d.
presenting only one side of an issue in a given question so respondents cannot focus on only the positive response.
 

 53. 
Research on acquiescence has revealed that people engage in it because
a.
they view the surveyor as being of higher status and feel pressure to agree with questions the surveyor poses.
b.
they often don’t know an answer to a question, so they give the response that makes them look best.
c.
they are not willing to think about questions deeply in order to generate an accurate response.
d.
it allows them to avoid nondifferentiated responses.
 

 54. 
When investigators conduct survey research on the internet, they should be concerned about generalizing from their samples because
a.
more Democrats than Republicans use the internet.
b.
more women than men use the internet.
c.
adults over the age of 35 are greater users of multimedia players than those under 35.
d.
teens spend more time on the internet than adults do.
 

 55. 
When researchers offer inducements, like money, so a member of a hidden population would go out and actively recruit others in that population for participation in a study, the sampling involves
a.
key informant sampling.
b.
snowball sampling.
c.
targeted sampling.
d.
respondent-driven sampling.
 

 56. 
In a prediction study, the outcome that you are interested in predicting is called the
a.
predictor variable.
b.
measured variable.
c.
criterion variable.
d.
confirmatory variable.
 

 57. 
When two variables are related in such a way that when one increases, so does the other, you can conclude that
a.
there is no problem with directionality.
b.
a confirmatory analysis is inappropriate.
c.
the relation between variables is positive.
d.
there are no latent variables affecting the relationship.
 

 58. 
If a researcher wanted to know whether certain behaviors are associated with income, he or she might be reluctant to travel of a poor part of town that has a high crime rate.  As a result, the data would not include very low values of income levels and the correlation coefficient would be lower than if such data were included.  The potential problem in this case is
a.
heterogeneous subgroups.
b.
nonlinear relationships.
c.
the presence of latent variables.
d.
a restrict range.
 

 59. 
When you try to predict the value of an outcome variable from several variables, you are likely to be using
a.
multiple regression.
b.
the Pearson product-moment correlation.
c.
the analysis of variance.
d.
heterogeneous subgroups.
 



 
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